PALM BEACH, Fla. — A surprisingly charged debate surrounding the Philadelphia Eagles’ unusual “tush push” play hit a stalemate Tuesday.
A proposal to ban the play did not pass at the league’s annual spring meeting – nor did it fail.
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Instead, club representatives decided to table the official vote, multiple sources confirmed to Yahoo Sports.
A vote could come as soon as the league’s May meeting on May 20 and 21 in Minneapolis; or, it could be tabled until after the 2025 season.
“Did not have the votes,” one source with knowledge of the meeting told Yahoo Sports. “Will study other language in the rule book.
The tush push involves teammates, often including offensive linemen, pushing a ball carrier over a line to gain. The Super Bowl champion Eagles and Buffalo Bills ran it more times than the other 30 NFL teams combined in the last three years, per ESPN Research.
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The Green Bay Packers introduced the proposal restricting any offensive player from “immediately at the snap, push or throw his body against a teammate, who was lined up directly behind the snapper and received the snap, to aid him in an attempt to gain yardage.”
The proposal needed at least 24 of 32 clubs’ affirmative votes to pass.
The Packers proposal cited “player safety” and “pace of play” as reasons to rule the play illegal, as the NFL has done with other plays recently including the hip-drop tackle.
The Eagles’ tush push was basically unstoppable on the field. So other teams went to the rulebook instead. (Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images)
(Al Bello via Getty Images)
But some questioned how genuine those cited claims were after Packers president Mark Murphy slammed the play in February as having “no skill involved.”
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“I am not a fan of this play,” Murphy said in a Feb. 1 online post to the team’s website. “There used to be a rule prohibiting this, but it is no longer enforced because I believe it was thought to be too hard for the officials to see.
“The play is bad for the game, and we should go back to prohibiting the push of the runner.”
The competition committee was aware of this concern, committee chairman Rich McKay said.
“The thing that nobody likes about this discussion that we’re having … is the idea that the rule is directed towards two teams,” McKay, who’s also the Atlanta Falcons CEO, said last week over Zoom. “We’ve had many rules over the years that come in about some play or some tactic or something that was just never contemplated, that all of a sudden is introduced and there’s a rule put up to say maybe we shouldn’t have that tactic or that play.
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“So I don’t think any of us like the fact that there’s teams associated with this particular rule proposal.”
The Eagles and Bills converted for a first down or touchdown on 87% of 163 tries the last three years, per ESPN’s data.
Murphy said the play generated “almost an automatic first down on plays of a yard or less.”
“It’s a little insulting to say it’s just we’re good at it, so it’s automatic,” Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni said. “The amount of things that we’ve looked into: how to coach that play, the fundamentals — there’s 1,000 plays out there, but it comes down to how you teach the fundamentals and how the players go through and do with the fundamentals. I can’t tell you how many times we practiced [it] because it’s not a play that is easy to practice.
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“Just because it’s a successful play for us doesn’t mean that it should go away.”
Conversation around spring meetings increasingly began to mention health concerns in their voting considerations.
“There’s a whole medical side of it,” Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid said Monday morning. “I give them credit because they’ve done a heck of a job with it. Tough play to stop, but then you’re listening to that and the medical side and you probably could go either way with it.
“I would say if it’s putting a player in a bad position, then you probably have to do something about it. But if it’s not, then it’s a heck of a play.”
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And yet, questions lingered about whether that data existed.
“The only reason I would be against it is if there is data that it’s more unsafe than your normal play for the players involved,” Rams general manager Les Snead told Yahoo Sports on Monday. “I think it’s probably right now not enough data to say one way or another. Now there’s more theories just based on that play and the angles involved.
“There hasn’t been a serious injury yet, but you could predict maybe there could be based on the way that goes.”
Ultimately, that speculation seemed to drive the resolution – or lack thereof – of a vote surrounding banning the play.
It’s not safe indefinitely. But leaving spring meetings, one of the Eagles’ favorite plays will live to see another day.
