What the Bills are saying about the new kickoff format + other rule changes for the 2024 NFL season
League owners voted Tuesday morning to approve a significant rule change regarding the kickoff, adopting a low-impact kickoff based on a model previously used in the XFL.
29 of the NFL’s 32 teams voted for the rule change.
The league believes the rule change will increase the number of returned kickoffs while decreasing the number of injuries.
“The two hot areas that we need to address are some of the injury data that’s coming off of the play, one, and then two is: this needs to be a real play,” said Buffalo Bills head coach Sean McDermott to SiriusXM at the NFL owners meetings. “That’s how the game was constructed years and years ago and keeping the form and structure of that in our game is important. That the fans can see an exciting play but it doesn’t go to extremes.”
Players on the kicking team will not be allowed to have a running start, five players must be on each side of the ball and at least two players must be positioned outside the numbers and two between the numbers and hash.
On the receiving side, at least nine players on the receiving team will line up in a “setup zone” located between the 30- and 35-yard lines. Two players will line up downfield as returners.
Players from the kickoff team will not be permitted to move until the ball lands inside the “landing zone” located inside the receiving team’s 20-yard line. If the ball fails to go past the 20, the receiving team will get the ball on their own 40-yard line as if the ball had been kicked out of bounds. Kicks landing in the end zone or goes out the back is a touchback to the 30 and any kick that lands within the landing zone must be returned or downed by the receiving yard for a touchback to the 20-yard line.
