Photo @ Gerry Boughan | Dreamstime.com
After negotiations, pressure from both sides and a lot of press, the news has come down: The NFL is being allowed to have its athletes play in men’s flag football in 2028.
Well... kinda sorta.
NFL owners passed a resolution, 32-0 at the Spring League Meeting that will allow league players to try out to participate in flag football during the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
According to ESPN, the flag football resolution establishes rules and a basic structure for how the NFL hopes to see the process work, subject to negotiations with the NFLPA and Olympics-related entities. They include:
- Permission for any player under NFL contract to participate in tryouts
- A limit of one player per NFL team on each national team participating
- Allowing, in addition, a team's designated international player to play for his home country
And yes, you read that correctly: Tryouts are going to be held. And it is not guaranteed that NFL players will be successful, since it is universally agreed that flag is a different game from tackle.
Touchdown Talk at Waterset notes, “The disparity in physicality between the two versions of football is striking. Tackle football heavily leans on physical contact and strength, while flag football thrives on quick thinking, strategic plays and agile movements.”
Already, seasoned flag football players have proven that their skillset makes them dominant on the international scene. Team USA Flag Football has been competing at the international level in games sanctioned by the International Federation of American Football (IFAF) for years, with the women’s team winning three IFAF World Championships, and the men, five.
Not all NFL players are signing up and lining up. Several, including Patrick Mahomes and Matthew Stafford, have already publicly distanced themselves from the idea of playing Olympic flag football. Mahomes, who will be 32 at the time of the Games (Stafford will be 40), said it was best to leave the Olympics “to the younger guys.”
Minnesota Vikings linebacker Brian Asamoah dissected the issue a bit more when he spoke to reporters after the NFL's unanimous vote, according to the Washington Post.
“It requires a lot of different abilities that football, in general, doesn’t require, but you definitely have to have speed, elusiveness and being able to get away from people,” Asamoah said, adding, "It’s a completely different game.”
Inside The Games noted that the underlying issue is fundamental: Flag football players cling to their track record, their codes and a game full of nuances that tackler players have yet to master. Former NFL wide receiver Chad 'Ochocinco' Johnson warned during an appearance on Shannon Sharpe's Nightcap podcast that "Doucette's team would beat a squad of NFL stars through the little things, the tricks and nuances of the game."
Additionally, pundits have noted, while a team with a lot of NFL stars could garner good TV ratings from a demographic that might not typically watch the Games, it could also lead to poor performance against seasoned international players – and an early exit from the competition, something that could prove embarrassing to the USA, since it is the home of what is known on the international scene as American Football.
At the lead of the men’s USA Flag Football team – and the guy with the most to lose if he is replaced by an NFL player – is Darrell "Housh" Doucette, the quarterback. And Doucette was a member of the flag team that, in 2018, defeated a team of former NFL players on national television.
Doucette led his team to a 20-point win over the NFL squad, which included running back Justin Forsett and former Seattle Seahawks quarterback Seneca Wallace, and was coached by Michael Johnson, a four-time Olympic gold medalist in track.
And yet, the NFL still lost, decisively.
Side note: Ouch.
In an article published in The Guardian, it was noted that Doucette's success in that 2018 game was largely due to the team's speed, plus the ability to pull off fakes and laterals in a way that the tackle players weren't used to. Flag also has a shorter field, a different system for downs and different penalties that don't exist in the NFL.
“It's entirely two different games,” Doucette said. “You can't really compare flag football and tackle football.”
As a result, NFL players hoping to join the flag football team might find that the game is difficult to adjust to, especially against a squad of players who have been playing the sport for years.
And make no mistake: Doucette is seriously angry about the NFL believing their players are as good as his team.
Doucette told Washington Post reporters, "The flag guys deserve their opportunity. That's all we want. We felt like we worked hard to get the sport to where it's at, and then when the NFL guys spoke about it, it was like we were getting kicked to the side."
The good news for Doucette and his squad is that Commissioner Roger Goodell said at the NFL's recent ownership meeting that USA Football will handle the selection process, not the NFL.
Doucette, for his part, believes the U.S. team is just fine without NFL players, but he told CBS Sports he would be fully supportive if the stars come in and show they are better suited for this opportunity than those who have been playing flag football competitively for years.
“This is a sport that we've played for a long time, and we feel like we are the best at it and we don't need other guys,” Doucette said. “But we all have one goal in mind, and that's to represent our country. We're definitely open to all competition. If those guys come in and ball out and they're better than us, hats off to them. Go win that gold medal for our country.”
There is no word yet as to when tryouts will take place but count on NFL players, if they really want to take the field in 2028, to be brushing up on the rules and trying to sharpen their skills between now and then.
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