For the love of logic, put the touch back in touchdown
It’s a contact sport. Yet players can score without contacting the end zone. Why is that?
News Desk: Touchdown rulings we’ll never understand. See below.
All of these plays were ruled touchdowns. Yet never did the ball or ballcarrier touch the end zone. Since 2020, fans have witnessed this more than 400 times.
Clockwise from top left: NBC Sports, Fox Sports, CBS Sports. Fox Sports
Airspace touchdowns 1) occur too often (almost 1 in every 4 games), 2) are farcical to watch, and 3) diminish the game we love. Fans deserve better.
Fix the Rule News: The puzzle of the pylon endures
Why does this site exist? Solid question. It’s largely because the guy running it still can’t understand why ballcarriers can skip making contact with the end zone and still walk off with six points.
Beyond the break-the-plane rule, which we think makes touchdowns too easy, it’s plays around the pylon that are the strangest of all. Here at the halfway point of the NFL’s regular season, check out our compilation of the five oddest touchdown rulings of 2026 so far. Why is hitting the pylon, a fully out-of-bounds field marker, but avoiding the end zone worth six points? It simply makes no sense.
So that is why this site is in its seventh year of documenting no-touch touchdowns. Maybe some fans or coaches will rise up and acknowledge that the existing rules need to be reconsidered. If nothing else would change, we really wish rulemakers would rethink the pylon. That stupid stick is out of bounds. Hitting it should not magically grant a ballcarrier a touchdown.
Check out our Film Room to view multiple compilation clips of touchdown rulings that make logic-loving football purists sigh and just shake their heads.
We shall carry on. Thanks for visiting.
Video: multiple networks; game image: CBS Sports
What if break-the-plane logic was applied to other games?
Hole in one
The ball is clearly breaking the plane of the cup, so it’s in. Put me down for an ace.
Home run
Who cares if the ball is in the glove? It broke the fence’s plane on the fly.
Bucket
Your corner three rimmed out? Easy. It dipped below the rim, so it’s good.
Cornhole
That bag is breaking the plane of the hole. We’ll take three points.
Ringer
Look, the shoe is breaking the plane of the stake. Three points for me.
Inside Fix the Rule
In brief
What we’re up to, in as few words as we can manage.
Concept
Learn about the Super Bowl touchdown that lit our inquisitive fuse.
New rule
Few rules are perfect, but we say our idea is better than the existing rule.
Pylons
What exactly are these orange foam antennae intended to do?
Ratings
Not all ATDs are equal. The ugliest of them earn The Full McEnroe.