National Football League

Should NFL games be allowed to end in a tie?

Updated Nov. 15, 2021 7:27 p.m. ET

By Martin Rogers
FOX Sports Columnist

Ties are never well-received in most American sports, and Sunday wasn’t going to be any different.

After a bizarre afternoon of action between the Detroit Lions and the Pittsburgh Steelers lurched to a 16-16 conclusion at Heinz Field, the unkind descriptions came rolling in.

In various media reports, the first tie of the 2021 National Football League season was called "crazy" and, according to the Detroit Free Press, "unsightly." It was, variously, "ugly and disappointing" and a "comedy of errors," capped by a Steelers fumble with eight seconds remaining in the contest.

The players seemed as bemused as anyone, with Steelers running back Najee Harris admitting that he didn’t know such a result was possible, leaving him somewhat stunned when the teams trotted off to the locker room following an overtime period that was just as empty of scoring as the final 11:31 of regulation.

"Didn't even know you could tie in the NFL," Harris told reporters. "I was sitting on the bench saying, 'I've got another quarter to go.' But someone came to me and said that [was] it. I've never had a tie in my life before."

Ties aren’t especially uncommon in some sports. In soccer, for example, they happen all the time. In Major League Soccer, Nashville SC ended 18 of its 34 games this season in a tie. Boxing matches end in a draw relatively frequently, usually accompanied by some recrimination over the judging.

Even in the NFL, it happens more than you’d think and often enough that it’s extraordinary that there are players — there’s always at least one — who follow in the time-honored tradition of Donovan McNabb and don’t know the rule.

No one especially likes to see a tie in football, but let’s put forward what might be an unpopular theory here: In some cases, it is the right, proper and worthiest outcome.

Neither the Lions nor the Steelers did enough to deserve to stick one in the win column Sunday. "Two muddling teams, fit to be tied," the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review wrote.

They both battled hard, but they fumbled and floundered and couldn’t advance the ball much. There were missed field goals and bountiful turnovers and all kinds of other mistakes that would normally lead to a loss, except for when the other team is doing the same.

For the Lions, it was the obvious end of one streak — they’d lost their previous 12 games — but the continuation of another in that they’ve still, naturally, gone 13 games without actually winning one. In some ways, this is the perfect summary of why they call NFL ties unsatisfying; they don’t really solve anything.

"It’s [the] Twilight Zone," Lions coach Dan Campbell said. "I don’t know what this is, really."

Maybe that’s kind of the point. If a team can’t do enough to earn a win within 70 minutes of football and a system (sudden death after opening possession) directly designed to force a victor, does it deserve another chance to claim one of those precious wins?

There have been five ties in the NFL since the 2017 decision to shorten overtime from 15 minutes to 10, with the Steelers/Lions stalemate the first since Week 3 of last season, when the Cincinnati Bengals and Philadelphia Eagles could not be separated.

There are, of course, alternatives that would mean there would not be ties ever again. The NFL could reduce the likelihood by extending the OT period back to 15 minutes or using its playoff model in the regular season. Or the college formula could be followed, whereby dueling offensive possessions from the 25-yard line take place.

If the last scenario sounds appealing, it can be. Texas A&M’s 74-72 victory over LSU in seven overtimes in 2018 was a classic. But it’s not always like that. For those in favor of the NFL moving that direction, I’d point out a game between Penn State and Illinois a few weeks ago. The final score? Illinois 20, Penn State 18 (9OT).

Nine overtimes? How thrilling! Sounds incredible, right?

Yeah, except that it wasn’t. It was dire, exhausting and overwhelmingly boring. No disrespect to Illinois, which fought hard against a team that was ranked No. 7, but it was a ridiculous way for a game to end. No one could score and, by the time of the merciful end, hardly anyone could stay awake.

And that’s how it sometimes goes in those instances when sports put rules in place to force a definitive result, no matter how long it goes on, no matter how evenly matched the participants.

When Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson duked it out in golf’s initial version of The Match in 2018, they were tied after 18 holes, were still tied after a playoff and then, with darkness descending, finished it off with three holes of a chipping competition from the practice area. What a way to decide the outcome of $9 million — when most agreed a handshake and honors even an hour earlier would have been fine, and no one would have felt shortchanged.

Sometimes, what a game gives us is enough. Sunday’s game was exciting in its own way, head-shaking in others, and truthfully, it didn’t need to go on any longer than it did, despite how odd it feels for things to end while still tied.

"It’s nuts," Lions RB Godwin Igwebuike said, and it was, but trying to force a win when neither team had earned one would have been even more ridiculous.

Martin Rogers is a columnist for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider Newsletter. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.