Welcome to the part of the offseason where we try and find anything and everything to talk about until the NFL draft arrives.
Over the last week, we have seen and heard potential changes to the NFL rule book that some teams love and some teams hate.
Last year, we, of course, saw the move to the dynamic kickoff, as well as the league awarding a third challenge to a team following one successful challenge.
We also saw the hip-drop tackle “outlawed,” although it was more often fined after the fact than called on the field.
What rule changes could be coming down the line this year? Believe it or not, we got wind of some potential changes during the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine, but now, they have officially been submitted by teams and announced by the league.
First of all, the proposed changes have to be approved by 24 of the NFL’s 32 owners to go into effect, and those votes could take place at the NFL’s owners meeting later this month in Palm Beach, Florida.
https://twitter.com/_CeeDeeThree/status/1905036309455925508
Recap
Not only are they want to change some rules, such as the Tush Push, but they also took away the celebration from CeeDee Lamb.
Here’s a look at Rule 12, Section 3, Article 1(d) from the rules report (via Benjamin Solak).
The NFL has previously received push back for banning and/or penalizing certain celebrations, so much so that the league even eased up on some of their stricter celebration policies back in 2017.
Urban Dictionary notes, “The index finger slides horizontally under the nose in the path of the ops and ends with the thumbs down position. This gesture lets your team know you’re out for blood and to scare the ops away.”
Other things like banning the tush push has been brought up again, and regular season overtime rules.
The Eagles want the regular-season overtime rules to match what we have in the playoffs — where both teams get a chance to possess the ball. The proposal is stated this way.
A change to the playoff seeding has also been brought to the forefront.
Playoff seeding change, tush push ban among 2025 NFL club playing rules, bylaw, resolution proposalshttps://t.co/HH9stJnl6x pic.twitter.com/vBuycR1JEl
— Around The NFL (@AroundTheNFL) March 19, 2025
To amend the current playoff seeding format to allow wild-card teams to be seeded higher than division champions if the wild-card team has a better regular-season record. This one I agree with!!
Turpin Time
The NFL is still tinkering with its kickoff rules after the so-called “dynamic kickoff” didn’t achieve the results the league expected during the 2024 regular season, and wig the best return in the entire leauge, of this gets change, Dallas and Turpin are going to benefit greatly.
The NFL is proposing the ball is set at the 35-yard line for touchback, a small yet impactful change. Keep in mind, when the dynamic kickoff was invented for the XFL in 2020, touchback were set at the 35-yard line.
Suddenly, the trade-off becomes much more difficult for kicking teams. Allowing the offense to start at the 35-yard line is less enticing because tackling them deeper into their territory becomes much more doable.
The NFL Competition Committee is proposing to make the dynamic kickoff rule permanent..
They're also expected to move the touchback to the 35 yard line #PMSLive pic.twitter.com/yKS2gMrI5X
— Pat McAfee (@PatMcAfeeShow) March 27, 2025
This still needs to be voted into place, but allowing the offense to start at nearly 50? Teams are going to want to kick the ball and let the returning team try and make a play.
In three years in the league, Turpin has become a two-time Pro Bowler and was named first-team All-Pro in 2024.
He led the league with 904 kick return yards and had a 99-yard touchdown return against the Washington Commanders.
This is a lot of information thrown at you, so we will have to wait and see if any of these rules get changed by enough votes. It seems like it never work.
I think it would be cool to give the kickoff guys a chance to return some more kicks.