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The fundamental difference is that - as sports of strategy - rugby football is real-time while American football is turn-based.

Rugby is far more improvisational while American football is far more orchestrated. That's not to say that rugby can't have set plays and that American football can't be spontaneous, but I think the generalisation is accurate. That also means that rugby players are more jacks-of-all-trades and American football players are specialists.

The fastest guy on a rugby football team also has to be able to make and shrug off tackles and (pardon the arcane terminology) clean out at rucks; the biggest guy on a rugby team also has to be able to run and catch and pass and kick. Possession can change in an instant. In rugby you have to be able to go from playing offense to defense and back at the drop of a hat and for long uninterrupted passages of play without a whistle going. A rugby player has to be able to do a bit of every other player's job if circumstances require.

In American football every step, every pass, every hit is planned out and prepared for in advance and the positions and responsibilities are far more specialised. The offensive teams specialise in offense, the defensive teams in defense, and the special teams in kicking plays. Large numbers of complex pre-planned plays have to be memorised. A top-level punt returner would probably make a top-level rugby winger - each the fastest man on his team - look laughably slow. A defensive tackle would probably make a rugby prop - each the heaviest strongest man on his team - look frickin' anorexic.

The notion of taking a rest on the sideline while a specialist team takes its turn on the field is alien shit to a rugby player. Similarly the notion of the biggest guy on the field spontaneously making a run down the sideline (entirely on his own initiative, without ever having discussed it with his teammates or coaches) before getting smashed by the fastest guy on the other team is a scenario that seems just as alien to an American footballer.

TLDR? Basically rugby is Starcraft while American football is Civilization.

Source: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotScience/~3/eyqkKf8b_xs/story01.htm

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