The Eagles’ ‘Brotherly Shove’ won’t catch a break. This offseason is getting a whole lot spicier, with teams now calling to ban Nick Sirianni’s team’s infamous Tush Push. It wasn’t long before a headline caught everybody’s attention that an anonymous team had submitted an official proposal to the NFL to ban the play. Later, an NFL insider revealed that team: “The Packers are the team that submitted a proposal to the NFL’s competition committee to ban the Tush Push, per sources.” Ouch…

Now that the Packers have been unmasked, it has created a frenzy in the NFL world. The NFL coaches are at the NFL Scouting Combine. Now, with the Tush Push drama, it looks more like a conference conducted to discuss the Eagles’ cheat code.

First up, we have Andy Reid, who gave his two cents on the play. Reid’s team fell victim to the Eagles‘ Tush Push technique, losing their three-peat bid against Jalen Hurts and Co. But that loss is not what’s driving Andy’s opinion.

“I understand how it can go both ways. I think it takes certain players to be able to do that. It’s not an easy thing for the center. I was close to their center, so I know that’s not an easy thing to do. My hat goes off to them for making it as consistent as they are doing it,” he shared, as reported by Chiefs Wire. Did Reid just give the Eagles credit for pulling off something the entire NFL world has been asking to ban? Well, not exactly.

You would remember that a few days back, Jason Kelce opened up about the Tush Push, saying, “For me, as a center, it sucks. It’s a grueling play where you’re going to get as low as possible.” Keeping it in mind, Andy added, “Now, there are other things you have to look at. You have to look at the injuries, whatever the other deals are that they evaluate on it. So I don’t have all that information. But it’s a heck of a play, I know that.”

“When Jason Kelce is saying it destroyed him, that itself is an alarm.”

Then enters Dolphins HC Mike McDaniel. He does not favor banning Nick Sirianni’s team’s cheat code, but he did talk about it from a safety aspect. “You know, I’m kind of, it’s tough because I have a hard time making things illegal because of success… it’s a different thing if it’s a safety issue.”

Talking about how the Tush Push, in a way, aligns with the football framework where the goal is to move the ball downfield and score, the Dolphins HC added, “I have a hard time being at the teeth of the argument to move on from it. That’s just my opinion. I do understand both sides.”

It’s certainly caught fire and the Super Bowl winners had their say. But what does Sirianni have to say about it?

Nick Sirianni defends his team’s ‘Tush Push’ play!

“I can’t tell you how many times we’ve practiced the snap, we’ve practiced the play — it’s not a play that’s easy to practice, so there’s different ways we’ve figured out how to practice it — the complements that come off of it that can create explosive plays,” he said.

“The fact that it’s [portrayed] as an automatic thing, we work really hard, and our guys are talented at this play, and so it’s a little insulting to say we’re good at it so it’s automatic. We work really hard at it.”

That’s what Nick Sirianni had to say to all the teams speaking against them.

“I think if you look at that [safety issues], because we’ve looked into that, too, there wasn’t a lot of injuries there. I think that’s a little made up, to be honest,” Sirianni said. “Now, the numbers will tell the truth, but I don’t think there was many injuries with it this year. I can’t remember one injury we had on that play, and we ran it more that everybody else.”

Sirianni and the Eagles had massive success executing the play both years as they made it to the playoffs. Philly had a 93.5% success rate in the 2022 season and this season they had an 82% success rate. Interestingly, they are the only team efficient at it. Other teams tried to execute the play but failed terribly.

Chargers HC Jim Harbaugh also chimed in on the discussion when asked about it. Often known for his no-BS approach, he had a straight answer, “It just seems like it works every single time, but it seems like football to me. Get good at it or stop it. I don’t have a strong opinion on it right now and probably defer to others and see which way the vote goes.”

Bills HC Sean McDermott voted against it, raising concerns about player safety. “That play, to me, the way that the techniques are used with that play, have been potentially contrary to the health and safety of the players… I’m not in love with.” Notably, the maneuver has been around in different fashions for a long time. However, the Eagles drew the play to perfection, even using it in the Super Bowl to win. Hopefully, we will find a solution to this play soon.

It looks like the NFL officiates might have to call an immediate meeting to figure out this controversial play. So, it will be interesting to see what the league decides, whether they ban the play or if the Packers’ controversial proposal goes in vain.