The biggest news coming out of the NFL today was, by far, the failure of the Green Bay Packers to get the "tush push" banned. The Indianapolis Colts were assumed to be one of the teams in support of the play, having used it on the field themselves. Chris Ballard has voiced his support for it, and Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni (more on him later) even gave a veiled threat to current Colts head coach Shane Steichen about the issue.
"We’ll see how it goes. All I will say about it is (Jonathan) Gannon, (Shane) Steichen and (Kellen) Moore better vote for it. They are in the (head coach) position right now because of that play. So all three, I better have those three votes right there and the ’ vote. I at least know we have four.”
Yikes.
Needless to say, the Colts were one of the 22 teams who voted for the tush push to be banned, which fell two votes short of what was needed for the ban to take effect. Sirianni must be fuming right now.
The tush push, for those not familiar, is basically a quarterback sneak play on steroids. When a team needs just a yard or so to get to the first down, the quarterback holds onto the ball and is literally pushed forward by the players behind him. The Eagles have become the most famous users of this play, but it didn't originate in Philadelphia. Fun fact: the tush push was created by Sirianni... when he was the offensive coordinator in Indianapolis.
In 2020, Sirianni put Jacoby Brissett in to run what would become known as the tush push, in a game against the Tennessee Titans. It became legendary... and, of course, controversial.
So that in and of itself makes it incredibly strange for the Colts to oppose the tush push, but when you add in that they have continued to use the play themselves, it's even stranger.
Furthermore, they have two quarterbacks - Anthony Richardson and Daniel Jones - who are practically made for the tush push. Both have the size and athleticism to be formidable with this play, and they have Tyler Warren at tight end now, too. Steichen has previously spoke in favor of it, so we can only assume that there was some serious miscommunication between Ballard, Steichen, and Irsay.
But for now - Colts nation should be glad this effort failed.