A Sensible Overtime Proposal for All of Football

Three lead changes after the two-minute warning. Patrick Mahomes setting up a game-tying, 49-yard field goal as time expired in regulation after getting the ball with just 13 seconds to work with. One of the greatest NFL playoff games ever played and it all came down to a coin toss. Josh Allen, despite throwing for more than 300 yards and four touchdowns, never touched the ball in overtime.

Obviously, I'm not alone in lamenting the absurdity of the NFL's overtime rules. I think a majority of us agree, especially after watching a heavyweight battle like we saw last night, that a system where one of the best quarterbacks in the League doesn't get at least a chance to score is dumb. I was actually naive enough five years ago to think this happening in the Super Bowl might have changed something, but it was the Falcons losing to the Patriots so nobody actually cared. We'd have different OT rules already if those teams were flipped, but I digress.

But then I saw a tweet this morning talking about how much better college overtime is than the NFL.

Well, that's no longer really true, either. It was when that game was played in 2018, but then the overlords of college football watched this amazing, captivating performance and decided we needed to put a stop to having fun. Now if a college game gets to a third OT, it becomes some perverted mini-game of two-point conversions, completely invalidating the 60 minutes of football which preceded it. Go watch Illinois and Penn State trade two-point conversion attempts for nine overtimes from this past season and tell me that's how we want to potentially decide a College Football Playoff game.

Both of these sets of overtime rules have their flaws. So I am here to propose a sensible solution. Implement these rules in both college and the NFL and let's decide the most important and closely contested football games fairly.

College was so close to having it perfect before, but the 25-yard line is too close to start out with — let's not forget the fact that Tennessee was screwed by a call in overtime in the Music City Bowl and then there was really nothing the Vols' defense could do to save the game since Purdue started already in field goal range.

In my perfect overtime, the first period sees each team get the ball at their own 40-yard line with a chance to score. If the teams are still tied after an overtime period, the ball then moves to the 50-yard line and we do it again. Each succeeding OT sees the ball move 10 yards closer to the goal line, with the 10-yard line being the starting point for the sixth overtime on.

This puts both teams' offenses and defenses on the field at least once, gives a defense a realistic chance to keep a game alive if the offense comes up empty and gives us a fair way to decide a game. I believe it would create fewer of the long OT games we saw in college with the ball starting on the minus side of the field, as well.

I don't see how anyone could watch Josh Allen last night and say, "Yep, I'm fine with him not getting the ball in overtime." Fix it.