>>10312437i see your argument, but it doesn't apply to particle physics (e.g. in the standard model and in old bootstrap models, the particles are all point particles). when we say "quarks and gluons are 'smaller' than protons and neutrons" what we really mean is that protons and neutrons are bound states of quarks and gluons. the size of a nucleon has more to do with how the constituents interact with one another rather than the size of the actual constituents.
this still doesn't answer the more puzzling question of "if a rho is more massive than a pion, then how can a pion be made of rhos?" and this is where renormalization comes in
