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" Absolutely nothing gets an NFL crowd out of their seats faster than a returner breaking the first line of defense on a kickoff. To see Devin Hester weave his way to the 40, the 50, and have nothing but daylight between himself and the end zone, is the kind of rare spectacle that causes a rise inside your chest. Unfortunately, in commissioner Roger Goodell&amp;#039;s continued attempt to dismantle football brick-by-brick, he told Time in this week&amp;#039;s issue that he&amp;#039;ll consider eliminating the kickoff from the game this off-season, completely changing the sport in the process. That&amp;#039;s because the kickoff isn&amp;#039;t just exciting; it&amp;#039;s necessary. Football, at its most basic, is about defending territory as two teams line up to fight for the ground beneath their feet. Taking the ball away from someone like Hester, who can influence how an entire game unfolds, changes the value of field position by turning it from a key part of a team&amp;#039;s offensive strategy into a predetermined line of chalk on the field.  Goodell says the move is in the interest of player safety, which is fair enough, but then again, no one has ever made it to the NFL without understanding the inherent danger of the game. And where someone like Goodell, who&amp;#039;s never played on that level, sees only the league&amp;#039;s liability as 22 giants crash into each other, the players can see the art of the movement. The returners see the holes open and collapse, and they&amp;#039;re made safer by their accumulated experience.  Buccaneers coach Greg Schiano became one of the biggest proponents of eliminating the kickoff when he watched one of his Rutgers players become paralyzed during a game two seasons ago. He&amp;#039;s posed the option of giving the scoring team a 4th-and-15 situation from its own 30-yard line and letting them decide whether to punt or go for it. The idea is at least interesting. It&amp;#039;s definitely fun, and it&amp;#039;s probably the best option for youth leagues. But the NFL employs grown men who committed to the risks of a game they&amp;#039;ve played since they were kids. The NFL has already put a halo around kickers, quarterbacks, and defenseless receivers. It&amp;#039;s eliminated the horse-collar tackle, head-to-head hits, and anything near the knee. And with a simple shift of the kickoff from the 30-yard line to the 35 \u2014 installed two years ago \u2014 it has already more than doubled the number of touchbacks per season and drastically limited how a returner can influence the game. Players are safer every year, and the NFL has profited at every turn. It&amp;#039;s time to move on. Thankfully, the NFL isn&amp;#039;t a dictatorship, and Goodell doesn&amp;#039;t command the tides. The competition committee will examine the pros and cons of eliminating the kickoff and determine whether it&amp;#039;s in the best interest of the players and fans. If it disappears, we&amp;#039;ll adjust. We probably won&amp;#039;t stop watching the game we love. We just won&amp;#039;t be watching the game as we now know it. Follow The Culture Blog on RSS and on Twitter at @ESQCulture. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/a17351/eliminating-the-kickoff-14845637/>