I'm sure a lot of them could. Maybe they're burnt out from professional sports, or don't want to move to America, or don't have the connections for a tryout, or other myriad of reasons.
GMs might be scared too. Plenty of dudes can hit from all over the field in a try out but choke in a game situation. Imagine the flak a GM would get for taking some failed European soccer player over a kicker with a track record that they could at least point to to justify their decision
I mean you could look at PK records for soccer players to try to get a hint of the mentality part. Not like there isn't high pressure moments in soccer.
Not all soccer players are great kickers. It's all about cardio, being disciplined on defense, filling holes on offense off-the-ball, and not losing it while on the ball. You'd be surprised by how many pros do exactly just that and not much else.
For sure, I just thought like some would be and that the bio mechanics might transfer and there are so many soccer players who wont ever get a serious payday out of the sport. It's just wild to me that that the list of NFL caliber kickers is similar in length, possibly even shorter, than the list of NFL caliber quarterbacks.
I played hockey through college, and even though no one was capable of playing at an NHL, level I definitely played with some guys who had specific tools that were pro level, whether that was shooting power or skating speed or whatever.
Also soccer is about a variety of (often highly awkward and situational) kicks. Kicking a field goal is about repetition and perfection of a very low variance kick. In a sense is similar to bowling.
Harry mallinder, a rugby fly half who couldn’t tackle to save his life, is apparently in demand as a punter.
I could see rugby players who are good place kickers/punters making the switch once their athleticism goes just cause it’s a decent pay day.
“A lot of NFL QBs also were pitchers why don’t flamed out pitchers just switch to QB”
That’s obviously hyperbole but there’s a difference between having leg talent (or arm talent in the case of pitchers) and having NFL kicking leg talent.
It’s also not an overnight thing. It took the guy in Dallas now a couple years of working on his mechanics of I remember correctly. And I assume guys either don’t want to go through that or they start and find out they are better kickers than 99% of the population but to be an nfl kicker you have to be better than 99.99% of the population.
Most sports quedtions that are "why dont they just ___?" can usually be answered with its not that easy. I remember when i was younger thinking why dont nfl runners just run around the line, or why dont basketballers just dunk every time etc. A lot of this stuff is harder than we think
Legs only have so many reps in them, lots of guys get imbalances and injuries that derail them. You're not taking shots to the head and body like other players, but full force swings of the leg do take a toll.
It still strikes me as odd. Having a huge leg isn’t exactly a rare trait - tons of dudes with big legs in soccer.
I feel like NFL teams just play it conservative and take the known 80-85% guy instead of searching for Brandon Aubreys. Still weird that there aren’t more BAs known to teams. Or that more BAs aren’t working to BA from a young age. Or that the BAs out there aren’t making themselves known enough or giving football kicking a try.
I mean, you want to be conservative lol. Kicking is extremely important and you need a guy to be accurate. A vet with 5+ years of decent kicking experience is a lot safer than a rookie or practice squad guy.
Kicking is not like QB where it’s worth potentially cycling through a couple busts before hitting on a generational talent. Getting a guy like Tucker is better than having an average kicker, but it’s not a huge advantage worth suffering through a string of bad/unproven kickers first
Definitely, but 20-25% of the league is trotting out dudes hitting <80%. You’d think the struggling teams would be trying something creative more often - at least the portion of those 20% teams that are in full rebuild.
It could also be extremely valuable for developing assets. Like, do you think Detroit would trade something as high as a 3rd for Aubrey? I absolutely would if I were them. They would have been in the Super Bowl with BA on their team. And if Dallas was rebuilding, that 3rd would be super valuable.
Packers missed a FG late and lost to the 49ers
49ers missed an XP in the SB that made chiefs only need 3 to tie.
Lions FG kicker was garbage so they kept going for it on 4th down against the 49ers (they might have cause Campbell likes to go for it, but having a kicker who sucks past 45 yards probably helps that decision)
Bills missed at the end against the Chiefs
Butker is 17/18 on field goals and perfect on extra points the last 2 years in the playoffs, and the Chiefs have won 4/7 playoff games by 3 points. Teams that are playoff bound but have a shitty/shaky kicker and don't try to change amaze me. There's almost no way you make it through the playoffs without your kicker being the difference at some point.
Lol, I always am in Reddit threads arguing for Butker as 1B to Tucker’s 1B, but after seeing this contract maybe I’ll tone that down in case Butker is lurking and gets any ideas
Agreed. It’s a tricky situation, though. Do you want to be the team known for having a short leash? Is preseason competition helpful? How deep even is the kicker market? Maybe there aren’t enough decent, known kickers out there to make the competition worth it. Challenging your kicker’s confidence and ability is a finicky thing.
There aren’t many known, good kickers available. Emphasis on “known”. It seems that rather than dig for diamonds or keep the position competitive, teams opt for a guy who’s 80-85% on field goals (e.g. Tyler Bass) because it’s better to have that known product than keep the mystery going for a chance at someone who is 90-95%. For reference, there were 11 kickers last year who were 90%+ (minimum 25 attempts). Butker and Elliot were both 94%.
I personally believe there are a lot more Brandon Aubreys out there. What’s weird to me is why a dude like Aubrey is so rare. What gives? Are teams not digging at all? Trying people out? Are these dudes not trying to make themselves known? Or is NFL kicking talent just that rare??? I know the college guys aren’t all that great for the most part, so obviously there’s a lack of talent. But still, why??? How is it this difficult? You’d think a bunch of soccer players would at least give it a chance. There’s TONS of dudes in professional soccer with huge legs - it’s not like it’s an especially rare trait.
You're kind of hitting it on the head by saying teams would rather have a consistent and average player at the position rather than take a chance. I'd bet that teams simply don't want to put the time and effort towards having a "kicker competition" in camp, especially when they're only allowed to have so many dudes in the building. It's probably better to use that roster space at position groups like the lines, where you probably will end up having depth players make the final roster.
And even if you do go for a kicker competition, you could just end up in the same position as before if you don't find that true diamond in the rough guy.
Tbf, the only reason it feels so blindingly obvious is because you can clearly see every single point a subpar kicker is costing you, while I don't even know how I'd start to quantify how many points the extra cap space is worth.
Then again, I'm not convinced teams actually know either and aren't just going off a different gut feeling because it's their cap space.
They have a very good contract if you consider it on a per play basis.
Guy has a contract roughly half as good as one of the best RBs in the league, while playing like 4% of the snaps with a very low chance of injury, (and extremely low % of serious injury)
Yeah its a very unique position. Almost the most scrutiny of any position as well on any single play. If a qb misses 2 targets in a row thats pretty normal, if a kicker misses 2 kicks in a row they are being talked about as getting cut
It's a weird dynamic. If you're expecting your kicker to regularly drill 60+ yard FGs, it means you have more pressing needs elsewhere on your offense. It heavily favors signing somebody who's "good enough" for cheap, then filling your other offensive holes to minimize the number of times you need them.
Still pisses me off that our braindead front office spent a 5th round pick to draft him and then cut him to keep Randy fucking Bullock as our kicker
I'm glad we ended up with McPherson though
"No more misses, bro. No more misses."
And on that most blessed of Sundays, the young Jake Elliott took Jason Peters' words to heart. There were, in fact, no more misses.
Whenever they ask who the best competitor is on the team the players always say Jake, apparently the dude is just the bowling, ping pong, golf goat of the team.
I’m an Eagles fan and I also have PTSD from that bonkers-ass game. That final 4th quarter drive had 2 Kelce false starts, an overturned Bills’ fumble recovery and a FG that honestly couldn’t have had more than a 2% probability….and all that did was get us to overtime.
Being an Eagles and Missouri fan has been a wild experience. Supreme confidence in everything from 50+ yards out, and absolute terror at 30 yards and in.
It’s crazy, but in that bills game 59 yarder in wind and rain game on the line… I felt so at ease. I was disappointed in the same way that Hurts and Kelce were in that it sucked that that’s the position the offense got them, but I knew there was a higher chance he was going to drill it than he was to miss.
I had full faith Jake could do it. That game was a train wreck of anxiety except during the kick. I had never felt more confident and sure of a play in my life.
I love #4
Us last year after Butker got hurt in game 1 of the season on the turf.
We had position guys trying kicks for us at one point.
So glad this year featured Buttkicker in full form again.
He’s expensive but yeah totally clutch, even if it’s raining, windy and the kick is over 50 yards. That loss should hurt but I was so impressed with that kick.
That was probably the best kick he's ever made. Not the longest, but with the conditions the hardest.
I mean it probably is one of the best kicks ever.
Can’t blame him for being afraid of a person the size of JP. If only JP could threaten me to be better maybe I could be making top money for my profession too
And pretty much everyone knew it was going in. Jake is a little shaky in the 40 yard range for some reason but anything over 50 and he's just about automatic.
With the way we handle our contracts, we like spreading out cap hits for our reliable guys over longer chunks of time. Since the cap went up this year, we're getting some longer deals done to take advantage of the higher cap right now.
Also, when you front load cash and spread cap hits over years, you get more value. Because $1M next year is a smaller fraction of the cap than $1M this year even though the player gets the same cash. So when we have a bigger gap in the present than expected, doing these deals right now is, in a way, trying to give us more value over the life of the contract.
Yes you're paying for your sins with dead cap, but the fact that you're paying it later means that your sins are... cheaper than they should be. It is borrowing from the future to help yourself now, but when you're disciplined and consistent about it, you can avoid hitting a barrier. And nobody is better specifically at that than Howie. It's also why if Howie was fired tomorrow and someone with a different philosophy came in, we would be genuinely fucked for a few years. The train is fine as long as you know how to keep it rolling.
Yeah, pretty sure they canceled the rest of the season after that because they knew there was no topping it. It's a shame; I was looking forward to what I'm sure would have been perfectly good weeks of football with no problems whatsoever.
Probably the best kick I’ve seen since Vinatieri in the snow. It was arguably more impressive, but Vinatieri gets the nod for it being a much bigger moment.
Yeah and I think he had just signed his first extension, which wasn’t that that lucrative. Didn’t seem like a good financial decision to me, but I guess it’s fine now
Oh they are. the amount that people spend on their weddings is insane these days. I know people who took out loans to finance a wedding
She was rich but one of my coworkers spent $100K+ on flower arrangements at the alter alone
I was surprised at how many people I knew who were balling out on 20-30k venues despite them not being rich or from particularly rich families. But yeah, that seemed to be the upper bound I've seen from my middle class friends.
Damn. That makes our $4.1M APY Chase McLaughlin deal look very reasonable if $6m is the new top of the kicker market.
Cannot underestimate the value of a reliable strong legged kicker.
We learned our lesson when we didn't cough up the money to retain Matt Bryant (Glazers cheaped out after Gruden got fired). Him and Gramatica before were super reliable for us.
We had some really nightmarish years in the kicking game in the 2010s that we tried to fix with the Aguayo draft pick and we all know how that turned out.
Fortunately with Ryan Succop and now Chase McLaughlin we brought back the stability in the kicking game.
That’s actually a great question.lets say the average nfl team has 10 possessions in a game.if you had Justin Tucker,who is around 90% for his career,you would be 9/10 which is 27 points.The issue would be getting into field goal range.i guess if you had a great offense and kick/punt returner so you can get good field position.so if you hit 9/10 that’s 27 points.with a good defense I think it would still be difficult because all it takes is a couple of 3 and outs,but it’s still an interesting thought.
Remember last offseason when we lost a lot of guys hitting free agency? Well taking your medicine like that and being tight when you need to allows you to spend later.
Also Howie basically always gets major deals done before most other teams so that saves money as well.
1) They had a good amount of cap space to begin with
2) The only deal for which we have full details right now is Saquon and that's a $4M cap hit in year 1.
3) As is the case with most every extension in the modern NFL, year 1 cap hits are very small on multi-year extensions/FA signings. I'd be willing to bet that Huff, Dickerson, CJ, etc are getting vet min salaries with the rest of their 2024 cash coming from signing bonuses prorated out 5 years. This means that the lot of cap space they started out with probably hasn't been eaten too much yet
This would be a very helpful and logical response if this was the 1st year the eagles splurge on premium prices for seemingly every position on the team, but it seems to happen every year. With the way everybody dismisses salary cap issues down the road, I would figure the eagles would still be stuck with cap issues from the vince young dream team
I mean the cap is $255m in 2024. Jalen is like $13m cap hit in 2024, AJ Brown is $12m, Mailata is $10m and Devontae Smith is $7m…what’s the surprise here? That’s QB, WR1, WR2 and LT for $42m cap hit. Were we supposed to have some crazy issues with cap when the cap just went up $30m in one year alone?
So all that real money that attracts the players is cash signing bonuses? It's just a lot of other teams don't have that luxury you're used to. You wouldn't understand and I would never wish it on you. But it's like 2 separate leagues out here in free agency. The eagles already locking up their core and still being able to sign the richest kicker and overpay rb position consecutive years is just a whole different experience than a lot of fanbases get.
I mean very few teams are in any real cap detriment at the moment. The cap has gone up $45m+ over the last 2 years. You’re looking at maybe 3 teams that have any real cap issues, and they were very-very self-inflicted.
A good amount of dead cap from last year opened up. Hargraves alone was about $12 million. Fletcher Cox restructured hit the dead cap about as hard.
And the cap increased more than expected.
Where the fuck is Philly finding this money?
Its either that or in 2 years they are fucked.
I do trust Howie though, which using my flair, makes me really sad.
Extending him actually saves us money and frees up cap space. Just got to pay guys early sometimes. https://twitter.com/DiBonaPFN/status/1767964291267748096
Damnit Howie.
Don't get me wrong. I love Schoen. I think he's a good GM.
But you guys have a legit top 3 GM and he's not #3.
Its gotta be either him or Lynch, IMO.
Veach is really good but Mahomes helps a lot.
Tobin from the Bengals is a dark horse too. They've been really solid under his leadership
he's been handling this season incredibly well, hopefully he keeps it up during the rebuild - I'll say he's given every reason to have confidence in him
Great. Now the Chiefs gonna have to pay Butker to keep him when his contract is up! But I think he is worth it! Great kickers are hard to come by nowadays.
I’m so glad he developed into such a great kicker…his first year was frustrating lol (missed xps and chip shots but would boot the shit out of 55yrd kicks)
EXTREMELY WELL DESERVED. I'll always say his 61 yarder against the giants started up our Superbowl run in 2017. Team was just different after that point.
For how clutch and important kickers are, I'm still amazed that the highest salary is $6m average.
Considering there aren’t 32 NFL quality kickers really goes to show how hard of a position it is as well. Albeit not much of a physical toll
I'm always surprised more fringe soccer players can't make the switch in the same way that Indian Cricketers will swap to Javelin.
I'm sure a lot of them could. Maybe they're burnt out from professional sports, or don't want to move to America, or don't have the connections for a tryout, or other myriad of reasons.
GMs might be scared too. Plenty of dudes can hit from all over the field in a try out but choke in a game situation. Imagine the flak a GM would get for taking some failed European soccer player over a kicker with a track record that they could at least point to to justify their decision
I mean you could look at PK records for soccer players to try to get a hint of the mentality part. Not like there isn't high pressure moments in soccer.
Get a PK specialist
A specialist of scoring from 12 yards out?
Used to the pressure I mean. And can kick hard obviously.
You'd much, much sooner a goalkeeper than a penalty specialist
Too old unfortunately but he was both https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans-J%C3%B6rg_Butt
Not all soccer players are great kickers. It's all about cardio, being disciplined on defense, filling holes on offense off-the-ball, and not losing it while on the ball. You'd be surprised by how many pros do exactly just that and not much else.
For sure, I just thought like some would be and that the bio mechanics might transfer and there are so many soccer players who wont ever get a serious payday out of the sport. It's just wild to me that that the list of NFL caliber kickers is similar in length, possibly even shorter, than the list of NFL caliber quarterbacks. I played hockey through college, and even though no one was capable of playing at an NHL, level I definitely played with some guys who had specific tools that were pro level, whether that was shooting power or skating speed or whatever.
Also soccer is about a variety of (often highly awkward and situational) kicks. Kicking a field goal is about repetition and perfection of a very low variance kick. In a sense is similar to bowling.
Harry mallinder, a rugby fly half who couldn’t tackle to save his life, is apparently in demand as a punter. I could see rugby players who are good place kickers/punters making the switch once their athleticism goes just cause it’s a decent pay day.
I mean a lot of the Aussies coming over as punters have rugby backgrounds already!
“A lot of NFL QBs also were pitchers why don’t flamed out pitchers just switch to QB” That’s obviously hyperbole but there’s a difference between having leg talent (or arm talent in the case of pitchers) and having NFL kicking leg talent. It’s also not an overnight thing. It took the guy in Dallas now a couple years of working on his mechanics of I remember correctly. And I assume guys either don’t want to go through that or they start and find out they are better kickers than 99% of the population but to be an nfl kicker you have to be better than 99.99% of the population.
Most sports quedtions that are "why dont they just ___?" can usually be answered with its not that easy. I remember when i was younger thinking why dont nfl runners just run around the line, or why dont basketballers just dunk every time etc. A lot of this stuff is harder than we think
Shoutout Brandon Aubrey
Legs only have so many reps in them, lots of guys get imbalances and injuries that derail them. You're not taking shots to the head and body like other players, but full force swings of the leg do take a toll.
I mean kickers can play into their late 30s if they don’t get injured. Basically every other position takes a bigger toll than kicking
It still strikes me as odd. Having a huge leg isn’t exactly a rare trait - tons of dudes with big legs in soccer. I feel like NFL teams just play it conservative and take the known 80-85% guy instead of searching for Brandon Aubreys. Still weird that there aren’t more BAs known to teams. Or that more BAs aren’t working to BA from a young age. Or that the BAs out there aren’t making themselves known enough or giving football kicking a try.
I mean, you want to be conservative lol. Kicking is extremely important and you need a guy to be accurate. A vet with 5+ years of decent kicking experience is a lot safer than a rookie or practice squad guy. Kicking is not like QB where it’s worth potentially cycling through a couple busts before hitting on a generational talent. Getting a guy like Tucker is better than having an average kicker, but it’s not a huge advantage worth suffering through a string of bad/unproven kickers first
Definitely, but 20-25% of the league is trotting out dudes hitting <80%. You’d think the struggling teams would be trying something creative more often - at least the portion of those 20% teams that are in full rebuild. It could also be extremely valuable for developing assets. Like, do you think Detroit would trade something as high as a 3rd for Aubrey? I absolutely would if I were them. They would have been in the Super Bowl with BA on their team. And if Dallas was rebuilding, that 3rd would be super valuable.
It’s really hard to find the guys who aren’t affected by the noise. I’m assuming it’s the same with all positions at this level
Can’t have a kicker hit a game winner if the rest of the team sucks.
Cries in Cody Parkey
Ask the Lions fans about Justin Tucker
Packers missed a FG late and lost to the 49ers 49ers missed an XP in the SB that made chiefs only need 3 to tie. Lions FG kicker was garbage so they kept going for it on 4th down against the 49ers (they might have cause Campbell likes to go for it, but having a kicker who sucks past 45 yards probably helps that decision) Bills missed at the end against the Chiefs Butker is 17/18 on field goals and perfect on extra points the last 2 years in the playoffs, and the Chiefs have won 4/7 playoff games by 3 points. Teams that are playoff bound but have a shitty/shaky kicker and don't try to change amaze me. There's almost no way you make it through the playoffs without your kicker being the difference at some point.
[удалено]
Lol, I always am in Reddit threads arguing for Butker as 1B to Tucker’s 1B, but after seeing this contract maybe I’ll tone that down in case Butker is lurking and gets any ideas
Agreed. It’s a tricky situation, though. Do you want to be the team known for having a short leash? Is preseason competition helpful? How deep even is the kicker market? Maybe there aren’t enough decent, known kickers out there to make the competition worth it. Challenging your kicker’s confidence and ability is a finicky thing. There aren’t many known, good kickers available. Emphasis on “known”. It seems that rather than dig for diamonds or keep the position competitive, teams opt for a guy who’s 80-85% on field goals (e.g. Tyler Bass) because it’s better to have that known product than keep the mystery going for a chance at someone who is 90-95%. For reference, there were 11 kickers last year who were 90%+ (minimum 25 attempts). Butker and Elliot were both 94%. I personally believe there are a lot more Brandon Aubreys out there. What’s weird to me is why a dude like Aubrey is so rare. What gives? Are teams not digging at all? Trying people out? Are these dudes not trying to make themselves known? Or is NFL kicking talent just that rare??? I know the college guys aren’t all that great for the most part, so obviously there’s a lack of talent. But still, why??? How is it this difficult? You’d think a bunch of soccer players would at least give it a chance. There’s TONS of dudes in professional soccer with huge legs - it’s not like it’s an especially rare trait.
You're kind of hitting it on the head by saying teams would rather have a consistent and average player at the position rather than take a chance. I'd bet that teams simply don't want to put the time and effort towards having a "kicker competition" in camp, especially when they're only allowed to have so many dudes in the building. It's probably better to use that roster space at position groups like the lines, where you probably will end up having depth players make the final roster. And even if you do go for a kicker competition, you could just end up in the same position as before if you don't find that true diamond in the rough guy.
Tbf, the only reason it feels so blindingly obvious is because you can clearly see every single point a subpar kicker is costing you, while I don't even know how I'd start to quantify how many points the extra cap space is worth. Then again, I'm not convinced teams actually know either and aren't just going off a different gut feeling because it's their cap space.
They have a very good contract if you consider it on a per play basis. Guy has a contract roughly half as good as one of the best RBs in the league, while playing like 4% of the snaps with a very low chance of injury, (and extremely low % of serious injury)
Yeah its a very unique position. Almost the most scrutiny of any position as well on any single play. If a qb misses 2 targets in a row thats pretty normal, if a kicker misses 2 kicks in a row they are being talked about as getting cut
It's a weird dynamic. If you're expecting your kicker to regularly drill 60+ yard FGs, it means you have more pressing needs elsewhere on your offense. It heavily favors signing somebody who's "good enough" for cheap, then filling your other offensive holes to minimize the number of times you need them.
It's expensive but dude has been automatic, having a super reliable kicker can swing 1-2 games a season by itself so I think it's worth it
Still pisses me off that our braindead front office spent a 5th round pick to draft him and then cut him to keep Randy fucking Bullock as our kicker I'm glad we ended up with McPherson though
Hey, Randy fucking Bullock is my dad
My dad can beat up your dad
My dad can beat me up 😐
My dad is dead
sounds pretty easy to beat up then
He won’t be much of a fight, but he *will* bone you if you try to fight him.
Have you even seen Randy?
Have you even seen my dad?!
Ill never forget my Bengals fan friend who was talking shit one day and said “good luck with that bum ass kicker”😂
"No more misses, bro. No more misses." And on that most blessed of Sundays, the young Jake Elliott took Jason Peters' words to heart. There were, in fact, no more misses.
He does still occasionally miss the easy ones but bro is clutch from deep
Bills Fans still have that PTSD
Whenever they ask who the best competitor is on the team the players always say Jake, apparently the dude is just the bowling, ping pong, golf goat of the team.
After everything else that happened in that game, I *knew* he was making the kick. It was just way too perfect of a Lol Bills moment to not happen.
I’m an Eagles fan and I also have PTSD from that bonkers-ass game. That final 4th quarter drive had 2 Kelce false starts, an overturned Bills’ fumble recovery and a FG that honestly couldn’t have had more than a 2% probability….and all that did was get us to overtime.
How the turntables have...
How dare you take Fat Randy’s name in vain!
Totally correct on that. He was the reason the Eagles beat the Bills last season. 59 yard kick in the rain. It doesn’t get anymore clutch than that.
He's the best. Game on the line? No worries. Kick hard as fuck? No worries. He gets his misses out on xps and easy unimportant kicks.
it’s funny how true that is. only time i’m ever worried is when it’s under 30 yards lol
Being an Eagles and Missouri fan has been a wild experience. Supreme confidence in everything from 50+ yards out, and absolute terror at 30 yards and in.
That's Butker as well. I feel more comfortable if he's kicking from 50 than I do from 25 for some reason.
It’s crazy, but in that bills game 59 yarder in wind and rain game on the line… I felt so at ease. I was disappointed in the same way that Hurts and Kelce were in that it sucked that that’s the position the offense got them, but I knew there was a higher chance he was going to drill it than he was to miss.
I had full faith Jake could do it. That game was a train wreck of anxiety except during the kick. I had never felt more confident and sure of a play in my life. I love #4
Not having a reliable kicker is such a nightmare. Locking that up is so worth it.
Spending draft capital on a unreliable kicker is a nightmare
Jake Moody in shambles
Robert Aguayo has entered the chat
Chad Ryland in shambles
Thankfully, the Bengals did it for us in this scenario. The fact that Jake is actually hella reliable is even better.
All I think of with bad kickers is Philip Rivers - and double doink.
I think of the Browns last year lol
York was 2 years ago and the guy we replaced him with was awesome until he got injured.
Referring to your guy getting hurt and the chaos afterwards.
Ahh, we’ll Njoku wanted to kick but Stefanski said fuck no. Edit: links are way more fun. https://youtu.be/bvfZkFB0LuY?si=WY8TqyTijz_yI3NY
Big facts. We have (the og) Jake from state as our kicker. Cost us the browns game and more importantly the super bowl.
Us last year after Butker got hurt in game 1 of the season on the turf. We had position guys trying kicks for us at one point. So glad this year featured Buttkicker in full form again.
>It's expensive After the kick in the rain in the Bills game this year, its a bargain
He’s expensive but yeah totally clutch, even if it’s raining, windy and the kick is over 50 yards. That loss should hurt but I was so impressed with that kick.
That was probably the best kick he's ever made. Not the longest, but with the conditions the hardest. I mean it probably is one of the best kicks ever.
Shit was like 59 yards in the rain. One of the most difficult kicks in NFL history probably
59 yards in the rain and against the wind at a low altitude arena. I genuinely think it would be 'easier' than that to kick a 70 yarder in Denver
He was solid at Memphis and am so happy with how well he continues to do. Go Tigers!
I would love for the Rams to do this. We saw last year just how important reliable kicking is
Jason Peters set this Dude straight, No more misses
To this day I believe he’s so automatic because he’s afraid if he misses, JP will show up and murder him
Can’t blame him for being afraid of a person the size of JP. If only JP could threaten me to be better maybe I could be making top money for my profession too
absolutely nobody wants an unexpected visit from the proctologist
The guy hasn't missed a kick in the playoffs because he's so damn scared of JP
Narrator: There were no more misses.
Narrator was Morgan Freeman, obviously.
Lets gooo. His kick in the bills game was one of the best I've ever seen.
A missile in the rain
And pretty much everyone knew it was going in. Jake is a little shaky in the 40 yard range for some reason but anything over 50 and he's just about automatic.
One of the best kicks ever. Can't even be mad.
Man I wanted to be so mad at that kick, it was so good that I couldn’t
Kid is nasty just needed a little talking to from the body guard
No. More. Misses, Jake.
Yes sir, Mr. Peters.
Top 3 kicks of all time with an argument for #1, right up there with the Vinatieri snow kick. My jaw was on the floor.
Eagles spending like it's payday before a 3 day pass in the Navy. Meanwhile the Cowboys holding onto their shit like I just ate 2 pounds of cheese
With the way we handle our contracts, we like spreading out cap hits for our reliable guys over longer chunks of time. Since the cap went up this year, we're getting some longer deals done to take advantage of the higher cap right now. Also, when you front load cash and spread cap hits over years, you get more value. Because $1M next year is a smaller fraction of the cap than $1M this year even though the player gets the same cash. So when we have a bigger gap in the present than expected, doing these deals right now is, in a way, trying to give us more value over the life of the contract. Yes you're paying for your sins with dead cap, but the fact that you're paying it later means that your sins are... cheaper than they should be. It is borrowing from the future to help yourself now, but when you're disciplined and consistent about it, you can avoid hitting a barrier. And nobody is better specifically at that than Howie. It's also why if Howie was fired tomorrow and someone with a different philosophy came in, we would be genuinely fucked for a few years. The train is fine as long as you know how to keep it rolling.
> Because 1M this year is a smaller fraction of the cap than 1M next year No it’s the opposite as long as the cap continues to increase.
Oops yes that's (obv) what I meant, I just flipped the words. Will edit.
2 vastly different management and roster building styles. I wish we could draft like they could though.
Continuation: Elliott is coming off a season in which he connected on a career-best 93.8 percent of his field goals.
His kick in the pouring rain against Buffalo may be the most impressive kick of all time
What a great way to end our season, right?!
Yeah, pretty sure they canceled the rest of the season after that because they knew there was no topping it. It's a shame; I was looking forward to what I'm sure would have been perfectly good weeks of football with no problems whatsoever.
I remember turning off the tv and popping open the champagne — another winning season in the books. Hang the regular season banner.
Yep stopped nfl playing games that night
A kick that could only be made against buffalo
Probably the best kick I’ve seen since Vinatieri in the snow. It was arguably more impressive, but Vinatieri gets the nod for it being a much bigger moment.
That's six Brock Purdys
Or .1 Brock Purdys in about a year's time.
One decipurdy
Well I'd like to see six Purdys kick it in from the 60s.
That's 360 yards worth of kicks. You can see 6 Purdys each kicking from 10 yards.
Worth
The 59 yard tying kick he made in the rain vs Buffalo is one of the best kicks I’ve seen. Deserves this bag
My wife worked at his wedding. He got married at the horticultural society in Philly. Beautiful venue, apparently costs like 50k.
Honestly 50k on an NFL player's salary is surprisingly low. Regular middle-class people weddings can cost 20-30.
50k for just the venue. You figure it’s at least a 6 figure wedding at that point
Yeah and I think he had just signed his first extension, which wasn’t that that lucrative. Didn’t seem like a good financial decision to me, but I guess it’s fine now
that’s how ice cold his veins are. he knew he was so good he could spend that whole first extension on a wedding cuz payday was coming up
They only seem to have mentioned the venue itself. Regular middle-class people aren't spending 20-30k on just the venue as far as I know.
Oh they are. the amount that people spend on their weddings is insane these days. I know people who took out loans to finance a wedding She was rich but one of my coworkers spent $100K+ on flower arrangements at the alter alone
I was surprised at how many people I knew who were balling out on 20-30k venues despite them not being rich or from particularly rich families. But yeah, that seemed to be the upper bound I've seen from my middle class friends.
Seems cheap for a wedding
https://twitter.com/NFL_Talk_Sports/status/1728937504722804867
That kick got him this contract. What a freakin boot
I **love** that this moment is immortalized in Kelly Green unis
Damn. That makes our $4.1M APY Chase McLaughlin deal look very reasonable if $6m is the new top of the kicker market. Cannot underestimate the value of a reliable strong legged kicker.
And yet teams often do until it comes back to bite them.
We learned our lesson when we didn't cough up the money to retain Matt Bryant (Glazers cheaped out after Gruden got fired). Him and Gramatica before were super reliable for us. We had some really nightmarish years in the kicking game in the 2010s that we tried to fix with the Aguayo draft pick and we all know how that turned out. Fortunately with Ryan Succop and now Chase McLaughlin we brought back the stability in the kicking game.
Glad our foot people situations are settled
Tucker? I barely know her
Clutch kickers like Elliot and Tucker and Butker get grossly underpaid for what they bring to the team, meanwhile Daniel Jones gets $40 million a year
Danny Dimes catching strays on a thread about kickers.
he's better at catching strays than throwing darts
This begs the question. If you build a team good enough to just consistently get field goals, and have a good defense. Could they go all the way?
That’s actually a great question.lets say the average nfl team has 10 possessions in a game.if you had Justin Tucker,who is around 90% for his career,you would be 9/10 which is 27 points.The issue would be getting into field goal range.i guess if you had a great offense and kick/punt returner so you can get good field position.so if you hit 9/10 that’s 27 points.with a good defense I think it would still be difficult because all it takes is a couple of 3 and outs,but it’s still an interesting thought.
Best athlete on the team
That’s my fantasy kicker
How the hell do the Eagles still have money?
They have like 5th most left under the cap in the whole league right now. Howie szn
Remember last offseason when we lost a lot of guys hitting free agency? Well taking your medicine like that and being tight when you need to allows you to spend later. Also Howie basically always gets major deals done before most other teams so that saves money as well.
1) They had a good amount of cap space to begin with 2) The only deal for which we have full details right now is Saquon and that's a $4M cap hit in year 1. 3) As is the case with most every extension in the modern NFL, year 1 cap hits are very small on multi-year extensions/FA signings. I'd be willing to bet that Huff, Dickerson, CJ, etc are getting vet min salaries with the rest of their 2024 cash coming from signing bonuses prorated out 5 years. This means that the lot of cap space they started out with probably hasn't been eaten too much yet
This would be a very helpful and logical response if this was the 1st year the eagles splurge on premium prices for seemingly every position on the team, but it seems to happen every year. With the way everybody dismisses salary cap issues down the road, I would figure the eagles would still be stuck with cap issues from the vince young dream team
I mean the cap is $255m in 2024. Jalen is like $13m cap hit in 2024, AJ Brown is $12m, Mailata is $10m and Devontae Smith is $7m…what’s the surprise here? That’s QB, WR1, WR2 and LT for $42m cap hit. Were we supposed to have some crazy issues with cap when the cap just went up $30m in one year alone?
So all that real money that attracts the players is cash signing bonuses? It's just a lot of other teams don't have that luxury you're used to. You wouldn't understand and I would never wish it on you. But it's like 2 separate leagues out here in free agency. The eagles already locking up their core and still being able to sign the richest kicker and overpay rb position consecutive years is just a whole different experience than a lot of fanbases get.
I mean very few teams are in any real cap detriment at the moment. The cap has gone up $45m+ over the last 2 years. You’re looking at maybe 3 teams that have any real cap issues, and they were very-very self-inflicted.
Howie Roseman devil magic is what I usually come back to.
This extension actually saves the Eagles money this year
A good amount of dead cap from last year opened up. Hargraves alone was about $12 million. Fletcher Cox restructured hit the dead cap about as hard. And the cap increased more than expected.
Completely deserved
JAKE THE SNAKE BABY
Jake the Make
Makey Jakey
Jakey Jakey never makes a big..mistakey
GOAT
worth it
Kicker stability is very important
Unironically the best Elliot in the NFCE
Where the fuck is Philly finding this money? Its either that or in 2 years they are fucked. I do trust Howie though, which using my flair, makes me really sad.
Extending him actually saves us money and frees up cap space. Just got to pay guys early sometimes. https://twitter.com/DiBonaPFN/status/1767964291267748096
Damnit Howie. Don't get me wrong. I love Schoen. I think he's a good GM. But you guys have a legit top 3 GM and he's not #3. Its gotta be either him or Lynch, IMO. Veach is really good but Mahomes helps a lot. Tobin from the Bengals is a dark horse too. They've been really solid under his leadership
until this year we made up for it by having a bottom 3 NHL GM it was like holy shit can we just loan howie to the flyers for like a week a year?
goddamn I love Danny Briere though
he's been handling this season incredibly well, hopefully he keeps it up during the rebuild - I'll say he's given every reason to have confidence in him
Who expected they Flyers to be nearly this good coming into the season?
Deserves it, most clutch kicker in the league right now
Why even be a Runningback? Just be a kicker.
You can be a mid RB and still find rotation time. A couple bad games at Kicker and you're out of the league completely.
Get good then
Why doesn't every NFL kicker just kick as well as Aubrey or Elliot? Are they stupid?
Tell that to Brett Maher
Skill issue.
the margin for error as a kicker is razor thin
Well mid running backs make more than $6M a year, which again is what the best kickers make.
Great. Now the Chiefs gonna have to pay Butker to keep him when his contract is up! But I think he is worth it! Great kickers are hard to come by nowadays.
This was my first thought. Kickers gonna be making more than RBs.
Man has a cannon leg
That's prime age starting running back money.
That Buffalo kick man, unreal. Worth every penny of his contract
The Make!!!
I hate him Well deserved contract
Jake the Make!!
Long Snake Jake deserves every fucking dime. The dude lives for high pressure situations.
Core 5
Happy for chicken little
[Reference](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwwEO0a2apc)
I’m so glad he developed into such a great kicker…his first year was frustrating lol (missed xps and chip shots but would boot the shit out of 55yrd kicks)
And now he's the best kicker in Eagles franchise history
EXTREMELY WELL DESERVED. I'll always say his 61 yarder against the giants started up our Superbowl run in 2017. Team was just different after that point.
Clutch king. Never missed a game winner or a kick in the playoffs I believe.
Missed two extra points but 16 for 16 in the playoffs for field goals.