The NFL’s new extra point sucks.

The season has begun, and 10 out of 10 Houston Texans kickers agree with me.  The NFL’s new extra point setup sucks.

Okay, it doesn’t suck, it’s just not the best option out there.
The story all starts with the NFL competition committee’s meeting in the offseason which had three proposals.  The ultimate selection was what we saw instituted this year.  One of the other proposals was very similar to the accepted proposal, but it put the line of scrimmage for the two point conversion at the one yard line in place of the two.  For those who have missed Week 1 in the NFL, the PAT was moved back to become a 33 yard try (snapped from the 15 yard line) instead of being placed at the 2.
“But that’s good, I’m sick of extra points being automatic!” you may be screaming from behind your computer screen (but hopefully you’re not because you’re a well adjusted human being who can function perfectly normal while reading a nobody’s blog on the internet).  I certainly don’t disagree that the PAT being automatic is boring, but let’s look at why the NFL’s new setup sucks.

1.  It eliminates the opportunity for a fake PAT on a 2 point conversion attempt.  If you want to try to surprise the defense any more, you’ll end up having to line up on the 2 (side note: I suppose you could fake a PAT from the 15, and that would be ballsyamazing to watch.  I’m looking in your direction, Chip Kelly.
2. Essentially all it does is penalize kickers, who lose value in this setup.  A kick from the 23 yard line in Green Bay in December is more or less a crapshoot.  With long field goals unlikely and PATs now more challenging, will teams in northern climates eschew carrying a kicker past November 15? I doubt it, since the NFL is, after all, an institution of tradition, but it certainly could be the case.
3. Much to the chagrin of Doug Flutie, the drop kick PAT is probably now out of the question. Sure, the Flutie PAT was a gimmick, or a polite headnod to a man who gave the city of Boston the football spirit before the Patriots (insert verb of your choice from the following: cheated, fairly conquered) their way to 4 Super Bowls in a decade.  However, the drop kick, if applied in the right environment, could have turned into a sort of Zone Read Option for PATs.  Scene: QB is in (a deep) shotgun.  Spread offense.  Not ready for the 2 point conversion, the defense scurries.  If a receiver is open, the snap and the throw.  Boom, 2 points.  If not, progress with the drop kick.  Boom, 1 point.

So with all of that said, what’s the way to fix the PAT, you may ask? The solution is simple, and comes from the old days of football, or currently, its cousin rugby.
In rugby, when you score a touchdown (called a try), you have to put the ball down in the end zone.  Yes, in rugby you literally touch the ball down, which is how it used to be done in American football until the rule was eliminated in 1900.  The conversion (also called such in rugby) is kicked from that same spot on the field (but moved back to where the conversion is kicked from). As such, many of the players will attempt to touch the ball down between the goal posts in the middle of the field.  However, occasionally a diving try in the corner happens, and when that happens, the conversion comes at a challenging angle.
For an example, check this out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnStVUDcckM

As you can see, this is not the easiest of tasks, and copying this rule over to the NFL could provide some very watchable conversion attempts. This would mean that teams still try both 1 and 2 point conversions from the 2, as historically they have.  The twist? That fade pattern in the far corner of the end zone becomes a lot less valuable when the ball is spotted on the 2 and about 20 yards wide.  Of course, a slight modification to this rule could be that the ball is to be placed between the numbers at the 2 yard line to ensure that unbalanced lines aren’t too absurd (though personally I would prefer with no limit, as the idea of having the snap from the “center” when the ball is almost on the sideline sounds really interesting to me, though it would require modifications or exemptions to existing rules surrounding number of players on each side of the ball.  The benefits to this system are threefold:
1. The strategy involved towards the goal line becomes more hard nosed.  A pitch to the side of the field makes the extra point more challenging, while running right at the heart of the defense is rewarded.
2. It achieves the NFL’s goal of encouraging two point conversions and making the PAT less automatic.  If you throw one of the previously mentioned fades into the corner of the end zone, your 1 point conversion won’t look as appetizing, but running an offset formation far on one side of the field may make a 2 point conversion more likely.
3. It would make some interesting PAT strategy.  Would you rather snap it back 15 yards instead of the normal 7 when you have the angle? Surely misses would still increase, as kicking at an angle is something that most kickers have never done in their life. Maybe you snap it, run it to the middle, and drop kick? Who knows, but any opportunity to drop kick should be seized, if you ask me.

To me, this seems like a simple solution that meets all the needs of the league. However, in their typical “actively trying to make football less fun” they have opted to take the easy option, and simply move the PAT back to the 15.  We will see how it turns out over this year, but my guess is that the proposal above would spice up the game miles more than the NFL’s new rule.