NFL Week 12 Contenders: Consider Browns, Vikings, Eagles
Lorenzo Reyes went 2-1 as a pick last week and is ready to carry that energy into Week 12.
Kansas City Chiefs special teams coordinator Dave Taub didn’t mince words when asked for his reaction to President Donald Trump’s recent criticism of the NFL’s dynamic kickoff rule.
Taub, who has been a special teams coordinator at the NFL level since the 2004 season, made it clear during his media availability on Nov. 20 that he doesn’t care what the president thinks about the play.
“He doesn’t even know what he’s looking at. He has no idea what’s going on with the kickoff rule,” Taub said, referring to President Trump. “Take it for what it’s worth. And I hope he hears it.”
Taub’s comments come just over a week after President Trump called the dynamic kickoff “terrible” during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show.”
“I hate football kickoffs,” Trump said on his Nov. 11 show. “I think it’s very bad, I think it’s very humiliating. I think it’s detrimental to the game, and I think it’s detrimental to the glamorous event.” “I told Roger Goodell that, and I don’t think it’s any safer. I mean, you still have people running into each other.”
“The ball is in the air and no one is moving. When the ball is in the air, when the ball is played, it should be moving. The glamor of the game has been severely tarnished. NFL, they’re doing what they want to do. I don’t think they’re going to change. I hope college football doesn’t change because the power of the kickoff was so beautiful.”
The NFL introduced the dynamic kickoff used in the XFL’s 2020 and 2023 seasons to the 2024 NFL season. The purpose of introducing the new kickoff was to create more return opportunities when kicking while limiting the amount of full speed collisions that occurred during the old kickoff setup.
The NFL has so far argued that dynamic kickoffs are safer than original kickoffs, with kick return rates increasing from a historic low of 21.8% in 2023 to 32.8% in 2024, according to the league.
And while the NFL has so far not released complete data on kicks during the 2025 season, the league reported that the kickoff return rate reached a significant increase of 81.3% after five weeks.
