Field Gulls
The staple of the Eagles’ short-yardage offense will not be banned this year.
It’s been described as an ugly play, a boring play, but it’s an undeniably effective play for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.
Despite a concerted effort led by the Green Bay Packers to change the rules, the ‘tush push’ isn’t going anywhere.
At the annual spring league meeting, NFL owners voted 22-10 in favor of amending the rulebook to effectively outlaw the tush push and revert to pre-2005 rules that forbade pushing ball-carriers forward. That’s close, but not cigar. There needed to be 24 votes in order to pass, to the Packers have been defeated by the Eagles by a 22-10 count for the second time in 2025.
The Packers’ amended rule proposal prohibited “an offensive player from pushing, pulling, lifting, or assisting the runner except by individually blocking opponents for him.” That was a slight alteration from a couple of months ago, when the initial language was, “to prohibit an offensive player from pushing a teammate who was lined up directly behind the snapper and receives the snap, immediately at the snap.” You can figure out which one is more directly targeted at the tush push.
The proposal was tabled after a 16-16 vote in March, so despite the wording tweak it still wasn’t enough to get over the line. It needed that extra push when it was essentially at the 2-yard line and it just didn’t happen.
Player safety and pace of play were cited as reasons for the rule change, even though there is zero evidence the the tush push is a uniquely harmful football play.
It is not yet known whether or not the Seattle Seahawks were for or against the rule change, but Mike Macdonald indicated he was pro-tush push.
I doubt that the story ends here, so prepare for more discourse about this play moving forward. The Packers host the Eagles in Week 10 on Monday Night Football. Until next time, hit the weight room and get better at stopping this play, which I must stress has been stopped before. Love it or hate it, the tush push isn’t going away next season.
