The NFL recently approved a rule proposal that’ll allow the receiving team to start their possession on their own 25-yard line if they call for a fair catch between the goal line and field of play.
Patriots head coach Bill Belichick subtly revealed that he’s not loving the controversial rule.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Belichick said he agrees with what Ravens coach John Harbaugh and Chiefs coach Andy Reid had to say about this rule change.
“We’ll see about all that,” Belichick said. “I know Coach [John] Harbaugh was pretty involved in that, Coach [Andy] Reid. I think they voiced some comments on it. I probably agree with the things they said.”
Meeting with reporters on Wednesday, Bill Belichick didn’t say much about the latest change to the kickoff rule, but he said enough to make it clear he doesn’t like it. https://t.co/UVZEv60M0x
— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) May 31, 2023
Harbaugh and Reid are clearly not fans of this new rule.
“We thought there were better ideas,” Harbaugh said, via ProFootballTalk. “… The fair catch rule, we had a chance to weigh in on that with all the special teams coaches. We had a long talk and discussion about that. We weren’t for it. We voted against it. We think it’s going to create more high-speed head trauma than not having it in there. That’s our position on it. But we’ll see. They want to give it a shot and take a look at it.”
Reid, on the other hand, is wondering if the NFL will just quietly transition to flag football.
“We’ll have to go through all that. My thing is, ‘Where does it stop?’ Right? So you start taking pieces [away] — and we’ll see how this goes — but you don’t want to take too many pieces away. You’ll be playing flag football,” Reid said.
If Belichick agrees with what Harbaugh and Reid said about the new rule, then he’s not fond of it either.