The NFL banning the swivel/hip-drop tackle was the big news out of the NFL’s annual meetings on Monday, and several pundits and current and former players had a wide range of opinions on it – including former Washington defensive tackle Kedric Golston, who told Grant and Danny he was a little conflicted by it all.
“It’s funny, because I feel like this is a tackling technique that they have been promoting for years, in terms of like the rugby-style, hip-drop roll-type tackle, so it's almost one of those things like the unintended consequences of something that they have been promoting,” Golston said. “My issue with it is that when they put a rule like this in place, how does it play out in the actual game? If you're chasing a ball carrier from behind, how then do you get them on the ground with two grown men running full speed and stop yourself from rolling or turning? It’s one of those things where obviously we want to make the game as safe as possible, but at the end of the day, you cannot legislate injuries out of the game, because then it in turn affects the product that we enjoy watching.”
Golston does have one rule change he’d like to see, of course…
“I think if we're going to talk about player safety, then we should eliminate all cut blocks in the line of scrimmage, and start there,” Golston said. “As a former defensive lineman, I'm selfish to say that if I'm going full speed and I know there's no more high/low blocks, we should be able to play from the waist up; we protect quarterbacks, we protect defenseless receivers, but if I'm getting a cut block from an offensive lineman that I'm not lined up on or my attention is not focusing on, that puts me in danger.
But that said, he knows it’s tough for NFL players to balance understanding safety versus the instinct of the game, so the league can find ways to help itself.
“I feel like instead of trying to regulate what we can't do, we should spend more time really focusing on how to tackle. That sounds kind of crazy when we're talking about professional sports, but we also have to realize that the people in the NFL today have never done a two-a-day practices, and always been under the guidelines of player safety and limited amount of contact,” Golston said. “I agree with all of that, but in order to do something safely, you need to know how to do it correctly, and I think if we learn how to tackle correctly, it will eliminate some of the kind of unintended consequences of the hip-drop tackle and the horse collar tackle. In essence, in my mind, all these kind of freak injuries come from defenders being out of position and not knowing how to properly tackle, because of not getting those reps in practice So, I think if we spent more time trying to teach them how to tackle safely, we would eliminate some of these injuries that are happening from people rolling up on the back of players’ legs.”
Golston admits that the game is so fast it’s tough to really think in the moment, so it will take time to get the adjustments made to the new rules, but to what effect?
“I think about years ago where Osi Umenyiora had Vince Young wrapped up and nine times out of 10, the officials would have blew it dead but they didn't, and Young scrambled out and scored a touchdown,” Golston said. “I don't really think it's an even playing field, because it’s just continuing to put more and more rules on what defenders can't do. This isn’t WWE where we're scripting this in the back, these are world-class athletes making decisions in milliseconds – and to that point, now, as a defender, do I put my body in a bad position trying to protect the offensive player’s position?”
So, yeah, he gets the intent, but is the execution really going to match it?
“Sometimes you make a rule just to make a rule and you realize, is it really gonna help players or is it gonna cause defenders to essentially play with like one arm tied behind their back?” Golston said. “With the skill that's in this league, it’s hard enough to get elite receivers and running backs on the ground when everything's working perfectly, but to say I can't try to stop his forward momentum, then he's just going to continue to get more yards when my object is to stop yardage. So it's just one of those things where I understand the intent behind the rule, I just think why continue to tweak on something when you cannot prevent injuries? The more they take away one thing, then the injuries are just going to pile up on something else in a sport where we want to take the officials out of making game- changing type calls.”
