With the NFL’s onside kick setup failing to provide enough drama, executive vice president Troy Vincent suggested last October that changes could be in store in 2026. Replacing the onside kick with a fourth-and-15 or fourth-and-20 play was at least a possibility then.
Current rules dictate that the onside kicking team has to announce its intentions in advance. It was already difficult for the kicking team to recover an onside try before the league introduced that change in 2024. Unsurprisingly, it has been even more of a challenge since then. A meager five of 52 onside attempts were successful last season.
Multiple sources told Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk that introducing a fourth-and-13 play as an onside kick replacement would be addressed this offseason. However, the competition committee did not have discussions regarding a fourth-and-long alternative during Sunday’s meeting at the scouting combine, according to Vincent (via Kevin Seifert of ESPN). Any tweaks to the onside kick would require 24 votes to pass. There does not appear to be much support across the league for such a radical change, though, per veteran reporter Mark Maske.
“When it was first proposed, it picked up a couple of votes,” Vincent said Monday. “And then it just kind of stalemated. I don’t think there was … much appetite.”
Then the Buccaneers’ head coach, Greg Schiano first floated the fourth-and-long idea to commissioner Roger Goodell over 13 years ago, according to a 2012 Time Magazine piece. Schiano’s suggestion came three years after one of his former Rutgers players, Eric LeGrand, was paralyzed from the neck down while making a tackle on a kickoff. The NFL has since made other significant adjustments to the kickoff in the interest of player safety.
When discussing the kickoff with the competition committee on Sunday, special teams coaches voiced concerns over returners and tacklers suffering concussions (via Maske). However, there will not be any “major changes” to the 2-year-old dynamic kickoff format this offseason, Maske reports. Jeff Miller, the league’s executive vice president, said “the competition committee, the health and safety side agree that we’re definitely on the right track.”
The league moved the touchback spot from the 30-yard line to the 35 in 2025, leading to a massive increase in action. Returners took the ball back on 74.5% of kickoffs last season. The number checked in at 32.8% in 2024.
Please give us at least a couple more years between having to learn new rules.
NFL has done everything they could to neuter the onside kick, then they wonder why it’s success rate is so low. You can only do onside kicks in the 4th quarter. You have to be trailing. You have to announce it ahead of time, so there’s no more surprise kicks. You can’t stack your players to one side and have to spread everyone out. It’s ridiculous. Instead of brainstorming tweaks and rule changes, just go back to the old way.
Same with the regular kickoff. The rules are way too complicated. Just push the kickoff back to the 30 yard line and touchbacks bring it out to the 20. If you’re worried about too many touchbacks, then push the kickoff back to the 25.
Look at all of the rules they’ve added in the last 15 years. It’s crazy and too complicated now. It’s a kickoff. The rules for it don’t need to be the size of a phonebook.
link to footballzebras.com
Best onside kick ever was when the Saints opened the 2nd half with/ one against Manning and his Colts in the SB.