The Rams have indeed made a proposal based on the nutty two-point play from the Week 16 overtime thriller in Seattle.
The initial report merely explained that a proposal was submitted. The details of the proposal have emerged.
Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the Rams have made two separate proposals. Under the first, a backward pass that is tipped by a defensive player and goes past the line of scrimmage would be treated like a fumble. This means that, during the final two minutes of a half, on fourth down, or on a conversion attempt, only the player who fumbled can recover the ball and advance it. If another offensive player recovers the ball, the offense gets the ball at the spot of the fumble.
As applied to the two-point attempt in Rams-Seahawks, the recovery of the loose ball in the end zone by running back Zach Charbonnet would not have resulted in a successful conversion. Seattle would have gotten two points only if quarterback Sam Darnold had recovered the ball.
Although that same situation will rarely happen, the reasoning makes sense. The defense disrupted the attempted backward pass. A fluke bounce sent the live ball beyond the line of scrimmage. In the situations where a fumble can't be recovered and advanced by any player except the one who fumbled it, a backward pass that is batted beyond the line of scrimmage would be treated the same way.
The Rams' second proposal would limit the time for the initiation of a replay review, capping it at either 40 seconds or a minute. Basically, if the replay process is going to activate, it needs to happen more quickly in order to keep the game moving.
For the Seahawks-Rams play, 100 seconds elapsed between the time Charbonnet recovered the ball and the moment referee Brad Allen announced that the play was under further review. The kickoff and kick-return teams were on the field and ready to proceed. The absence of a specific deadline for starting the review process allows potentially protracted delays — and opens the door for (as happened in this case) someone from outside the apparatus alerting the league to the potential need for a review.
While the league eventually got the Rams-Seahawks play right, the Rams' thinking is that no review should take that long to get started. As it relates to the quirk that allows backward passes to hit the ground and be recovered and advanced, the Rams' proposal would eliminate situations in which the backward pass is deflected forward and crosses the line of scrimmage.
Again, something like this may not happen again, for years. It makes sense, now that the league has witnessed that specific outcome, for the NFL to consider whether it wants to allow that same thing to possibly happen in the future.