Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce isn’t losing sleep over a potential ban of the Tush Push.
The Eagles’ “Brotherly Shove” version of the play has drummed up plenty of controversy around the NFL, mostly because of teams’ inability to stop it. Kelce addressed reports that NFL commissioner Roger Goodell wants to ban the play permanently during this week’s episode of his podcast, New Heights. Despite how effective the play has been for the Eagles, Kelce didn’t seem overly concerned about a looming ban.
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“Ban it. At this point, I don’t care. I’m over the discussion about it,” Kelce said. “We were really good at running quarterback sneak before we did the push. I don’t think it’s a necessary part for it. It certainly helps, there’s no question about it. I don’t have the energy to care about whether it gets banned or not. We’re going to run it right now because we’re good at it and it’s effective, and whatever they decide to do next season we’ll find a way to do something at a high level.”
Two words you never expected Jason to say about the shove: Ban It
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Kelce did push back on a pair of popular reasons why fans have suggested a ban on the play, noting that he hasn’t seen an uptick in injuries due to the play and mentioning that other teams haven’t been as effective running the play as Philadelphia has been to address the concerns about an unfair advantage.
“If they do ban the “Brotherly Shove” there will be a good reason behind it that the commissioner wants to get done,” Kelce said. “Whether people agree with it or not, it is what it is and we move forward.”
He even brought some stats to the table, noting the team was 36–38 on QB sneak even before they started using the push.
“The Tush Push gets a lot of the hype, but ever since [Eagles Offensive Line Coach] Jeff Stoutland’s been here, we’ve been pretty darn efficient on quarterback sneaks.”
So be careful taking that sigh of relief if you’re awaiting a rule change. The Eagles seem fairly confident they’ll still be dominant in short-yardage situations regardless.
