NFL meeting to ban hip drop tackles.. (Update: Now banned)
Less than one single tackle occurrence per game isn’t “rare” to you?
Not really. Once per game is a lot for a personal foul. How often do you see targeting? Blow to the head? Chop block? Horse collar? Not once per game.
I don't think this will ruin the game or anything and I think there are plenty of overreactions to it. But, I do think the NFL definition of a "hip drop tackle" is overly broad and vague. And that the fact that they saw 230 of them last year is evidence that it is overly broad and subject to too much subjective interpretation. I think it's going to lead to a lot of controversial game changing calls that end up in replay review. But, that's likely a good thing to the NFL because controversial calls means people get more invested and talk about them for a week. It's more attention and media coverage for the NFL which is what they want anyway. There is no such thing as bad publicity.
But, because it is vague, over broad and subject to so much subjective interpretation, it's not going to help player safety because players won't know exactly what it is they are not supposed to do. It will stop the rare actual clearly hip drop tackles, but there will be many that it won't stop because the rule is not clear. And, like I said, if they really cared about player safety they would just fine people for things instead of making it a penalty that can change games. They do it all the time with things like uniform violations and it works to stop that except for rare occasions. But, they would rather this vague foul be part of the game so the controversy becomes part of the media coverage, they get extra publicity, and it's another public statement that they care about player safety when they don't.
I mean, if it was really an issue for player safety wouldn't you expect the NFLPA to be in favor of the rule? Why would they be against it?