PHOENIX — The NFL could turn the ho-hum extra point into a cliff-hanger as soon as the upcoming season.
Giants co-owner John Mara, a powerful member of the league’s competition committee, said Sunday momentum is gaining to move the PAT all the way back to the 15-yard line from its current (virtually automatic) spot at the 2.
The change is being pushed by Patriots coach Bill Belichick, and Mara indicated here on the eve of this week’s NFL owners meetings that 33-yard extra points might actually pass.
“We’ve had a lot of discussions about that,” Mara said at the Arizona Biltmore hotel. “I think that one has a chance. I don’t know if it’s going to get [the minimum amount of] votes, but I happen to be in favor of that one.”
The change wouldn’t exactly come out of the blue, either. The NFL experimented with a 33-yard PAT in the first two weeks of the preseason last year, and then again in the Pro Bowl here at University of Phoenix Stadium in January.
Kickers missed eight field goals from the longer distance in the exhibition season, then the Colts’ Adam Vinatieri — long one of the league’s most reliable specialists when it comes to PATs — opened eyes by missing two extra points in the Pro Bowl.
Belichick’s proposal has a high mountain to climb, though. It must be approved by at least 24 of the league’s 32 owners in a vote during the meetings after discussion Monday and Tuesday, and those owners have traditionally been loathe to make dramatic rules changes.
But NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell publicly backed making the extra point more difficult during his Super Bowl press conference in January, and Mara sounded Sunday as if he would be willing to lobby his fellow owners to make the PAT exponentially more difficult.
The reason? Kickers have all but turned it into a useless play in recent years. Just two extra points were missed all last season (one each by the Rams and Bills), and the PAT success rate was a staggering 99.6 percent in 2013 as teams connected on 1,262 out of 1,267 tries.
“I think it’s a good proposal because we have a play right now that is a ceremonial play,” Mara said. “Why not make it competitive?”
The NFL also experimented with narrower goal posts in the Pro Bowl, bringing them in 4 feet to 14 feet-wide, but there doesn’t appear to be any push to do that during the actual season anytime soon.
Vinatieri missed a 38-yard chip shot in the Pro Bowl and said at the time that kickers would put up a fight if the narrower posts were implemented.
“Anytime you make our job more difficult, no kicker is going to be happy with that,” Vinatieri said at the Pro Bowl.
Mara also indicated Sunday the league’s playoff field could expand to 14 teams (from its current 12) as soon as the 2016 season, but that Belichick’s push to expand challenges and replay to all plays — particularly interference penalties — is unlikely to pass, at least this year.