Originally <a href='/showthread.php?p=16103798'>posted</a> on 09/21/2012:

Quote Originally Posted by ChalkyDog View Post
On a serious note, the sad thing is the pads and helmet probably make the contact worse. I played coed intramural Rugby when in undergrad - on the teams were real rugby players (I was not), and all of them said that Rugby is a lot less dangerous than american football, because you can feel everything - so the hits aren't as hard, etc.

Also, I agree with this thread:

Canucks: give us your hockey picks.
Euro trash: Give us your soccer picks
Asians: Give us all your picks - you guys are very good at math
Americans: NBA and NFL picks, and also food recommendations.
This is true. Sports science did a show illustrating the difference in force that a amateur rugby union player takes compared to a pro NFL player.

Sure the results were skewed (PRO v AMATEUR) but it did show that the padding provides a mental barrier that makes the wearer alot more carefree when it comes to tackling and 'throwing' onself into the action and as such the force of the hit from pro NFL player was more than twice as much as that of a amateur union player as the padding takes over 85% of the energy from the hit.