As much as the NFL is generally a well-run league it has badly bungled the transition to the new dynamic kickoff.
Designed to minimize spectacular (and dangerous) collisions, the new kickoff format feels like something scrambled together in a last-minute brainstorming session.
First, it was the new, nonsensical onside kick rules and how they tried to adapt the sneakiest play in the game into a new system that simply couldn’t accommodate it.
Their solution? If you want to attempt an onside kick now you have to announce your intention loudly to the world (and to the other team) much like when a foreign dignitary is introduced to the other partygoers at a swanky royal ball.
But now, in 2026, we have a different problem that violates a different founding principle. That would be the weather or, more succinctly in this case, how wind gusts can disrupt a kickoff.
We’ve all seen how it happens. A particularly blustery day when the football keeps blowing off the tee so the kicker keeps resetting it in the hopes that Mother Nature will give him a single moment of respite but that never happens.
So, then we revert to a Plan B, where one of the kicker’s teammates becomes the tee and his job is to hold the ball steady long enough for the kicker to do his job by putting his foot through the football.
This scenario was workable in the old format but impossible in the new one because in this format the kicker’s nearest teammate is thirty yards downfield. On kick coverage, waiting to tackle whoever receives the kick.
So, if you’re the NFL how do we solve this problem?
You decide to add a 12th man to the game. To just the kicking team, and this role is only temporary. Once the ball is gone the 12th man needs to get to the sidelines. Pronto.
Don’t worry about how the kick coverage is working out. Just get to the sidelines. It’s illegal to have twelve players on the field. Except for this situation. And it’s only for a short time. Like a hall pass.
So naturally the coaches want to modify his role for the short time he’s out there. Like giving an actor an extra line or two, which is exactly what the Philadelphia Eagles did in Week 2 of 2026 when they used the 12th man to hold the ball. But not only hold it but to position it at an odd angle, which changes the trajectory of the kick, and makes it harder to return.
In this short of time – a single season – NFL coaches have found a way to exploit the 12th man rule.
Of course, most of the special teams coordinators around the league weren’t happy about this and made it known. Nearly all of them agreed that the NFL should change the way the rule is interpreted so the human ball holder could only be utilized on days when the wind was strong enough to need him.
But then who decides that? Would the ball have to roll off the tee a certain number of times before the 12th man rule could be activated into the game? Like how much wind is really windy? What’s the threshold?
Who cares? The NFL had this wrong from the very beginning.
Since when did the NFL start to care about the weather?
It’s a game famous for playing through blizzards and monsoons and everything short of lightning, yet it now feels the need to implement a rule requiring human ball handling assistance when the skies get a little blustery.
This is the only time Mother Nature has had a say in the NFL rule book. Other than to explicitly clarify that you’re not allowed to bring some snow-clearing equipment onto the field so you can clear enough of it away to give the hometown kicker a better chance at making the field goal. Yeah. Like what Bill Belichick did in a 1982 game against the Miami Dolphins.
So why this rule? Now?
Because you didn’t need to do it this way. There is a much better alternative just sitting there. One which is both simple and tantalizingly strategic.
Call it the 11th Man Shuffle.
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When the wind is blowing hard enough to need a human tee, you get to use one, but it’s got to be one of the players who’s already on the field. One of your coverage players, standing there on the opponent’s 40-yard line, ready to make some tackles.
You have to choose one of them. It’s just 11-man football. With a twist.
The first being that you’re now going to be one guy short in the kick coverage although you were already short a man when you did it in the old days as well. He’s now just a little farther away from the ball now. Like 30 yards farther.
This makes the kicking team a little more diligent when using this player because he’s been stolen from one role to serve another.
But it works both ways.
Your opponent gets the same advantage.
And the same disadvantage.
How much you get of each is based entirely on how good a coach you are. And how good a kicker you have on your team. The kind of kicker that can take advantage of a skilled holder.
And return teams now have a literal gap to aim it. They can see the chink the armour which they now can exploit. And that only happens with good coaching and great execution. Now using a holder can become a distinct advantage. For the receiving team. If done properly.
One tiny change like this and now using a place holder has massive game implications. This little nuance comes with teeth. This makes coming up with an innovative 11th man kickoff strategy invaluable to both sides.
And this effectively erases your new 12th man rule from the rule book. It erases the very need for the rule in the first place.
Now the same eleven players play the game the same way, with the same number of bodies, regardless of the conditions because that’s just what football does. They play through anything.
Football doesn’t even have bad weather. They play through typhoons, and hailstorms if they need to. So, every day is football day.
Only lightning can stop this game.
Shocking, I know.
Aside from that, the NFL will play through whatever can be dumped on them.
And if that means that one day, when the wind is howling badly, you need a guy to hold the ball steady for the kicker, well, use one.
Just make sure he’s one of the eleven players already on the field.
Eleven in sunshine, eleven in rain.
Why change it now?