Is American Football Too "Girly"?

Why would i be joking????

My point of this thread was to show what i think.American Footballer's wear too much padding! And when you think of how little active play there is during a match,and how the whole team can be subbed,these players hardly do any work!
Compare that with Rugby League,where they play 80mins being punched,stamped on,headbutted,tackled etc.and only have a 10min break.

As for weight.Peter Stringer(plays for munster in ireland) is 5"7 weighs only 152lbs.but i've seen him knock over players such as Lawrence Dallaglio(plays for london wasps in egland) who is 6"4 and weighs 246lb!!

Originally posted by jakyll
Lawrence Dallaglio(plays for london wasps in egland) who is 6"4 and weighs 246lb!!

I don't know how to tell you this, but this guy is almost too small for American football. I know there are smaller players, but they're rare.

Rugby is played in the US and it's played the same way it's played elsewhere.

Yet, American football, pads and all, is the sport everyone is interested in.

It's the play that counts, not the costumes. It's not Broadway.

This incident might illustrate the violence involved in American football.

Buffalo reserve tight end Kevin Everett suffered a "potentially lethal" spinal injury in the Bills' National Football League season-opener, his doctors said Monday.

Everett, 25, had emergency surgery Sunday night after suffering what team doctor John Marzo called a "fracture/dislocation of the cervical spine and injury to the spinal cord."

Orthopedic surgeon Andrew Cappuccino said Everett had feeling in his limbs, but acknowledged the prospect of the player making a complete recovery remained "bleak".

afp.google.com...

Similar injuries can be researched here:

football injuries paralyze

Football-related deaths may be researched here:

football injuries death

reply to post by GradyPhilpott


Oh,i know most A.F players are bigger and heavier than R.L players.i was just replying to the comments about weight by showing that a smaller lighter man can still take down a taller heavier guy.

reply to post by GradyPhilpott


Do you not think sometimes that too much protective gear may lead to these horiffic injuries??

I know that sometimes its because they get hit hard,but when the body is so restrained,it cannot react in a normal manner.

i think comparing american football to rugby is unfair.

apples and oranges people apples and oranges.

reply to post by jakyll


To really understand football pads, you must understand a little of the history of football and how pads evolved.

I'm pretty sure that the plastic coated pads that one football player wears might injure another player and that some padding helps to protect one from the other's pads.

However, the real reason for wearing pads is to protect players from the crushing blows that routinely take place on the field of play.

reply to post by The Phantom


I fully agree with you. Except that American football evolved from rugby, there isn't much these days that compares with the other.

Rugby

American Football

reply to post by GradyPhilpott


I don't know for sure if the protective gear does hinder them,i was just wondering about it and thought i'd ask you what you think.

And to answer to an earlier comment,its great that the US is taking up rugby again.Over here at the moment we've got a big advertising campaign going for the NFL and England's fledgling A.F.league.

But y'know what you really should get into? Soccer!!
After the Olympics the World Cup is the biggest sporting event in the world! You have dirt poor countries,countries suffering war of civil strife,and they take part in it.yet America still seems oblivious!! Its so weird,lol.
I know over the years you get a few more supporters,but there's one thing you miss out on.America are a great football team! in the 2002 tournament you were robbed of a place in the semi finals,as you were up against Germany and their "master tactics" of diving and falling over if someone so much as breathed on them! (their notorious for it)At least they went on to get beat by Brazil in the final.lol.

A big part of why soccer is so popular is it isnt really all that expensive to play in terms of equipment rather. American Football has a huge hinderance that way. as far as all the pads and things they arent really so mucha hinderence (if you get a chance take a peek at just how articulated they are) as they are necessity originally football was played with little more than a leather helmet and to many people were gettign severly injured playing. even today there are stories about the former great football players with scrambled brain and repercusions from severe injures effecting them much later in life (and these are guys that played with the gear). It should also be noted that to play Football in the states on the professional level pretty much requires it to be not only a game but a lifestyle in terms of all the training and preperation one has to endure to be fit for play.

Let's see, is this "girly"?



Mind you, most of these are the little guys, receivers and DBs. You should have seen the hit Alex Smith took this weekend by a lineman. He was still able to walk off of the field but I'd wager that his answer to trainers question, "What city are we in?" would probably been "Thursday coach."

BTW, rugby doesn't have the forward pass, does it? That is where players are most vulnerable.

[edit on 1-10-2007 by intrepid]

The players are just different. The men in the National Football League are generally the biggest, strongest, fastest men in the U.S. The brute force exerted by these men would severely injure/kill without the protection.

If you were to look at an average injury report from any team for their one game a week you would be shocked. The same injuries the rugby players get every game (cuts, bruises, broken bones, etc.) the NFL players get...even with their pads on!

Rugby players could very well be better conditioned. But you also have to take into account the fact that since players rotate in the NFL, there are always fresh legs in the game to hit you as hard as they can. When your in a rugby match in the 60th minute, the man that hits you will be hitting a bit easier than they were at the start of the match.

As for whose tougher, a Rugby player or NFL player? Its a draw. They both play the most popular violent sport their country has to offer which takes definite balls, and both get hurt every time out on the field. As for which sport is more violent and has the greater risk of injury if neither participants were to wear pads? It would be American Football. The real question is why isn't American football more popular in Europe and why isn't Rugby more popular in America?

At various points in my life I've played all THREE games being discussed here!

Rugby Leauge is not as good as Rugby Union (Union is the World Cup going on now!) But this is just my very personal opinion from having played them both and watched a hullva lot of both.

Now to compare AF and RU is almost bordering on silly. While they are both played on a big rectangle of grass by mostly big men, that is pretty much where the similarities run out.

In RU you tackle another player in AF you hit them.

In RU you play at full throttle for 40 mins in AF there are enough commercial breaks in one half to show "Saving Private Ryan".

In RU the squad is 20/25 Men in AF there are 234 players 650 support people (PC) 75 cheerleaders. A coach for each play of the game, 14 bus drivers and a pet goat.

You can see this is getting silly now!!

I love both of these games, but they are hugly different. Rugby is a more skillful game per player because you do not always have a fixed position (very Bruce Lee) AF is a harder hitting game where at player level less intelligence is needed, you just have to follow the plan for the play (yes I know some teams playbooks are huge!!)

In conclusion (I could have drivvelled on for ages)

Rugby is a game for Animals played by Gentlemen and American Football is a game for Gentlemen played by Animals.

MonKey

Originally posted by Jovi1
A big part of why soccer is so popular is it isnt really all that expensive to play in terms of equipment rather. American Football has a huge hinderance that way. as far as all the pads and things they arent really so mucha hinderence

I am an American. I played American football growing up with my friends in many informal games. Like most American children we did not use any pads or other expensive equipment during our informal games. We played "two hand touch" where you touched the player with two hands rather than tacked him. We also played tackle without pads, but we did not hit eachother hard.

My 2 cents (or 2 pence) is that Rugby and American football are different games which require different skills. Rugby requires more cardio vascular conditioning and endurance than American football. Rugby players must run all over the field for 80 minutes straight. Many American football players have been known to suck oxygen after running a 100 yard dash down the field.

On the other hand American football players are bigger and stronger. Many positions in American football require world class sprint speed. The world's finest sprinters are not running the 100m and 200m in the Olympics, but are playing cornerback or wide receiver in the NFL. James Jett was an olympic gold medalist in the 4x100m relay who also played wide receiver in the NFL. His foot speed relative to other NFL players was unremarkable.