Why bother even having kickoffs if every kick is just going to sail out the endzone with no possibility of a return, or trying to pin the opposition deep? It was bad week 1, and bad again here in week 2.
Just start out from the 25 and be done with kickoffs/returns entirely, instead of this farce. “Stopgap” excuse be damned.
Honestly the NFL should should adopt the xfl kickoff rule:
NFL rule: Kicking team lines up at their own 35-yard line, with eight members of the return team within 15 yards. No double-team blocks allowed. Touchbacks are spotted at the 25-yard line.
XFL rule: The kicker lines up at his 30-yard line, with the other 10 members of the kickoff team lining up at the opponent’s 35 – 5 yards away from the returning team. Only the kicker and one returner can move until the ball is fielded. Touchbacks are spotted at the 35-yard line.
I haven’t watched any of the new iterations of the XFL but I originally thought of posting something similar to the XFL rule you describe before I decided to make my post more generic to avoid sounding foolish. Good to know that while my imagined rule’s details were a bit off from something that works in reality, I was at least maybe in the ballpark.
Nah it’s always good to see what other people may come up with. I’ve seen things like recommendations to remove the kickoff all together and start on the 20 and if you want the ball back you need to complete like a 4th & 20 scenario and if you fail the team gets it back on their 40.
Things are always evolving so you’ll always get those staunch supporters of never wanting to change anything, but eventually theyll get used to the change.