Packers launch effort to ban Eagles tush push

How does the old saying go? “If you can’t beat ‘em, submit a proposal to change the rules so then maybe you can beat ‘em?”

We’re not certain that’s the phrase, but the Packers sure think it is. The organization submitted a proposal to the league on Monday to ban the Eagles’ tush push. A play that the Eagles perfected and that the Packers can neither stop on defense nor execute on offense. Embarrassing.

In other Philly sports news, the Sixers had a brutal day (even by their own standards). And On Pattison caught up with the man who documented his same-day, round-trip excursion from Philly to Clearwooder on Sunday.

In the email today:

• 🪦 Sixers quietly announce that the tank is on in blowout loss to Bulls

• ⭐ Star of viral Philly-to-Clearwater day trip video talks with On Pattison

• 🧀 Packers want Brotherly Shove banned because of course they do

  • 📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

  • 📊 Poll

  • 🔗 Links

  • 📺 Coming Up

On Monday in Sixerland, it was another day, another not-very-encouraging Joel Embiid update.

In other words, Embiid’s future is even muddier than previously thought. If surgery isn’t guaranteed to fix him, and the Sixers don’t figure something out, the Ryan Howard parallels get real, and real scary, in a hurry.

So that’s Embiid’s (and by extension the Sixers’) future. Unfortunately, their present is incredibly even worse.

Last night, the Sixers hosted the Chicago Bulls. At 22-35 entering play, the Bulls had a 1.5 game lead over the Sixers for the last play-in spot. That’s a must-win for the Sixers, right?

Well, the Sixers gave up 75 points in the first half and trailed by 17 at the break. That’s not really the effort of a team fighting to stay in the play-in discussion. That’s the effort of a team that is desperate to keep its first-round pick.

They heard you, Rome. It was 115-76 Bulls after the third quarter. The fourth quarter was only important to parlay bettors, alternate spread players and masochists.

The Sixers were actually favored by six in this game, which is remarkable in its own right. We wish we had been on this downfall sooner, too.

After last night, it’s hard to imagine the Sixers will be favored again any time soon. If they’re smart, that’s how it will stay.

"It's currently 4:00 a.m. in Philly, and there is a 1:00 p.m. Phillies game today in Clearwater, Florida," says Eric Lord--a TikToker, Philly native, and lifelong Fightins fan--in a video that made the social media rounds on Monday. "I'm going empty-handed, I'm going to make it, and I'm going to make it to work tomorrow."

Lord made his trip on Sunday. By 9:00 a.m., he was in sunny Florida sporting a t-shirt, knocking down drinks and making friends. We see him at the 1:00 p.m Phillies game living the dream, and we see him partying postgame in a Clearwater bar.

We also see him dragging ass on his way back to Philly. "I have work tomorrow, fuck," says a smiling, inebriated Lord near the end of his vid.

So did he make it to work on Monday morning?

"I actually did," said Lord to On Pattison on Monday evening. "My alarms woke me up on time, I was actually earlier than I usually was. So all was good. I'm a seasoned vet at this point, I handled it well."

What a pro.

On Pattison also asked Lord about his philosophy on life. Is the purpose of our time on this earth truly to get drunk and have fun, as he states in the video?

"At the end of the day, if you got drunk and had fun, what else matters?"

No argument here.

Lord said he frequently travels for Philly sports away games: "I will travel for Eagles, Phillies . . . I was thinking, man, it's really cold this week, and it's really windy. I'm kind of tired of this. Where are the Sixers at? They're home. Flyers are home. Phillies! Clearwater! That sounds like paradise right now . . . So I booked it right away."

Lord was luckier than any fans who hoped to see Phillies regulars take on Paul Skenes and the Pirates Monday afternoon, as that game was rained out.

"I did check the weather," said Lord.

Again, the man is a pro.

Follow Lord on TikTok at @EricLord7 to live vicariously through his adventures.

It was a very sleepy sports Monday here at On Pattison until the late afternoon news wave gave us this juicy present.

You remember the Packers. They’re the team that lost to the Eagles in Brazil to start the 2024 NFL season, then saw basically half their team tap out of the teams’ playoff game.

The NFL’s own web page was initially cagey about which team was doing the complaining.

The seeds of this rule change request were very obviously planted with the Packers’ loss at the Linc in the playoffs. Take a look at this:

Translation: “We can’t stop that play. The Eagles are in our conference and knocked us out of the playoffs. Make them stop!”

Getting rid of this play will be more difficult than the Packers might imagine. Again from the Shook story: “The ‘Tush Push’ has drawn the ire of opponents…justifying its illegality, however, could be difficult.”

Perhaps the best argument for not eliminating the play is that there’s already a means in the rules of the game to stop it: Don’t let the Eagles get to 3rd and one or 4th and one.

And the Packers can’t do much about the optics of trying to ban a play that they can neither stop nor, apparently, execute themselves.

The Green Bay Packers used to be a proper NFL franchise. Imagine being stuck rooting for them now. Whiny bitches.

Better yet, don’t. Maybe rewatch the Eagles sending half a dozen Packers to the blue tent in January instead.

📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

On February 25, 1972, the Phillies made a pretty good trade.

📊 Poll

Results from Monday:

The stage is all yours, Phillies.

🔗 Links

• 🏈 Penn State standout Abdul Carter will not work out at the NFL Scouting Combine.

• 🎙️ Legendary sportscaster Al Trautwig is dead at 68.

• 🗽 Giancarlo Stanton is getting an early start on his standard doctors’ visits.

• 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Manchester United’s new ownership is cutting costs in the wake of hundreds of millions of dollars in recent losses.

• 🤠 The Dallas Cowboys are going to be, um, “selectively aggressive” in free agency. Right.

📺 Coming Up

Games before our next send.

Tuesday, February 25, 2025

• Flyers vs. Penguins, 7:00 p.m. (NBC Sports Philadelphia)

Thanks for reading. See you tomorrow.

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