NFL Continues Regulation of Kickoffs

The kickoff return team can call for a fair catch on any kickoff and take the ball at the 25, though that might not change the aggressive approach by Rich Bisaccia and Keisean Nixon.

Author:
Bill Huber
Updated:
May 23, 2023 7:04 PM EDT
Original:
May 23, 2023

In this story:

Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The NFL’s war on kickoffs continued at its spring meetings in Minneapolis on Tuesday, though the change might not impact Keisean Nixon and the Green Bay Packers’ prolific return unit.

Starting with what’s billed as a one-year trial in 2023, the return team can signal for a fair catch on any kickoff and take possession at the 25-yard line.

“I don’t know what a fair catch is,” Nixon said after Tuesday’s OTA practice.

He might never need to learn, given the Packers’ aggressive approach once Nixon showed his big-play potential.

“I think it’s irrelevant to me,” he said. “I know who I am as a player and who I am as a person. Coaches say certain things but the way I know our coaches are in the building, we’re not worried about a rule change. We voted against it. It’s irrelevant.”

Across the NFL, there have been two philosophies to kickoffs. One is the bombs-away approach of simply trying to kick the ball out of the end zone for a touchback, in which case the offense takes over at the 25. The second is to kick the ball toward the goal line with great hangtime in order to get the coverage unit downfield to tackle the returner closer to the 15 or 20.

It’s that play that’s been targeted. Now, even if the ball is going to land at the 10-yard line, the kicking team can take the ball at the 25 so long as it fields the ball on the fly.

“The kickoff play for us has been a play that has had a lot of changes for us over the years, all really driven by health and safety,” NFL competition committee chairman Rich McKay told NFL Network’s Judy Battista.

“The concussion rate on the play has gone up. It’s gone up because the ball is being returned more by kicks that are being hung inside the 5-yard line. College made this rule change in maybe 2018 or 2019. We looked at their data and said, you know what, this is the right thing to do now.”

According to league modeling, the kickoff-return rate will decrease from 38 percent to 31 percent and the concussion rate will fall 15 percent.

“We just can’t sit there and ignore the data,” McKay said.

As noted by Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer in a story previewing the rules change, concussions on kickoffs have increased from 10 in 2020 to 14 in 2021 to 19 in 2022.

Nonetheless, Breer said, NFL special teams coordinators were unanimously against the change. The coordinators, and one veteran player from each team, participated in a conference call to oppose the change.

Coordinators mounted a facts-based offensive in opposition.

While going from 10 concussions to 19 is a sharp uptick, 99.3 percent of kickoffs were concussion-free – making it a relatively safe play in the grand scheme of the game.

According to Breer, the coordinators found that 11 of the 19 concussions were sustained on kickoffs that were returned from the end zone – something the rules change wouldn’t prevent, anyway. Nixon, who helped spark the Packers’ late-season rally, was the only returner to suffer a concussion.

Moreover, coordinators predicted the result would mean more squib kicks – so those kicks would have to be returned, anyway, which would put concussions back in play.

The rules change was passed despite those arguments. Given previous changes in the name of player safety, such as moving the touchback spot from the 20-yard line to the 25 to incentivize touchbacks, banning wedge blocks by the return team and eliminating the running start from members of the kicking team, is this rules change another step in banning the kickoff altogether?

Said McKay via Breer: “We want to keep it in the game. We don’t know that we’ll be able to keep it in the game.”

The Packers last season ranked third in starting field position after a kickoff return, a rather remarkable feat considering Nixon didn’t become the returner until close to midseason. With Mason Crosby’s struggles on kickoffs, the coverage unit ranked 26th in opponent starting field position following a kickoff. The team hopes rookie kicker Anders Carlson can fix that weakness.

“I think time will tell,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said after practice. “I know it’s been part of the college game. Certainly, always looking for ways to make our players more safe, and apparently the injury data suggests this was a necessity. I don’t really want to get into my personal thoughts on the rule, but we’ll adjust.”