The NFL is considering allowing teams to onside kick any time they want, regardless of the score.
When the league implemented the new kickoff rules that require teams to declare in advance whether they would onside kick or not, teams could only do so when trailing and only in the fourth quarter. Last year, the league eliminated the provision that onside kicks had to be in the fourth quarter.
Now the Competition Committee is proposing allowing onside kicks at any time, whether the kicking team is ahead, behind or tied.
Realistically, teams are hardly ever going to onside kick unless they’re losing. The onside kick has become so difficult to recover that teams just aren’t going to risk giving a failed onside kick, which gives the receiving team great field position, unless the kicking team is losing. But the new rules would let a team onside kick when winning, if it wants to.
NFL teams will vote on the onside kick proposal, and it will become a new rule if at least 24 teams vote in favor of it.
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