The Philadelphia Eagles recorded a great win when they just about managed to keep the infamous “tush push” play alive for the 2025 season.
The proposal to ban the play was put forward by the Green Bay Packers – although it seems like there were other hands involved behind the scenes – and fell just short of the 24 votes required to pass a resolution, with the ban getting support from only 22 teams, with 10 remaining in favor of keeping the play around.
After this victory, owner Jeffrey Lurie had a unique way of stating his glee at the fact that the rest of the league had tried to ban his franchise’s trademark play, as a token of its effectiveness. But Lurie’s triumph may end up being short lived, as Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk reports on Friday that NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell, is looking to continue to find ways to eliminate the eye-sore play.
Eagles Victory Cry For Tush Push May Be Premature
With regards to the proposed tush push ban (and the playoff re-seeding proposal, which was ultimately withdrawn by the Detroit Lions), Goodell – speaking in a press conference at the conclusion of the owners’ meeting – noted that the league “usually take[s] a neutral position on wanting to make sure that the process goes well, but also that there’s a full discussion.”
When subsequently asked about the ban, Florio notes that Goodell remained intent on continuing to examine the play.
“We’ll see how it plays out this season,” Goodell said. “And then we’ll come back, and we’ll discuss those as we always do every year. What’s the right way to go forward? So, I think the discussion was helpful to us and what we want to focus on this season.”
NFL Keeping The Door Open For Future Tush Push Ban
It is no secret that the NFL wanted the play to be banned; in fact Florio reported that a league insider believed that the league pushed the Packers to put forward the motion to can the play – and that Green bay itself “doesn’t care” about the push.
Only the NFL owners have the power to verify and consolidate proposed resolutions, but the league and Goodell has substantially more power than many realize in liaising with all 32 owners.
Critics of the play believed that it could be an injury risk – a data point that the league will no doubt make a big emphasis on scrutinizing – and that it is essentially a form of the otherwise disallowed ‘assisting the runner’.
Proponents of the tush push believe that other teams are just salty that they are unable to stop it, and have to look to an outright ban as the only way to give themselves a defense against it.
