As a flanker the constant rucking, tackling, and counter rucking certainly leaves you out of breath! Photographs From the Last Quiet Places on Earth. Whlst many of the skill sets are similar, many of them are quite different too. N. Chrystine Olson: From the perspective of an American football official Rugby and gridiron compete for my loyalty in September. “It would have to be the rugby guys,” he said. We all know about football players, but few US sporting fans have seen the top rugby players in action. The average NFL player could pick up the average Super 14 player, turn him upside down, and shake him like a piggy bank.”, But Stephen, like many New Zealanders, feels otherwise. Get the best of Smithsonian magazine by email. Alastair Bland is a journalist based in San Francisco who writes about the environment, agriculture, science and food. Football is a series of downs, and everyone knows when the hitting is about to start, and when it is about to stop....then, we take a little rest, and do it again. If my hometown 49ers had won their way into the battle, I’d be hunting for a television in Christchurch—but I think I’ll go fly fishing. r/AskReddit is the place to ask and answer thought-provoking questions. For in Europe we use "Football" to refer to the sport you call "Soccer"; so I wonder if you apply "football" just to "American" or if you also have "European Football", etc.? My whole life I've played both Rugby and American Football and I am always asked to compare the two. And there's just so much more contact. This means that rugby players have to have much more stamina, but it also means that football is open to stronger and bigger players with less natural endurance. or Love it. Seems like every match I've seen had some serious injury. And I asked that pivotal question: Of rugby players and NFL footballer, who’s tougher? “Rugby is 80 minutes nonstop,” said Stephen Horton, who also plays lock and open-side on Kaikoura’s regional team. Perhaps the answer to the question, which is the toughest, comes down to how the individual plays; neither of the games are tougher than the other, but both of them have players who play harder than anyone else, the players that make you flinch when you watch the highlight reel! Controllers, ScoreLink, and Other Options. 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Rex Sold for $31.8 Million, and Paleontologists Are Worried, This Humongous Fungus Is as Massive as Three Blue Whales, Nero, History's Most Despised Emperor, Gets a Makeover. Love it. Generally football has more aggression going on during a play, as all the players are fighting it out, whilst in rugby just the players near or on the ball are involved. I love the game. I’ve had three broken collar bones and been knocked out three times.”. I attempted to watch both last Saturday, contacting the only sports bar known for showing “the rugby,” hoping one screen could be dedicated to the South Africa / Australia match. Your email address will not be published. Almost all of them have college educations. However, Rugby is by far the tougher sport because of the nature of the game. Do you want to be knocked down by an elephant whilst you have padding on, or by a horse without any padding? You tackle someone and the play keeps going, and going, and going. I would have to agree with you there. I love the game. The Redditor also points to a 2008 study showing lower rates of injury in college rugby than college football. It sounds like football fans in Kiwi land could be hard-pressed to find venues showing the match. That's what you use to hit, not take a tackle. Having broken my neck twice on the football field I can attest. Both sports give rise to physically impressive players. Gotta go with Rugby because there is so much less time to catch your breath. In 2000, my son played a junior high football game in which a Catholic school fielded eight kids, 14-year olds, who weighed between 200 and 250. In New Zealand, they start playing at as young as four years of age, and even in adult leagues, swearing is forbidden during practice and “joking around,” Stephen explained, is curtailed by the coaches. Which Sport is tougher and more Dangerous, Rugby vs American Football? Not taking any way thing away from rugby it's a great game and the most physical game on the planet, but American football collisions due to the necessity to gain and stop the acquisition of yardage (not to mention the style of athlete that plays American football) makes it the hardest hitting game in the world. I once noticed a 1938 football roster of the University of Kansas--only two players weighed more than 200 pounds, one 205, the other 215. Continue 71 players over 110 years have been known to die in a rugby match, there have been 0 reported deaths from a NFL football game. A friend just pointed this out to me I think anyone weighing in on the debate should read the #1 rugby story at the end. 17th Annual Photo Contest Finalists Announced. “Oh, yeah!” he laughed. Right—defense and offense. In a football scoreboards feature, we compare the great games of football and rugby and ponder the quesion: which is the toughest? The first obvious difference is that football players play in small bursts often of just a few seconds, and the football scoreboards show that they generally play no more than 40% of each game as each football team essentially consists of three teams, and subs are unlimited. While permanent brain damage might be more prevalent in NFL, because of using the head as weapon in tackles. I just wanted to be clear for the international community. I once witnessed a guy have his back broken playing rugby. I played football my whole life. Rugby is more free flowing. Cookie Policy Later in the week, in Blenheim, I stopped at the Moa Brewing Company for a beer—and to egg on more conversation. Rugby players can be substituted, but often they play for the whole game and they spend much more time running as they game is stopped much less than football. You get hurt in rugby. And this. Football players do indeed hit quite a lot harder than rugby players, who have to be more careful not to injure themselves or the other player, but the net result of the collisions are probably about the same for each sport. http://www.cracked.com/article_20260_the-5-most-horrifying-sports-injuries-all-time_p2.html, Not sure how you define a tougher, I think the only aspect of rugby that is more demanding than football is the constant slowtwitch aerobic demand of covering the field nonstop however in terms of physicality, strategy, skill development, risk and concept mastery, I don't think there's a sport that can compare to American football. Having seen both games up close, Michael also feels that American football, much more than rugby, “has been evolved for commercialization and television.” Which explains the three-hour games, endless breaks and timeouts and the huge advertising campaigns that climax on Super Bowl day. Respect. Do Americans call it "American Football" or just "Football"? I once witnessed a guy have his back broken playing rugby. Keep up-to-date on: © 2020 Smithsonian Magazine. I would definitely say rugby, I watch both and have played rugby and nothing makes me flinch more than when you can hear a massive tackle through the TV. Both camps are right. Tri Nations winds up, American football starts.
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