The Phinsider
The NFL owners voted on several potential changes to the league rules in 2025.
The NFL owners met this week in Minnesota, with the agenda including votes on several rules that had been tabled during the April meeting. This week’s meeting featured just the owners themselves, while the previous meeting included general managers and head coaches. Several noteworthy items were considered this week, though a couple of the bigger resolutions failed.
Included on the agenda were changes to the rules allowing ball carriers to be pushed by their teammates - essentially a rule change to ban the “tush push” used to perfection by the Philadelphia Eagles. The owners also considered a change to the playoff format and whether NFL players would be allowed to participate in the 2028 Olympics’ flag football tournament.
Previously, the NFL had banned any direct assistance to a ball carrier, outlawing it from the league’s founding until 2005. There have been plenty of incidents of a running back or wide receiver getting stood up down the field, but not being tackled, with several of his teammates running to the play and shoving him forward for several more years. That did not seem to draw the ire of fans or teams
The “tush push,” also known as the “Brotherly Shove” due to the Eagles’ success with the play, does, however, bother some people in and out of the game. This play is a quarterback sneak, with the running backs in the backfield immediately slamming into the quarterback, shoving him forward for the short-yardage conversion.
The Green Bay Packers proposed a rule change to remove the play. During the April meeting, the proposal was specifically aimed at the tush push and was tabled until this week’s meeting. Recently, the Packers added clarification to their proposal, aligning back to the original league’s rule of no pushing a ball carrier in any situation.
The proposal was voted down by the owners, allowing for the tush push to continue at least during the 2025 season. Needing 24 of the 32 owners to vote in favor of any rule change, the tush push ban received 22 votes. Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross was one of the owners to vote against the proposed change.
According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, joining the Dolphins in voting down the change were the Eagles, the Baltimore Ravens, the Cleveland Browns, the Detroit Lions, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the New England Patriots, the New Orleans Saints, the New York Jets, and the Tennessee Titans.
The Buffalo Bills, who are probably the second most successful team to use the play, were among the teams to vote for the ban. They were also the only AFC East team to vote for it.
Much of the arguments against the play focus on the difficulty to stop it. That concern was not enough to lead to the ban, however.
During the NFL Scouting Combine back in February, Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel spoke about the play and if he believed...
