NFL to Consider Rule Change to Eliminate Hip-Drop Tackle Due to Risk of Injury

The NFL wants to ban the hip-drop tackle, which reportedly increases the risk of player injury at 25 times the rate of a regular tackle.

NFL competition committee chairman Rich McKay explained the league's rationale to reporters at league meetings on Tuesday (h/t Rob Maaddi of the Associated Press).

"What's happening on the hip-drop is the defender is encircling tackling the runner and then swinging their weight and falling on the side of their leg, which is their ankle or their knee," McKay said.

"When they use that tactic, you can see why they do, because it can be a smaller man against a bigger man and they're trying to get that person down because that's the object of the game. But when they do it, the runner becomes defenseless. They can't kick their way out from under. And that's the problem. That's where the injury occurs. You see the ankle get trapped underneath the weight of the defender."

NFL executive vice president of communications Jeff Miller stated the league's findings on the increased injury rate and added further perspective.

"It is an unforgiving behavior and one that we need to try to define and get out of the game," Miller said at the league meetings. "To quantify it for you, we see an injury more or less every week in the regular season on the hip-drop."

The hip-drop tackle came under the spotlight during last year's playoffs.

Dallas Cowboys running back Tony Pollard suffered a fractured fibula and ligament damage after a hip drop tackle from then-San Francisco 49ers defensive back Jimmie Ward.

Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes suffered an ankle injury after a hip-drop tackle by Jacksonville Jaguars defensive lineman Arden Key in the AFC Divisional Round.

This season, Seattle Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith was briefly removed from a Week 4 game against the New York Giants after another hip drop tackle via New York Giants linebacker Isaiah Simmons.

As for what's next, "the league is gathering data and conducting a study on the hip-drop to make a determination," per Maaddi's relay of Miller's and McKay's remarks.

For now, the hip-drop tackle remains legal, but it's very possible that won't be the case this time next year.