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Exactly one week ago today, some genius suggested that the NFL's updated rules for extra points would have modest impact on the 2015 season. That genius took his cues from the league's head coaches, who seemed unmoved by the new 33-yard kick and unwilling to change their game-management approach as a result. At the most, a handful of bad-weather games could be affected.

So it has been more than interesting to note a significant uptick in two-point conversion attempts during the preseason. At the rough midpoint of 33 games, teams already have attempted more two-point plays than they did during all 65 games of the 2014 preseason. At their current pace, they would exceed the league total for last year's entire 256-game regular season.

Let's review the numbers before getting to a few thoughts on what this preseason surge might mean for the regular season.

Teams have missed five of 105 extra-point attempts from the longer distance, a 95.2 percent conversion rate. That figure is lower than the 99.3 percent rate from the 2014 regular season and nearly identical to the rate that place-kickers converted field goals from 30-35 yards in 2014. In other words, the 95.2 percent rate has hit expectations precisely.

There have been 31 two-point conversion attempts, coming after 24 percent of touchdowns scored. During the full 2014 preseason, teams attempted 30 two-point plays on 10 percent of touchdowns scored. In the 2014 regular season, coaches called for 59 two-point plays after 4.6 percent of touchdowns.

The quick analysis: Despite their protestations, NFL coaches are preparing to be more aggressive after touchdowns this season. The extra point will remain their default decision, but they won't turn to it quite as automatically as they did in the past.

Is that in fact the case? We should at least consider a number of explanations unrelated to a philosophical change.

More than anything, the preseason is a time for practice and experimentation. If there is going to be a point in the season when a 33-yard extra point is unfeasible, now is when coaches would test alternatives. Two-point conversion attempts also give them additional goal-line repetitions for assessing backup personnel, and in some cases, they offer an avenue to avoid an unwanted overtime period.

(That's exactly what happened Aug. 14 at Ralph Wilson Stadium. Carolina Panthers coach Ron Rivera went for the win, and got it, after a touchdown closed the deficit to one point with 54 seconds remaining.)

The educated assumption has been that coaches wouldn't flock to the two-point conversion unless it was moved from the 2-yard line to the 1-yard line. The Philadelphia Eagles proposed that rule change during the offseason, but the league's competition committee elected to leave the play untouched.

Late last week, Eagles coach Chip Kelly reiterated to local reporters that he saw no upside in abandoning the 33-yard extra point unless absolutely necessary. It's fair to question whether his protestations are a form of gamesmanship, given his history of using the two-point play in college and the presence of Tim Tebow on his roster, but the Eagles are one of 12 teams not to have attempted a two-point play this preseason.

"I don't think there is anything to entice us," Kelly said. "The ball has been on the 2-yard line for the longest time. So just look at the statistics on trying to get a two-point play. If they wanted to encourage us to go for two, then they should have moved where we were going from two from, but it's always been at [the 2-yard line]."

When it was noted that the extra-point conversion rate is expected to fall at least three percentage points this season, Kelly said: "I'm not hanging my hat on 3 percent. It's 3 percent on extra points and it drops down to under 50 percent on two-point plays."

(Indeed, during the 2015 preseason, teams have converted 14 of those 31 two-point attempts, a 45.2 percent success rate.)

It's reasonable to expect two-point attempts to come more frequently in the preseason. As noted earlier, teams tried them in the 2014 preseason at a rate nearly twice that of their eventual regular-season rate. And many a fool has been lured into projecting regular-season trends based on preseason activity.

But it's certainly worth noting when the apple-to-apple comparison -- preseason vs. preseason -- also reveals a spike. Our genius hasn't been debunked yet, but the trend merits continued inspection.

Statistics courtesy Vince Masi of ESPN Stats & Information.