Where Has the Scoring Gone? How the New NFL Kickoff Rules are Affecting Fantasy Football

Where, oh where, have all the fantasy points gone? The lamentation and frustration of Fantasy Football players has been heard loudly through two weeks of the NFL regular season, as we have seen historic lows in scoring. Myriad factors affect the modern day NFL product, but perhaps none are depressing the value of our favorite fantasy football players more than the new NFL kickoff rules. That’s right, the rules intended to increase scoring, while protecting the players, are having the opposite effect on the scoreboard. The new kickoff rules are merely the first domino, cascading into toppling the facet of the game that actually matters to us, offense. @The_Coach_A (Cody Alexander) has a great thread in response to @MikeClayNFL about the offensive and defensive adjustments being made this year. It begs the question as to why? I believe NFL defenses had already begun adapting to the modern NFL rules in regards to tackling. However, I believe this has now been exacerbated due to the shortened fields occurring more frequently because of the new kickoff rule.

Let’s start with the most obvious. The way the new NFL kickoff rules affect special teams is the biggest change overall. Not only are we seeing teams employ different personnel than they may have in the past, we’re seeing the team kicking the ball away more routinely take the touchback kick. This results in the offense starting from the 30 yard line. It also negates the possibility of a penalty. Where teams were once starting from between the 10-20 yard line, they are now guaranteed to start at the 30 more often than not. The new rules also facilitate kickoffs for many teams when they do happen, meaning teams are actually starting even further down the field when they have successfully returned a kick for yards. Further compounding a lack of offense is a historical rate of long field goal attempts, as this has become a skill possessed by many NFL kickers. It is not abnormal to see even average NFL kickers attempting 50 yard field goals in today’s NFL.

NFL defenses had already begun adapting to modern play last season, as NFL scoring had already taken a hit in 2023. This is because today’s NFL defenses have realized that it’s all about covering the big plays. As long as you keep the field in front of you, you force NFL quarterbacks to read through their progressions and take smart plays as opposed to open shots downfield. This has been compounded even further this year by the shortened fields NFL teams are playing on. If you’re already starting at the 30-50 yard line, you bet you are covering your endzone by playing variations of Cover 2 or Shell coverages. What this means basically is having two safeties deep, not just one. Teams are playing these safeties deep and bracketing coverage either with underneath zone concepts or man coverage. Only the New York Giants, in the history of the NFL, have managed to lose a football game while scoring three touchdowns more than their opponent. They pulled off this nefarious accomplishment this year, in part because of what we saw in the previous paragraph. It is easier than ever to kick field goals in today’s NFL. It's also because this adaptive style of bend-but-don't-break defense is susceptible to allowing 18-21 points still if they're allowing 6-7 field goals in a game.

Finally, we are seeing the offenses adapt to the new kickoff rules as well. Shortened fields are enticing coaches to run the football more, because it doesn’t take much to position your team for at least 3 points. There are fewer explosive plays, because NFL defenses are less willing to take risks by employing heavy blitz packages when they feel the endzone is closer behind them. Where you once could win the field position battle by playing excellent defense and forcing a team to punt from inside their own 10 yard line, the new kickoff rules make this an almost antiquated concept. Even if you are able to sack the quarterback multiple times, you’re likely not forcing the team to punt from inside of their own endzone. In the past, this short punts, muffed punts or blocked punts, as the punter and special teams simply had less space to operate. What this means for fantasy football scoring is that more than ever, we will need to rely on touchdowns. We are likely to continue seeing less passing attempts on average due to shortened games caused by more rushing attempts, but also less cheap yards due to playing on shortened fields. Unfortunately, touchdowns are perhaps the most fickle and least predictable stat in all of fantasy football.

In conclusion, the domino effect of the new NFL kickoff rules is ruining scoring for fantasy football. Shortened fields mean less yards and more conservative defenses leading to less explosive plays. This also begets a stronger use of the running game as shortened fields mean it is easier to position your team for long field goals, which have become the norm in today’s modern NFL. This in turn literally can make games shorter and give teams less opportunities to make plays. Finally, we’ve seen an erasure of the field position game, as shortened fields mean teams are far less likely to ever find themselves punting from inside their own endzone. This means NFL defenses are less likely to send blitz packages that make them susceptible to a broken play, as there is no upside like there was when you could potentially pin your opponent down inside their own 10 yard line. It remains to be seen if NFL offenses will be able to adapt to the changes this year, or if perhaps we as a fantasy football community will need to adapt on the fly.