Jonathan Gannon Sounds Off on NFL’s Tackling Crisis

“We were just talking about that," said Gannon when asked about how to improve tackling during a week of practice.

"You can definitely practice that — in my opinion, it's a skill. This is a long dissertation on that, so I'll try to give you the cliff notes. How the rules are set up, it's hard to get better as a tackler being in the NFL. I'll say that. I will say this, because we tackle every day — drill it in some way, shape, or form because that's one of the top skills of any defensive player — there's no drill you can do that can mimic a game. There's not. It's too chaotic of an environment to drill it.

"A lot of ways that you can try to do it, but you just have to keep harping on the fundamentals and the details of it. We try to obviously have language that we use that keeps it simple in their head. I always think you have to tackle better, but it's hard.”

As highlighted by ESPN's Josh Weinfuss, the current NFL CBA says teams are allowed up to 14 padded practices, though 11 of them have to take place during the first 11 weeks of the season.

Contact is also prohibited during the offseason.

“The rules are the rules," said Gannon, who also added he doesn't plan to advocate for change.

“I'm not going to lobby for anything. I just play by the rules. Why I say that is if you're talking about skill development, right? Now I'm going to go on a tangent now, but it would be like (saying), ‘Hey Scotty Scheffler, it's your offseason. Don’t hit a wedge’. It's set up how it's set up, that's fine, but to get better at a skill, you have to practice the skill. You practice skill. You can scale it. You can scale the tempo, and you can scale how you do it, but to practice a skill, you need to practice the skill.

"It's just a conundrum I think all defensive guys’ face. There's risk/reward trying to practice with it however you set things up, but you definitely have to be a good tackling defense to play good defense.”

It's a question, and topic, that continues to carry league-wide interest. The NFL's current CBA runs through 2030, and it's unlikely tackling rules will get lighter with the league eying even more expanded games to the regular season schedule.

“We spent so much time on tasks to that question. That's why I'm passionate about it. And it's a really good question and it's a topic that every year people are talking about," Gannon added.

"Head coaches, defensive coaches, this and that. A lot of people think you can't practice it. You better just acquire people that can tackle because you aren’t going to help them at all. That's a thought process too. To each their own, but it's a challenge.”