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It's a shame that if the NFL was going to commit to designing a new kickoff rule, they couldn't have committed to designing a better one. Is the NFL trying to kill the kickoff, or are they just incompetent? Perhaps I'm not giving them enough credit, and they did all this to hide the subtle bump in scoring that will come from moving the touchback line out. Any way you look at the motivations of the rule makers, with the rule in its current formulation, this (touchbacks) was always going to be the outcome.

If the kickoff is so dead that teams will begin changing their roster formulation ideas as a result, why not just pull a CFL and give the other team the ball on the 35 without this touchback charade? I'm a kickoff supporter. They're fun, and I want to see a well designed rule that keeps the play in the game, but the way it stands right now it feels like a waste of time for all involved. Again.

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if teams aren't practicing kickoffs, do you think they'll practice returns?

a tricky ST coordinator decide to squib it & maybe get a turnover?

I'm thinking that if the actual kick returners are getting minimal reps, nobody else is getting any

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author

smart idea. might work once, but if you know a team was doing that you'd probably put some reps in ahead of the game. also if the team has a kicker who can drop it in there youd probably dedicate some time those weeks as well.

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