The UFL Rules the NFL Should Steal

Dean Blandino has a list. The UFL is doing things the NFL should seriously think about, and Blandino is happy to walk through them.

He starts with the four-point field goal. In the UFL, kicks of 60 yards or further are worth four. He doesn't expect the NFL to go that far, but he also reminds the audience that he would have laughed off the kickoff rule that everyone now watches every Sunday. The XFL started that kickoff alignment in 2020. Four years later, the NFL is running the same setup.

His real pitch is transparency. In the UFL, Blandino and Mike Pereira are live in the command center. You can hear what they are saying. You can hear the officials. You may not always agree with the call, but you understand why. That, he argues, takes air out of the conspiracy theories and the angst that follow every disputed play.

Rich asks if the NFL would ever mic up Walt Anderson. Blandino thinks the league should consider it, but he is honest about the hurdles. The NFL can have eight or nine games in the same Sunday window. You have to pick the right people. Some replay conversations and some sideline conversations should not go over the air.

He also flags a real side effect. If officials know they are being broadcast, their communication may get guarded. That can hurt the game. His recommendation is to crawl before you run. Start with primetime. Start with one-off games. Build the muscle before making it league-wide.

Blandino frames the case for transparency in stakes. Players' careers, coaches' careers, and a sports betting market now make every call heavier. More transparency is better for everyone.

Rich brings up a specific moment that would have benefited. The two-point conversion play between the Rams and Seahawks where the question on the table was whether Terry McAulay opining on the Prime Video broadcast actually triggered the league's review from New York. Blandino admits that is always the downside. But transparency, he argues, forces everyone to tighten their communication.

He goes further on that play. The delay was unacceptable. Forward-backward pass was reviewable. The recovery was the key question. Seahawks recovered in the end zone, by rule they get the ball there. The process should have moved. 90 seconds or two minutes of dead air is a failure of the system, not a feature of it.

Blandino's pitch is not revolution. It is evolution with a broadcast feed.