The NFL has been looking to change some moves in order to ensure player safety and there has been some significant strides towards this. It was announced on Monday morning that the league has officially banned the hip-drop tackle beginning this upcoming season.
While there is no official definition of the hip-drop tackle, NFL executives have loosely defined itas when a defender “encircles the runner and then swings their weight” to land on the offensive player. There have been injuries throughout the previous season to players with this method of tackling, including Baltimore Ravens All-Pro tight end Mark Andrews sustained a cracked fibula and an ankle ligament injury due to the tackle.
The NFL Players Association argued against the ban of this tackle as they claimed this would put the defender in an impossible decision. However, the NFL seems to be going along with the ban as chairman of the NFL’s competition committee Rich McKay refers to it as the cousin of the horse-collar tackle.
It will be interesting to see how players react to losing the hip-drop tackle as things are going to be tougher on the defense going forward.
Did the NFL do right by banning the hip-drop tackle?
The NFL is in an interesting spot as this definitely will help with player’s safety but there is going to be intriguing ramifications from this. One is the defender is going to be put in terrible positions that they cannot revert to that tackle in order to stop a player. Is this a reaction for player safety or trying to get more offense in the game?
Another thing will be how this is penalized. Fans and players alike get annoyed at the ticky-tacky pass interference call and now are going to be subjected to the same thing with tackling. While the initial reports are that it will unlikely be flagged often this season, only time will tell.
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