Anyone in the US watching the rugby World Cup?

I'm always interested in what sports can learn from other sports and we're starting to see a few rugby players look at making it to the NFL (Christian Wade, Nate Ebner, Alex Gray, Jamie Gillan, Christian Scotland-Williamson and some Aussie rugby league guys like Jordan Mailata).

One obvious position would be kicker/punter. There would be several advantages: one would be potentially saving on a roster spot as in rugby the kicker would both kick and punt. Another would be the trick play capability as the kicker would also be use to running with the ball, add in their ability to lateral and this could make it very hard to scheme against.

I watch the 7's leagues whenever I catch them on TV. I like them for their fast pace style of play, and I admire the fact they play full-contact without helmets and pads.

I get that Rugby players are tough but man that sport has very little skill involved. Toughness & Endurance sure but other than that it's a meh game.

(09-27-2019, 11:34 AM)Jakeypoo Wrote: I get that Rugby players are tough but man that sport has very little skill involved. Toughness & Endurance sure but other than that it's a meh game.

Really? It involves pretty much every skill involved in football.

(09-27-2019, 12:09 PM)TJHoushmandzadeh Wrote: Really? It involves pretty much every skill involved in football.

Not really there is no Blocking, catching, throwing, or overall strategy involved in rugby. It
Football is violent Chess  vs Rugby which is just pure violence.

(09-27-2019, 06:57 PM)Jakeypoo Wrote: Not really there is no Blocking, catching, throwing, or overall strategy involved in rugby. It
Football is violent Chess  vs Rugby which is just pure violence.

I'm not sure what sport you watched but it wasn't rugby if it didn't involve catching, passing and strategy.

The big difference between football and rugby (other than the same players being on offense and defense) is that football offense is scripted whereas rugby offense is more improvised but the same strategizing goes on - it's just more player than coach led as it happens on the field. Like in the NFL you need to decide whether to pack the box, defend deep, when to punt etc rugby has all those same quandaries. The equivalent of a defense blitzing is probably how many men you commit to the ruck. If it works out you have a good chance of a turnover but if the attacking team gets the ball out quickly it leaves space to be exploited by a skilled opposition.

Whilst there's no blocking as such (and since when has O-line - your primary blockers, been considered a skill position?) there is scrummaging and mauling which is the equivalent of run-blocking when the forwards (the O-line) try to push the opposition backwards through power combined with technique. Like football, when you have a dominant O-line, having a dominant pack in rugby puts you on the front foot. If you don't, you need to come up with strategies to mitigate it and get the ball out early. 

Rugby Union is traditionally seen as less violent than football and whilst that's changing (the NFL has obviously started clamping down on lots of the big hits and starting to feign an interest in player safety whilst rugby players are bulking up like NFL players - rugby union only became professional in the 90s - and in the last decade or so a lot more attacking play is based around the ball carrier running into rather than around the defender than use to be the case) rugby is probably still less violent than the NFL with far fewer injuries.

(09-30-2019, 10:17 AM)TJHoushmandzadeh Wrote: I'm not sure what sport you watched but it wasn't rugby if it didn't involve catching, passing and strategy.

The big difference between football and rugby (other than the same players being on offense and defense) is that football offense is scripted whereas rugby offense is more improvised but the same strategizing goes on - it's just more player than coach led as it happens on the field. Like in the NFL you need to decide whether to pack the box, defend deep, when to punt etc rugby has all those same quandaries. The equivalent of a defense blitzing is probably how many men you commit to the ruck. If it works out you have a good chance of a turnover but if the attacking team gets the ball out quickly it leaves space to be exploited by a skilled opposition.

Whilst there's no blocking as such (and since when has O-line - your primary blockers, been considered a skill position?) there is scrummaging and mauling which is the equivalent of run-blocking when the forwards (the O-line) try to push the opposition backwards through power combined with technique. Like football, when you have a dominant O-line, having a dominant pack in rugby puts you on the front foot. If you don't, you need to come up with strategies to mitigate it and get the ball out early. 

Rugby Union is traditionally seen as less violent than football and whilst that's changing (the NFL has obviously started clamping down on lots of the big hits and starting to feign an interest in player safety whilst rugby players are bulking up like NFL players - rugby union only became professional in the 90s - and in the last decade or so a lot more attacking play is based around the ball carrier running into rather than around the defender than use to be the case) rugby is probably still less violent than the NFL with far fewer injuries.

Ok there's blocking still find it boring; look I have tried watching it just found it confusing and boring. Still have a tremendous respect for the athlete's of the sport but it doesn't interest me. Hope you enjoy the world Cup though I am jealous that Rugby has one and Football really doesn't it.

(09-30-2019, 12:46 PM)Jakeypoo Wrote: Ok there's blocking still find it boring; look I have tried watching it just found it confusing and boring. Still have a tremendous respect for the athlete's of the sport but it doesn't interest me. Hope you enjoy the world Cup though I am jealous that Rugby has one and Football really doesn't it.

Yeah, it's definitely confusing and if you don't know what's going on it's going to get boring. That's something else it has in common with football - I usually have this conversation the other way around, trying to explain to people who don't understand football how great it is once you understand the tactics!

As for World Cups - they are awesome. I was discussing this the other day in the context of women soccer stars selling so many jerseys. The US has so few events which bring the whole country together rooting behind the same team. The big set pieces in the US are things like Super Bowl, World Series, March Madness, NBA Finals. Everyone has different teams and whilst it may unite a city it doesn't unite a country - outside of maybe Olympics (mainly individual sports - the Miracle on Ice and the Dream Team being two notable exceptions) and Women's Soccer World Cup.

Rugby has done a terrific job of growing the sport from including Italy in the 5 Nations, Argentina in the Tri-Nations to having Japan host the World Cup and they've been rewarded with Japan beating Ireland, Uruguay beating Fiji. The NFL is trying to go down that path with the London Series, games in Mexico but it's going to be a long time until they get rugby's global reach as a participant sport (as a spectator sport they are further advanced).