The league says it's considering moving touchbacks to the 35-yard line from the 30. This after moving them from the 20, to the 25. First they tried to kill the kick return, which their research has shown causes the most injuries among NFL plays, and now they're trying to bring it back.
It's a little weird. They moved touchbacks to the 25-yard-line to encourage teams to stay in the end zone, and that worked. Twenty years ago, teams averaged 60-65 kick returns per season, about 4 per game. Ten years ago, that number had dropped to about 30, which can be explained both by teams choosing to bring fewer kicks out of the end zone, and kickers legs getting stronger (and more kickoff specialists) and booting balls through the end zone. At the time, this was what the league wanted.
But they've changed their minds, concerned that the play has become a bore. Which it has. So last year heralded the "dynamic kickoff" where teams were encouraged to place kickoffs in a "landing zone" that could be returned. Touchbacks would be placed at the 30, with the idea being that teams wouldn't want to give their opponents such good field position, so there'd be more returns.
But they messed that one up, since the original plan was that touchbacks would be placed at the 35 (which might have yielded the desired results) but it was modified last minute to the 30. That wasn't enough incentive; we still had a lot of touchbacks.
The NFL proudly points out that kick returns were up 57 percent last year, from 587 league-wide in 2023 to 920 in 2024. They can look at that and say things are working. But a little history is in order, since even that is nearly 100 returns below 2022 (1,011) and 200 below 2021 (1,101). And less than half of what it was 15 years ago, when there were over 2,000 kick returns league-wide.
In short, the league is trying to have it both ways, trying to generate excitement from a play they've gradually killed off. Yeah, returns were up last year from 2023, but they're still far, far below the times when kick returns actually mattered in the NFL.
For the sake of discussion, let's say the league is concerned about player safety. The inexorable march to an 18-game season belies this, of course, as does the league's weak attempt to justify it by saying they'll be taking away another exhibition game, so the total number of NFL games will stay the same -- as if we're too stupid to realize that most starters don't play much in the preseason, but will be needed to play throughout all the regular-season games.
Bottom line is that the league's current efforts to increase the number of kick returns still fall well short of what they used to be. And if at some point another change (moving touchbacks to the 35, or 40) dramatically increases the number of returns, rest assured the injury numbers will climb back up, and the league will say, Well, damn, that wasn't what we were going for.
The table below shows the kick return touchdowns by team over the last 20 years, in 5-year increments. From 2005-2009, there were 77 kick return touchdowns -- nearly 16 per season, worth factoring into fantasy defense rankings so you could get the teams best in this area (Jets, Vikings, Texans and Bears were all pretty good back then). Over the past 5 years, there have been 33 total; about 7 per season, with only Dallas (whose returner KaVontae Turpin is pictured) having more than 3 TDs, total, in that span. Barely a blip.
| KICK RETURN TOUCHDOWNS, 2005-2024 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Team | '05-'09 | '10-'14 | '15-'19 | '20-'24 | Total |
| NY Jets | 8 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 15 |
| Minnesota | 4 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 15 |
| Houston | 7 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 10 |
| Chicago | 6 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 10 |
| Seattle | 2 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 10 |
| Baltimore | 2 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 10 |
| New England | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 10 |
| Buffalo | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 9 |
| Washington | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 8 |
| Kansas City | 2 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 8 |
| Cleveland | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8 |
| Arizona | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 7 |
| Las Vegas | 2 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 6 |
| Miami | 2 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 6 |
| Dallas | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 5 |
| Indianapolis | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Cincinnati | 2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 5 |
| NY Giants | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Denver | 1 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| Tennessee | 0 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Philadelphia | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 5 |
| LA Chargers | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| Jacksonville | 3 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Detroit | 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 4 |
| Tampa Bay | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| San Francisco | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Pittsburgh | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Green Bay | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| LA Rams | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| New Orleans | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| Atlanta | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Carolina | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| NFL | 77 | 58 | 33 | 33 | 201 |
The league can talk about last year's 57 percent increase in kick returns, but they're still a long way from making the play nearly as relevant as it used to be.
--Andy Richardson