NFL Going Into Overtime

NFL owners approve OT changes
By Don Banks, SI.com

ORLANDO -- In a move that will at least remove the NFL's nightmare scenario of a Super Bowl that's unduly impacted by the flip of a coin, the league's owners on Tuesday surprisingly approved a modified sudden death overtime proposal.

The new rule, which will be in effect for the NFL's postseason only, allows the team that loses the coin flip at the start of overtime to have a possession unless a touchdown is scored -- either offensively or defensively -- on the first possession.

Twenty-eight of the owners voted to approve the proposal, with four voting against it -- Buffalo, Minnesota, Baltimore and Cincinnati. Twenty-four votes were needed to approve the proposal.

The league's coaches were said to be overwhelmingly against the measure, but the owners were swayed by the weight of statistics showing that 59.8 percent of the games since 1994 -- when kickoffs were moved back to the 30-yard line -- were won by the team winning the overtime coin toss.

Echoing the feelings of the many coaches unhappy with the new overtime rule, Super Bowl champion coach Sean Payton ripped the reform and how it was implemented at the NFL Meetings Wednesday morning.

"I hate it," Payton, speaking from the annual NFC Coaches breakfast, told me on Sirius NFL Radio. "I'm not a big fan of the rule that was implemented. I'm probably going to have to spend a half-hour explaining it to my wife."

In the game that may have been the catalyst for change, the Vikings lost last season's NFC Championship Game in overtime to the Saints, which won the toss, drove downfield and kicked a field goal to win.

"Modified sudden death is an opportunity to make a pretty good rule ... even better," said Atlanta Falcons president Rich McKay, co-chairman of the competition committee. "Statistically, it needed to change. It wasn't producing the 'fairest result."'

With Sunday's being my only certain day off next season I am surely going to be watching more NFL ball and I'm happy that the NFL took a step in the right direction with the new overtime rule. But they need to finish the job. First of all, I agree with Sean Payton that the rule is too complicated. And I agree with Rich McKay that the old system wasn't fair.

The NFL needs to adopt the college system. Why punish each team for playing well in regulation. Give both teams a chance to score. If they both score. Let them keep going. It's less confusing and more exciting. Sure, the player may have to play more snaps but they're grown men. They can handle it. I'm all about handling overtime in an egalitarian manner. Let's do the college system and for the whole season. If you don't believe me just watch this.