Head Contact & Red Cards

Where goats go to escape
Line6 HXFX
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So the landmark study date is October 2022, not October 1989.
That is when you can say the players knew for sure. Scientifically.
October 2022..

Can all the players walk away from contracts signed before then, without losing the shirt off their backs and without just being sued by clubs back into the stone age?

What choices do these current players really have? How voluntary is professional rugby really, when you factor in the culture, personal debt, peoples immediate career paths, contracts, mortgages..

The extreme risk for most has already, and unknowingly been taken, and it would actually be pointless for most of them to just give up.

We enabled this horror show,

Us.

Time to stop it.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/spor ... sease.
Line6 HXFX
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Line6 HXFX wrote: Tue Jan 17, 2023 5:40 pm So the landmark study date is October 2022, not October 1989.
That is when you can say the players knew for sure. Scientifically.
October 2022..

Can all the players walk away from contracts signed before then, without losing the shirt off their backs and without just being sued by clubs back into the stone age?

What choices do these current players really have? How voluntary is professional rugby really, when you factor in the culture, personal debt, peoples immediate career paths, contracts, mortgages..

The extreme risk and much of the damage for many has already, and unknowingly been taken, and it would actually be of limited benefit for most of them to give up now.

We enabled this horror show,

Us.

Time to stop it.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/spor ... sease.
inactionman
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Line6 HXFX wrote: Tue Jan 17, 2023 5:40 pm So the landmark study date is October 2022, not October 1989.
That is when you can say the players knew for sure. Scientifically.
October 2022..

Can all the players walk away from contracts signed before then, without losing the shirt off their backs and without just being sued by clubs back into the stone age?

What choices do these current players really have? How voluntary is professional rugby really, when you factor in the culture, personal debt, peoples immediate career paths, contracts, mortgages..

The extreme risk for most has already, and unknowingly been taken, and it would actually be pointless for most of them to just give up.

We enabled this horror show,

Us.

Time to stop it.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/spor ... sease.
They're not indentured - yes, they can walk away. Simply retire from the sport. Take up something else. Most - pretty much all - would need a second career anyway.
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Sandstorm
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inactionman wrote: Wed Jan 18, 2023 9:35 am They're not indentured - yes, they can walk away. Simply retire from the sport. Take up something else. Most - pretty much all - would need a second career anyway.
Two careers? Stop trolling REFRY.
Line6 HXFX
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Just feel degraded, sickenned and lowered watching rugby now. For me it is like watching horse racing if the jockey was strapped upside down to the underside of the horse, with their head dragging on the floor, and the horses hooves are kicking its head. Or like paying a desperate homeless person 6 quid to hit themselves on the head with a hamer. O.K some would say no way, but others are so desperate, so trapped, so invested, brain damaged and fucked up they could be easily cheered on to do it.

Rugby is Exactly like that.
We are cheering people on to harming themselves.
Society needs to step in.
These brain injuries are incidental to the sport of Rugby, not accidental.
You play rugby, your brain is fucked, just depends upon dumb luck, the degree of devestation and the amount.
It is just appalling what we are supporting.
And why, just for eighty minutes of entertainment a week?

If we cannot see how wrong this sport is, knowing what we know now, society and its people are just worthless.
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LoveOfTheGame
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Line6 HXFX wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 11:44 am Just feel degraded, sickenned and lowered watching rugby now. For me it is like watching horse racing if the jockey was strapped upside down to the underside of the horse, with their head dragging on the floor, and the horses hooves are kicking its head. Or like paying a desperate homeless person 6 quid to hit themselves on the head with a hamer. O.K some would say no way, but others are so desperate, so trapped, so invested, brain damaged and fucked up they could be easily cheered on to do it.

Rugby is Exactly like that.
We are cheering people on to harming themselves.
Society needs to step in.
These brain injuries are incidental to the sport of Rugby, not accidental.
You play rugby, your brain is fucked, just depends upon dumb luck, the degree of devestation and the amount.
It is just appalling what we are supporting.
And why, just for eighty minutes of entertainment a week?

If we cannot see how wrong this sport is, knowing what we know now, society and its people are just worthless.
You need help. Also, help needs to find you.
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assfly
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assfly wrote: Mon Jan 16, 2023 7:53 am

My suggestions:

1. Tackles to be waist height, to be enforced by coaches and referees. Players can't attack the ball anymore, which is often chest-height at contact.
OK I thought it was a good idea, but I didn't expect the RFU to implement it so quickly :lol:
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Niegs
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Raggs
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assfly wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 2:05 pm
assfly wrote: Mon Jan 16, 2023 7:53 am

My suggestions:

1. Tackles to be waist height, to be enforced by coaches and referees. Players can't attack the ball anymore, which is often chest-height at contact.
OK I thought it was a good idea, but I didn't expect the RFU to implement it so quickly :lol:
They've been watching the French, who've had it in place for a few seasons now.
Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
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Sandstorm
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Niegs wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 2:57 pm Some data from France in this: https://www.msn.com/en-gb/health/fitnes ... r-AA15BLCh
The legal tackle height would go down to the waist
Good idea
and there would only be a single tackler allowed in any one contact.
Bad idea
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Raggs
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Sandstorm wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 3:19 pm
Niegs wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 2:57 pm Some data from France in this: https://www.msn.com/en-gb/health/fitnes ... r-AA15BLCh
The legal tackle height would go down to the waist
Good idea
and there would only be a single tackler allowed in any one contact.
Bad idea
RFU are not enforcing the single tackler thing by the looks of it.
Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
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Sandstorm
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:thumbup:
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JM2K6
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Very pleased to see the club I support leading the way on these safety policies by adopting a "sometimes zero tacklers allowed" approach to defence
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Sandstorm
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JM2K6 wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 4:10 pm Very pleased to see the club I support leading the way on these safety policies by adopting a "sometimes zero tacklers allowed" approach to defence
:lol:
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Niegs
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Sandstorm wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 3:51 pm:thumbup:
What's your thinking re: double tackles?

With two going waist high, there'd be greater risk of wrapping around the carrier and bonking heads.

Image
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Sandstorm
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Niegs wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 6:46 pm
Sandstorm wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 3:51 pm:thumbup:
What's your thinking re: double tackles?

With two going waist high, there'd be greater risk of wrapping around the carrier and bonking heads.

Image
Friendly fire is rarer, but it happens. However making Union strictly 1on1 doesn’t sound like a good plan to me.
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Enzedder
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How long before the pick and go is banned inside the final 10 metres? It will become unstoppable with one waist-high tackler.
I drink and I forget things.
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Niegs
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Enzedder wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 7:04 pm How long before the pick and go is banned inside the final 10 metres? It will become unstoppable with one waist-high tackler.
I'd hope teams get more creative.

I grew up playing American football first and friends who are more into that sport laugh at how basic rugby defence tends to be. I remember one year an American Samoan (Samu Manoa) with Northampton seemed to be running NFL-style blitzes independent of the rest of the defensive line, but it didn't seem like that caught on anywhere else.

My immediate thought was inside man goes for the waist, man in front goes for the jackal. It happens, but as I said elsewhere, the obsession seems to be square up and man in front must do the lion's share of the work to make a 'dominant' hit. This is what's led to more clashes. I feel like those weren't as common in the 90s and earlier? And there were pick and goes, but maybe the breakdowns were more contestable so there were far fewer of them? Lineouts certainly were, so entering 5m surely didn't happen as much?
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fishfoodie
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Enzedder wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 7:04 pm How long before the pick and go is banned inside the final 10 metres? It will become unstoppable with one waist-high tackler.
Not quite banning, but maybe there should be a limit, where you only get one/two phases of pick & go inside the 5m line, & then it's, go wide, or scrum ?

The danger now is you get the endless series of pick & goes, where the forwards are just trying to narrow the defense, but they are trying to get a penalty for a clearout, or a highshot. If you make it a use it, or lose it situation, you stop these, & maybe make the attack go to the backs quicker
Line6 HXFX
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Yeah, i am not sure you get how fucked up rugby is.

I am not trolling anyone and I couldn't give a shit what you all think.
My opinions are mine, if you can't bare them I couldn't care less.
People will have a different variety of opinions, doesn't mean they are trolling.
I don't watch MMA or Boxing or dog fighting, or Bull fighting either.

Most of you lot would still support rugby if they shot baby elephants at half time
I get it.
You couldn't give a shit.
You would even support Rugby if Ryan Jones Alex Popham et al, people you know, have watched for decades..get early onset senile dementia, CTE or Motor Neurons from it, or nearly all current players say they don't want their kids to play it.
You would still support it.
I am not trolling these are the facts. The world that is.

Its not a great f'cking world, is all I am saying.
Fucking awful in fact.
Rugby just adds to the awfulness.

It doesn't have to.
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Mahoney
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You could require that at the end of a ruck or maul the ball has to be passed to someone standing behind the 5m line.
Wha daur meddle wi' me?
Line6 HXFX
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Oh and people who equate or indulge in MMA what-aboutery, Rugby fans are not MMA fans.
Rugby fans are intelligent, ethical, moralistic middle class by and large, MMA fans are the other end of the spectrum.. who seem to want to bathe in the bloody messes of other human beings.
Thje bloodier the more choked out the more near death the MM artist the better.

If they stopped Rugby, supporters of it won't flock to MMA............well unless they are Irish. :)
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Sandstorm
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Line6 HXFX wrote: Fri Jan 20, 2023 10:30 am If they stopped Rugby....
We don't need to stop Rugby, you loon.
Just make some adjustments to make it as safe as we can. That appears to be happening quickly now.
Line6 HXFX
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He said: “In rugby – players taking 100 impacts a week – we see chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) very frequently. Athletes as young as 17 have died with this disease. “Your brain is soft and it can stretch, twist and compress from an impact. This causes microscopic damage.8 Oct 2022

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/rugby-le ... n-28189353


Over 400 players have died early from brain injuries.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/ ... im-lawyers


We seem to have glossed over these things and accepted them.

A physician once warned Alex Pophan about the abuse and unpleasantness he is going to face.

We all have to stand up and face it with him.

Omalu: Omalu: Don’t be afraid. They are going to come after you, they are going to call you all types of names, don’t worry about it, just speak your truth quietly and clearly and respectfully, and let people know you are not against rugby, you just want to improve the quality of life for your fellow human beings. That is what this is all about. People respect retired players, but you need to realise they are going to come with a counter-narrative to counter whatever you are doing, so you need to develop your own strategy. In my interactions with the NFL what I did was focus on the angle of a shared common humanity: that if I wouldn’t let my son play, why would I let someone else’s son play? We all are one, we want to see the upliftment of everybody, of all rugby players, they can’t beat that. All right.”

https://headforchange.org.uk/they-are-g ... n-injuries
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MungoMan
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Line6 HXFX wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 11:44 am Just feel degraded, sickenned and lowered watching rugby now. For me it is like watching horse racing if the jockey was strapped upside down to the underside of the horse, with their head dragging on the floor, and the horses hooves are kicking its head. Or like paying a desperate homeless person 6 quid to hit themselves on the head with a hamer. O.K some would say no way, but others are so desperate, so trapped, so invested, brain damaged and fucked up they could be easily cheered on to do it.

Rugby is Exactly like that.
We are cheering people on to harming themselves.
Society needs to step in.
These brain injuries are incidental to the sport of Rugby, not accidental.
You play rugby, your brain is fucked, just depends upon dumb luck, the degree of devestation and the amount.
It is just appalling what we are supporting.
And why, just for eighty minutes of entertainment a week?

If we cannot see how wrong this sport is, knowing what we know now, society and its people are just worthless.
Your novelty value is but a memory, You never amuse. You never say anything interesting or insightful. You are a johnny-fucken-onenote, and that note is a dud note.

Any chance you can go stick your head up a dead bear's bum?
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JM2K6
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REFRY's posts on this topic remind me about that old joke:
Please BE WARNED! Over the last month I have become a victim of a clever 'Eastern European' scam whilst out shopping.

Here's how the scam works:

Two very good-looking 20-21 year-old girls of eastern European origin come over to your car as you are packing your shopping into the boot. They both start cleaning your windscreen, their breasts almost falling out of their skimpy T- shirts. When you thank them and offer them a tip, they'll say 'No' and instead they ask you for a lift to another supermarket. You agree and they both get in the back seat.

On the way there, they start undressing, until both are completely naked. Then, when you pull over to remonstrate, one of them climbs over into the front seat and starts crawling all over your lap, kissing you, touching you intimately and thrusting herself against you, while the other one steals your wallet!

I had my wallet stolen on September 4th, 9th,10th, twice on the 15th, 17th, 20th, 24th and 29th. Also on October 1st, 4th, 6th, 9th and 10th and twice yesterday.So please warn all the older men you know to be on the lookout for this scam.

The best times seem to be just before lunch and about 4:30 in the afternoon.

REFRY is sickened, appalled, humiliated, degraded, disgusted by watching rugby, and has been almost every weekend for a few years now. He finds is particularly horrific when he's watching an entire weekend of rugby, posting about rugby, and presumably talking about rugby. I just hope he only goes so far as to wear a hair shirt and hasn't fully progressed to leather and whips...
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Sandstorm
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Niegs wrote: Fri Jan 20, 2023 3:01 pm Ross Tucker's take: https://www.patreon.com/posts/lowering-legal-77489775
Long, but worth a read. He presented the original tackle data in 2015 and knows his onions.
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SaintK
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Interesting and heartfelt article. Have to say I'm leaning in that direction on this.
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Tichtheid
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I thought I recognised the name, he does the egg chaser podcast. He's been wrong about rugby for a long time now, though I haven't heard about him in ages, years, but it's twice in two days now.

Yesterday the egg chaser podcast tweeted, or retweeted, an opinion from someone saying that this was only to mitigate legal action against the RFU - err no, if you take measures now you are not released from previous responsibility. Also they were mystified as to why it's only being brought in below professional level.

Is it really a difficult question?

Maybe because at the professional level it would have to be done by World Rugby so that everyone is on the same page at the same time, it cannot be done unilaterally at that level by one union.

If he's so misty-eyed about the old days and club rugby, he should probably be aware that this is going back to how players used to tackle.

The first time I saw huge hits to the chest was when Samoa (it may have been Western Samoa at that time) came to play Scotland and some guy whacked John Jeffrey, apart from that tackling was all aimed at the waist and legs.
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PornDog
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Tichtheid wrote: Fri Jan 20, 2023 4:26 pm I thought I recognised the name, he does the egg chaser podcast. He's been wrong about rugby for a long time now, though I haven't heard about him in ages, years, but it's twice in two days now.

Yesterday the egg chaser podcast tweeted, or retweeted, an opinion from someone saying that this was only to mitigate legal action against the RFU - err no, if you take measures now you are not released from previous responsibility. Also they were mystified as to why it's only being brought in below professional level.

Is it really a difficult question?

Maybe because at the professional level it would have to be done by World Rugby so that everyone is on the same page at the same time, it cannot be done unilaterally at that level by one union.

If he's so misty-eyed about the old days and club rugby, he should probably be aware that this is going back to how players used to tackle.

The first time I saw huge hits to the chest was when Samoa (it may have been Western Samoa at that time) came to play Scotland and some guy whacked John Jeffrey, apart from that tackling was all aimed at the waist and legs.
Yep - Western Samoa in the '91 World Cup was the first time I ever saw that type fo tackling. It just didn't happen prior to that. It has now become the default style for the majority of players (though certainly not all - Vd Flier, Lydiatte, Tipuric, Watson, Curry - you know, all the renowned shite defenders - rarely if ever tackle that way)
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Niegs
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Tichtheid wrote: Fri Jan 20, 2023 4:26 pm
If he's so misty-eyed about the old days and club rugby, he should probably be aware that this is going back to how players used to tackle.

The first time I saw huge hits to the chest was when Samoa (it may have been Western Samoa at that time) came to play Scotland and some guy whacked John Jeffrey, apart from that tackling was all aimed at the waist and legs.
That was my thinking, too. It's only been this way since, what, the 90s at best? I even came from gridiron, with school rugby coaches who'd also played it, but in late 90s Canada, we were passing the ball, not tucking it and trying to run people over. I remembered the stand-up tackle creeping in when I was a uni coach in the mid-00s, with a greater focus on 'flat line' defence and, a few years later everyone screaming 'line speed'.

Watching a few of these lately, there are reckless high tackles as those were kind of overlooked then, but most are going waist height. I noticed watching old games before that they'd rather kick than get caught in a ruck, but there's also a lot of offloading too. A surprising lack of pick and goes, but that could also be about a. Avoiding the ruck, b. Everyone getting stuck in so there's space on offer out wide.

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Sandstorm
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Marylandolorian wrote: Mon Jan 23, 2023 3:23 pm
Sandstorm wrote: Thu Jan 19, 2023 6:59 pm
Friendly fire is rarer, but it happens. However making Union strictly 1on1 doesn’t sound like a good plan to me.
Not that rare, last weekend, both players out . But I agree restricting 1on1 isn’t a good idea .

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Ouch!
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Niegs
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Lots of chatter about Jamie George being allowed to come back on after this. Shouldn't have been allowed an HIA, straight off. Hamilton reports from Sarries bench that he was "just winded". Rugby needs saving from itself, it seems.

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JM2K6
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Rugby definitely needs saving from Jim Hamilton.
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Niegs
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Ross Tucker vs James (Eggchaser JB) Beardmore ... JB hasn't responded, but Tucker wades in with information overload.




Someone in support of RT added this... https://keepyourbootson.co.uk/rugbysafe ... /research/

I haven't gone through it, but looks like they've been keeping an eye on injuries in the amateur game for a few seasons. I took a quick look at community male 2020 and it looked like there wasn't much change in concussion rates. Maybe they see this as far too high so need an intervention... though one per 12 games seems very low given what I saw at my club this year. I can't give numbers, but about five games in I was stood on the sidelines and noticed there were 5 guys out following concussion protocols (all from the last two weeks). I can't comment on game/training practices that led to those, but can say that our club has a professional athletic therapist on hand for all training sessions / games to monitor and enforce protocols. Will all the clubs in this RFU study have that? Not sure. Are players possibly hiding concussions? Very likely as our AT says some of our lads try to evade her.
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JM2K6
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If nothing else positive comes from this, the fact that it's allowed Beardmore to take a brief break from being a hysterical anti vaxxer wanking on about the WEF and demanding Jacinda Ardern be put on trial for lockdown crimes must be a small relief

Definitely an excellent voice of reason who is a credit to the rugby community and epitomises good faith discussions
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Raggs
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JM2K6 wrote: Wed Jan 25, 2023 8:38 am If nothing else positive comes from this, the fact that it's allowed Beardmore to take a brief break from being a hysterical anti vaxxer wanking on about the WEF and demanding Jacinda Ardern be put on trial for lockdown crimes must be a small relief

Definitely an excellent voice of reason who is a credit to the rugby community and epitomises good faith discussions
Christ is he really an anti vaxxer too? I've blocked him for some time now, probably even pre-covid.
Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
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JM2K6
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Raggs wrote: Wed Jan 25, 2023 9:08 am
JM2K6 wrote: Wed Jan 25, 2023 8:38 am If nothing else positive comes from this, the fact that it's allowed Beardmore to take a brief break from being a hysterical anti vaxxer wanking on about the WEF and demanding Jacinda Ardern be put on trial for lockdown crimes must be a small relief

Definitely an excellent voice of reason who is a credit to the rugby community and epitomises good faith discussions
Christ is he really an anti vaxxer too? I've blocked him for some time now, probably even pre-covid.
He's a real treat. In fairness his anti vaxxing stuff is quieter than the rest of his output and is more of the "I took the vaccine but we were lied to so much about it blah blah vaccine injury blah blah long term side effects blah blah", but y'know, difficult to draw the line considering how much of a caricature he is:

"You mean lying, like we have been mislead about these vaccines numerous times."

"I have had many amateur players contact me regarding chest pains post vaccination but I have come across zero cases of long covid within the playing community"

"If I was [Henry] Slade, I would need a lot more convincing than simply the say so of the media"

"No one thought that on account COVID is a far more stable virus then flu. Furthermore there is a good change the vaccines cause mutations as the virus selects for the antibodies. You shouldn't vaccinate into a pandemic ideally."

"The truth in lockdowns will come out, just like the truth in vaccines"

and some of his other nonsense:

"I think we might of reached peak WEF and peak climate lies."

"Anyone who separates families and locks up a nation should be put on trial."

(On Greta Thunberg) "The true face of white privilege"

"Every lockdown supporter has blood on their hands"

"Just shows what a degrading effect wokeness has on society. A virus destroying almost every aspect of sports and culture."
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