PALM BEACH, Fla. — After a few days of debate about the fate of the Tush Push, Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie weighed in to close out the 2025 NFL owners meetings on Tuesday afternoon.
And, no, he definitely doesn’t think the play should be banned.
“It's ironic that people would bring up health and safety,” Lurie said on Tuesday. “We're at the top of the game in terms of wanting health and safety on every play. We voted for hip-drop tackle and defenseless receiver. We will always, always support what is safer for the players. It's a no-brainer.
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“If this is proven to be less safe for the players, we will be against the Tush Push. But until that's the case, to me, there'd be no reason to ban this play.”
Entering this week’s annual NFL meetings, the Green Bay Packers had proposed a rule change that would ban the push element of the Eagles’ signature play. But that debate was tabled on Tuesday and will likely be discussed again at the next league meetings in May after some rewriting of the proposal.
While the proposal was tabled before an official vote, reports indicate that support was split right down the middle 16-16 out of 32 owners. In order for any rule proposal to pass, 24 votes are required.
So will tabling the debate and fine-tuning the wording of the proposal gain an extra eight votes? It seems possible. But the Eagles aren’t going down without a fight and Lurie on Tuesday publicly made his case for keeping the play legal.
NFL
The NFL has previously said there were zero injuries on the play in 2024 league-wide but this week, the word “proactive” has been thrown around in regard to preventing future injuries.
“We've been very open to whatever data exists on the Tush Push and there's just been no data that shows that it isn't a very, very safe play,” Lurie said. “If it weren't, we wouldn't be pushing the Tush Push.
“But I think, first of all, it's a precision play. It's very practiced. We devote a lot of resources to the Tush Push. We think we have an unusual use of personnel because we have a quarterback (Jalen Hurts) that can squat over 600 pounds and an offensive line that's filled with All-Pro players. That combination with incredible, detailed coaching with Coach (Jeff) Stoutland, has created a play we can be very successful at. There's other ways of gaining that half yard, that yard. There's quarterback sneaks, other types, but we've been very, very good at it.”
Lurie on Tuesday actually argued that the Tush Push version of the quarterback sneak is safer than the traditional version of the play. His point was that quarterbacks on a traditional sneak are less protected by the players around them.
While the Packers cited player safety in their initial proposal, Competition Committee chairman Rich McKay on Tuesday divulged that there were other reasons teams want the play banned, specifically aesthetics. That came up during the 30-40 minutes of debate this week.
Even though this rule change proposal entered the week under the guise of player safety, several teams basically argued that the Tush Push doesn’t look like a traditional football play.
“You know what?” Lurie said. “I remember reading about the forward pass and they said it really was an odd play that is no part of American football. It was controversial when the forward pass came out. I think aestheticism is very subjective. I've never judged whether a play looks, OK. Does a screen pass look better than an in-route or an out-route? I don't know. To me, it's not a very relevant critique that it doesn't look right or something like that. I don't know what looks right. Scoring. We like to win and score.”
The Eagles spent the week at The Breakers fighting for a play that they have been able to perfect, unlike most of the other teams who have tried it. They’ll likely continue to battle for it going into the meetings in May.
Although it seems possible all these efforts might be in vain if the league wants to return to pre-2004 rules, which prohibited pushing or pulling on all plays.
“I don't ever remember a play being banned because a single team or a few teams were running it effectively,” Lurie said. “It's part of what I think I personally, and I think most of us love about football, is it's a chess match. Let the chess match play out.
“And if for any reason it does get banned, we will try to be the very best at short yardage situations. We've got a lot of ideas there, but I think it's a credit to using our personnel in a way. There aren't that many teams that have 600-pound squat quarterbacks and that offensive line. Listen, if there were any injury concern, I would be concerned.”