Indianapolis Colts 9-Point TD Proposal Makes No Sense

The Indianapolis Colts and a handful of other teams proposed a few changes to the current NFL rulebook. Some of them are helpful and could make the game better, some are just wacky. One of the craziest change proposals came from the Indianapolis Colts.

Basically they’re trying to introduce a nine-point touchdown. How would that be possible? Let me explain that to you. First things first: you score a touchdown, you get 6 points.

Now you can either:

kick an extra point from the 2-yard line (+1 point)
attempt a two-point conversion (+2 points)

Here’s the tricky part: if your two-point attempt is successful you get an additional extra-point kick from the 32-yard line (i.e. a 50-yard field goal). This way you could be able to score a total of 6 + 2 + 1 = 9 points on a single drive.

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As of now the maximum score you can obtain is, of course, 8 points with a touchdown and a successful two-point conversion. Does one little point makes all this difference? Yes, it does. Each point scored by a team is so hard to get and is extremely valuable in every game. Plus, what if the extra-extra (?) point is blocked? The other team has chance to turn your scoring opportunity in its own scoring opportunity! Pure chaos.

This rule change was submitted to encourage more teams to “go for two” but is it worth it to go for two (47.5% success rate, per ESPN.com national NFL writer Kevin Seifert) just to have an extra attempt for an additional point? This could possibly discourage teams to attempt a two-point conversion since a 50-yard field goal is not exactly a piece of cake for a lot of kickers in the league.

It’s unrealistic to think that this idea will be even considered by the NFL rules committee but maybe, just maybe, they could experiment it in the early preseason games, just like in 2014 when the extra points were moved backwards from the two-yard line to the 20-yard line.

Still, I don’t think this change will happen anytime soon. Unsurprisingly, the Colts’ proposal was not endorsed by the committee but other proposals might get more attention. It’s easy to see why: the last time the scoring format was changed was a long time ago.

As you can see in this page from “The Telegraph“ dated February 4, 1912 the value of a touchdown was increased from five points to six points in that year and has yet to be changed since. The value of field goals was modified in 1904 (and then in 1909) and went down from four points to the current three points.

These rule changes are fun and all but teams should focus on feasible changes to improve the game. To be fair the Colts had another proposal that makes more sense and would make a lot of fans happy:

Colts proposed a rule that will allow teams to open retractable roofs at halftime (weather permitting, etc) of games.
— Will Brinson (@WillBrinson) March 18, 2015

This one is a much better proposal that would reward the cheering fans with an even better experience at the stadium.

There were a few hot topics among other change proposals like the challenge system and the overtime rules. Check out Mike Chiari’s article on Bleacher Report for a complete breakdown.

Next: Colts Free Agency Grades on Offense

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