On the last day of the 2022 league meetings, NFL owners voted to approve a modified version of a proposal put forth by the Philadelphia Eagles and Indianapolis Colts, which now allows both teams to have a chance to score in overtime. The modification is that the new rule applies only in the postseason, which is just fine, because the postseason was where the former rule, ending a game if the first team with the ball in overtime scores a touchdown, had led to a 10-2 overall disparity between the team taking the ball, and the team on the wrong side of that equation.
It’s past time for this modification, and the rule it replaces was weird and reactionary at best.
In the 2009 NFC Championship game, the New Orleans Saints beat the Minnesota Vikings, 31-28, on a 40-yard Garrett Hartley field goal with 10:15 left in overtime. The fact that Brett Favre wasn’t able to participate in Super Bowl XLIV caused the NFL to alter its overtime rules. Now, instead of a first-drive field goal winning the game, a team would have to score a touchdown or a safety on its first overtime drive to win, and if that team kicked a field goal, the opposing team would have an opportunity to tie or win from there.
