During the meetings of the league's owners this past week, talk was resurrected regarding a potential tush push ban. The Packers proposed a revised version of the ban, which would prohibit players from assisting the ball carrier in any way other than blocking. So, not only would the famous tush push be banned, but players would no longer be able to get behind any ball carrier and drive them forward in a stampede.
Ultimately, the revised proposal was voted 22-10 in favor of passing the ban, but it needed 24 votes to go into effect. It will be brought up likely yearly at these meetings, but the tush push will remain in 2025.
Browns join nine other teams against tush push ban
ESPN's Adam Schefter named the 10 teams that voted to keep the tush push, including the Cleveland Browns. The nine other teams were the Eagles (obviously), Ravens, Lions, Jaguars, Dolphins, Patriots, Saints, Jets, and Titans. Interestingly enough, the Bills voted to ban the tush push even though Josh Allen converted 20 of 21 sneaks in 2024 before the AFC Championship game, where he only converted two of five.
Browns coach Kevin Stefanski previously elaborated on his thoughts about the controversial play.
“To eliminate a quarterback sneak from getting pushed, I don't know that it's something that needs to be legislated out of the game. The injury data is not there for it. So I would be in favor of keeping the rules as they are.”
Without sufficient data that the play is definitively more dangerous than regular football plays, banning the tush push would happen because there are few ways to stop it against teams who have perfected it. Banning a play because a few teams are great at running it could open the floodgates for some drastic changes down the line. Should studies show elevated dangers on the play, then banning it would be a justified decision.
Three of the Browns' quarterbacks are almost certainly not going to benefit from this lack of change, as Kenny Pickett, Shedeur Sanders, and Dillon Gabriel aren't guys with the size required to have any sort of success on that play. Joe Flacco, on the other hand, scored elite in the physical size category coming out of college at six-foot-six, 236 pounds. He is entering his age-40 season, so putting that stress on his body is probably not the best idea.
Ultimately, the Browns aren't likely to be extreme beneficiaries of the tush push, so voting in favor to keep it shows their unbiased feelings on the subject.
