Another rugby player to try his luck in the NFL is Louis Rees-Zammit. Like Christian Wade and Jarryd Hayne, he left rugby at or around the height of his career to experiment with American football.
Leaving Wales before the Six Nations, Rees-Zammit will participate in the National Football League's foreign Player Pathway Program (IPPP), a 10-week program that offers foreign players a shot at making an NFL squad, as Rees-Zammit confirmed on Tuesday.
Overseas players' presence in the National Football League has been on the rise recently. Like Rees-Zammit, we've had an English pass-rusher, an Australian lineman, and a Scottish punter who had little experience playing the sport before reaching the highest level.
Despite this, even with the most generous interpretation, Rees-Zammit has lengthy chances of joining the league. Very few IPPP players have had significant careers in the NFL. He is an energetic player in rugby.
With his speed and 6 feet 2 inches and 200 pounds, he is simply another one of the hundreds of players produced annually by the NFL's best college schools. Those whose duty it is toss the ball about in this league can, when instructed to run, do the following:
Rees-Zammit isn't bad at his sport; it's just that he's up against hundreds of other top athletes who have mastered the ins and outs of this complicated activity throughout the years.
It is challenging to stand out in that environment. Learning the ins and outs of a team's playbook or a particular position is much more challenging.
Thousands of plays make up a standard NFL playbook. There were more over three thousand distinct calls in the 2001 Rams playbook, which is famous for being the Greatest Show on Turf. A basic passing path can have hundreds of possible modifications, and every play is soaked in position-specific intricacies.