There were not enough teams that wanted to change the rule for defensive holding and illegal contact.
According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Lions’ proposal to eliminate an automatic first down for the penalty did not pass on a vote of the 32 teams at the annual league meeting in Palm Beach on Tuesday.
The rule change needed 24 of 32 votes to pass. The count has not yet been reported.
Detroit had cited “competitive equity” as the reason for wanting to change the rule in its proposal.
The Lions have been called for numerous defensive holding and illegal contact penalties over the last few seasons. But they could not find enough teams to side with them to change the rules.
