When you have either, Murray, Hanson, or Prater for most 40 years, you tend to get a little spoiled.
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Checkout Hanson and Murrayās career numbers. They wouldnāt even be top 20 kickers in todays nfl
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Go back further and add Errol Mann ('68 - '76) and Benny Ricardo ('77 - '79).
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Very good point! I just looked up Hanson, career 82.4% on field goals. There were more than 10 kickers last year over 90%. Very interesting that Hanson wasnāt nearly as good as compared to the kickers in modern football.
Eddie Murrayās percentage was only 75.5%, which would get you fired almost immediately in the modern NFL. Seibert is at 80% for his career in comparison and many people are calling for his job. Interesting.
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Really interesting. Whatās even more interesting is that I feel like teams are more likely now to go for it on 4th and short inside their opponentās territory than they were back in the day, even though statistically, field goal kickers are better now than they were. Imagine what the analytics would say back in the day if your teamās kicker was only about 70% accurate instead of 90% accurate.
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He will make the HOF. Heās already recognized as the GOAT IMO.
TBH ? I donāt either . yet kickers sometimes are the difference wether we win or lose a game/good kickers that is.
Yeahā¦ I donāt understand why people complain about spending a late round pick on a stud kicker.
A majority of players taken after the 4th round donāt stay with their original team for more than 2 years.
Meanwhileā¦ if you can get a kicker like Evan McPherson in the 5th roundā¦ you look pretty smart.
I also bet a bunch of Vikings fans still curse Zimmer for giving up on 5th round pick Daniel Carlson after only 4 FG attemptsā¦ since he has gone on to make 90% of his FGs for the Raidersā¦ including 15 of 18 from 50+ yardsā¦ 
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Conversely, Nate Freese is out of the NFLā¦ I looked his college stats up out of curiosity, and he hit 86% of his attempts in college, including multiple from 50+ā¦ so maybe my whole āit should be easy to scout kickersā theory isnāt quite as solid as Iād like to think.
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But during their era, they were both easily top 5. Bart Starr and Bobby Layne probably wouldnāt get an invite to training camp in todayās nfl.
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Iām not sure any position group is guaranteed successā¦
but Zimmer gave up on Carlson after 2 gamesā¦
when he missed 3 FGs in a single gameā¦
2 of which were 48 & 49 yardsā¦.
and 2 of them were in OTā¦ against a division rivalā¦
on the roadā¦. in the most (in)famous stadium of NFL history.
I havenāt run the numbersā¦. but I would venture a guess that MOST drafted kickers have successful careers.
Just looking back at Freeseā¦ he played in only three games in 2014 for us, and was 3/7 on FGs, (0-4 beyond 40 yards). Got canned, and we ended up with Prater after a two week 1/5 showing by Alex Henery.
The crazy thing is that Freese was 90% accurate his junior year in college, and 100% accurate in his senior year- 20/20, including going 4/4 from 40-50 yards and 2/2 from 50+. The two years before we drafted him, he was 38/40! He had a bad start w/ us, got cut, and as far as I can tell, never even got a tryout with another NFL team. Alex Henery was an 85%+ kicker for the Eagles for 3 years before getting cut, and then went 1/5 with us and never played in the NFL again.
Basically, if the NFL treated QBs like they treat kickers, Goff would have been replaced after 3 weeks last year, and no other team in the league would have even called him for a tryout.
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Just looking into Nate Freese. It looks like he didnāt really care about his career. Ok, so you got cut. There are 31 other NFL teams, there is the CFL, Europe, USFL or similar. He could have found a job if he wanted.
Could he have though? Iām kind of tempted to go down a rabbit hole on this, but Alex Henery doesnāt appear to have gotten another chance after going 1/5 with us over 2 games, either. And he had three years of high-quality NFL play on his resume.
It sure looks like (from a very small sample size) that if you are a kicker that gets cut mid-season for performance reasons, youāre pretty much done in the NFL. Obviously some guys take better contracts, or get beaten out in pre-season by a cheaper rookie, etc., but getting cut during the season is apparently the kiss of death.
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The change in philosophy is twofold. They are going for it more often in certain situationsā¦particularly super short field goals. While also being willing to take much longer field goal attempts instead of punting. I think they have increased 50+ yard field goals by 400% since the 90s, or something ridiculous like that.
our scouts look at ballet classes for our kickers ?
I just realized that Josh Lambo is still not signed.
He is famous for the Urban Meyer catastrophe nowā¦ and he is suing the Jags because Meyer allegedly kicked him while stretching.
On the fieldā¦. prior to the āUrbanā gripā¦ Lambo made 128 of 144 kicksā¦ good for 89% in his careerā¦ which makes him one of the most accurate kickers in history. He also has a good leg and had made 76% of 50+ yard attempts before Meyer Madness.
Even with Meyer and his 0-3 FGs in 2021ā¦ Lambo made 91.6% of his FGs with the Jags in 5 yearsā¦. and was at 95% before the Meyer āmanhandlingā of 2021.
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How is Lambo unemployed???
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Itās a no snitching allowed league. Once you snitch youāre black balled
I can respect a good no snitch policy. That being said his numbers are so good, iād be interested in the Lionās taking a look.
Kickers are weird enough anyways itās not like the rest of the team pays them much attention. So the odds of them creating locker room issues are normally minimal. All that being said the last positionās coaches feel like having issues to deal with in the pecking order would be the specialist room
It is funny that they are hard to find, often determine the outcome of games, yet are drafted low and paid less. Supply and demand paradox.
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90% on extra points really sucks though. Although Seibert isnāt any better, also 90%.
Justin Tucker, the bar of excellence, at 99%.
Patterson, the guy we cut, at 100%.
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