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The Rams and Cowboys line up for a kickoff under the new NFL rules. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
The NFL is making changes this season from start to finish, from so-called dynamic kickoffs to the way some defenders finish tackles.
Even casual observers will notice the difference in kickoffs, a one-year change aimed at making the play safer and more relevant. The new rules put the majority of opposing players much closer together for kickoffs, limiting those violent, full-speed collisions.
The league is also cracking down on “hip-drop” tackles in which ball carriers are wrangled down from behind by a tackler who unweights — fully lifts his body off the ground — to generate the required pull-down force.
That doesn’t mean officials will always be able to spot those tackles in games, but the league will be on the lookout to fine offenders in the aftermath.
“There’s going to be a lot of these that might end up occurring where there might not be a flag on the field because it’s so hard for the officials to see it,” said Walt Anderson, longtime referee turned NFL officiating rules analyst. “But you have to have a rule on the books to at least be able to deal with it during the week in the discipline process. That’s how most of them will be dealt with.”
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There are four elements to a hip-drop tackle: the wrapping with the hands or arms, the swiveling across the back of the ball carrier’s body, the unweighting in which the defender lifts himself off the ground, and the dropping onto the knee or below in a way that endangers the offensive player’s lower leg, ankle or foot.
“We’ve looked [at] a lot of plays in the preseason,” Anderson said. “There have been a lot of tackles that had some of the elements of the hip-drop tackle, but we only found two tackles in the preseason that met the requirements for a hip-drop tackle.”
The preseason gave NFL fans a chance to look…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/officially-nfl-kickoff-tackling-replay-120057935.html
Author : LA Times
Publish date : 2024-09-02 12:00:57
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