Leaping over the line of scrimmage to block a kick. Standing in the end zone to swat away field goals. Openly slapping an opponent in the head.
Once upon a time, you could see N.F.L. players do all those things. And they were legal. But over time, all of them have been banned.
And perhaps soon to join them is the “Tush Push” or “Brotherly Shove,” the move perfected by the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.
In that play, which is executed when the team needs only a yard or less, the Eagles’ offensive linemen mass closely together, snap the ball and push forward. The quarterback, Jalen Hurts, keeps the ball and lunges forward while other big players push him from behind.
The play has been remarkably successful for the Eagles over the last few seasons, nearly always gaining the yard or so needed.
Now a complaint has been filed with the league asking it to ban the play. Although the complaining team was not revealed, several news media sources have identified it as the Green Bay Packers.
The Packers’ president, Mark Murphy, said on the team’s website, “There is no skill involved, and it is almost an automatic first down on plays of a yard or less.”
But Eagles Coach Nick Sirianni and others say the move to bar the shove has the whiff of sour grapes. It’s not that other teams avoid the play because it’s unfair; it’s that they can’t execute it as well as the Eagles do.
“We work so hard at that play,” Sirianni said on NBC. “I know teams are trying it, and I know if they were successful at it they would use it.”
Others have suggested the play might be dangerous. But a league study did not find conclusive evidence that the play caused an increased risk of injury.
There was a thought that with the retirement of Jason Kelce, the Eagles center who was a key factor in the play, the Eagles would not be as successful with the push. But even without him the team kept pushing and shoving all their way to the championship this season.
Here are some of the other plays you can no longer see on an N.F.L. gridiron.
The Forward Fumble
Sometimes, a single play prompts a rule change.
In a 1978 game against the San Diego Chargers, the Oakland Raiders trailed by 6 points with 10 seconds left. They were 14 yards from the end zone.
Quarterback Ken Stabler was about to be sacked and the ball came out of his hands, moving forward. Another player pushed it forward some more and then Dave Casper kicked it into the end zone and fell on it, scoring a touchdown and winning the game for the Raiders. The play became known as the Holy Roller.
A new rule was adopted after the season: On a fumble in the last two minutes, only the fumbling player himself can advance the ball.
Jumping Over the Line
Blocking a field goal can prevent the opposing team from scoring 3 points. So why not try whatever it takes to do it?
In the 2010s, some athletic players, notably on the Seattle Seahawks, tried leaping over the line of scrimmage to get a better shot at blocking that kick. Sometimes they succeeded. But in 2017 the N.F.L. put a stop to it in most cases. (On that occasion, it was the Eagles who proposed the rule change.)
Goaltending, N.F.L. Style
How about getting a really tall guy to stand right at the goal posts and try to swat away the field goal try? Yeah, that’s been tried. And that’s been banned.
In the early 1970s the Kansas City Chiefs parked a 6-foot-10 player named Morris Stroud just in front of the goal posts and had him try to block lower-trajectory kicks. It worked from time to time.
But the N.F.L. soon amended its rules to ban — borrowing a basketball term — “goaltending by a defensive player leaping up to deflect a kick as it passes above the crossbar of a goal post.”
Dangerous Plays
Whatever you think about these plays, few would argue that it would be a good idea if players could still slap each other in the head (banned in 1977), tackle by grabbing the back of the shoulder pads (the so-called horse collar, banned in 2005) or hit an opponent helmet-to-helmet (banned in 1996).
The N.F.L. has a reputation for being stodgy and slow to change. But almost every year, some rules are tweaked, and the game is, one hopes, improved.
Whether banning the Brotherly Shove would be an improvement depends on your point of view and your interpretation of the intricacies and nuances of the voluminous N.F.L. rule book.
Or perhaps on whether or not you’re an Eagles fan.
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