The NFL’s owners will vote this week on whether to change the rules of overtime so that each team is guaranteed a possession. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell hopes the owners vote it down.
Goodell told Peter King of TheMMQB.com that he likes the current format in which a team can win on the opening possession of overtime by scoring a touchdown.
“I think our overtime rule is really working well,” Goodell said. “I think it’s got the right balance. It keeps the sudden death nature of the game but . . . you have the opportunity to win the game and not give the other team the ball if you score a touchdown. . . . I think that maintaining the sudden death nature of the game is very important.”
The current rule, which says the game doesn’t end if the team receiving the kickoff kicks a field goal on its opening possession, has been in place since 2012. It still gives the team that wins the coin toss an advantage, but not as significant an advantage as that team had when it only needed a field goal to win the game. There have been many suggestions for how to improve overtime, ranging from adopting the college system of alternating possessions to taking field goals out of it entirely. But Goodell thinks the rules the NFL has in place right now are the best system.
