Posted on 10/30/2013 5:30:48 PM PDT by rickmichaels
NFL kickers are so accurate now, they’ve booted field-goal drama between the uprights, over the netting and right out of the stadium.
Almost every kicker is “Mr. Automatic.” They seldom miss.
It’s time to make their jobs more difficult with a couple of drastic rule changes.
Placekicking success in the NFL has been trending upward for decades, and shows no signs of plateauing. Halfway through the 2013 season, placekickers are on pace to set the league’s season record for field-goal success: 86.0%.
From every 10-yard increment, in fact, kickers are better than ever. (See accompanying chart.)
Even on attempts from 50 yards out or longer, their success rate this season is 65.2%. That’s right, practically two-thirds of even the longest kicks attempted still sail between the uprights, many of them well over the crossbar and into the netting. That’s better than the success rate on all field goals attempted in any NFL season through the 1981.
“It’s unbelievable how good the kickers are today,” said Pete Gogolak, inventor of the “side-winder” or “soccer style” manner of placekicking that everyone uses today.
Since 2004 the average success rate of NFL kickers has been in the 80s. From 1983 to 2003 it was mostly in the 70s. From 1972 to 1982 it was in the 60s. Before 1972 it was in the 50s -- meaning field-goal attempts back then were little better than coin flips.
And extra points? Please. A waste of time and effort.
This season you’re seven times more likely to see a game delayed by lightning than you are to see an extra point missed. Yup. Three of 120 games in 2013 have been delayed by the threat of lightning (2.5%), while only two of 588 conversion kicks (0.34%) have been missed.
It has been 20 years since fewer than 98% of extra points were made. So why bother with them anymore, at least as snapped from the 2? They’re gimmes.
It’s to the point where something needs to be done to make the placekicker’s job more difficult. But what? And how did we get to this point?
Some historical perspective.
It was Gogolak in the 1960s who set in motion this upswing of placekicking success -- and he did it with a new motion.
Before Gogolak began kicking footballs like he kicked soccer balls back in his native Hungary, the style employed universally on both sides of the U.S./Canada border, college or pro, was toe on leather. That is, the “straight-on” kick.
The style might have been intuitive -- every toddler will kick his first ball that way -- but not very accurate. An example: in the 1942 Michigan-Notre Dame college game, eight touchdowns were scored. Half the extra points were missed in the Wolverines’ 32-20 victory, and no one even made a big deal out of it.
Until Gogolak immigrated, the straight-on style had been the norm going back to the late 1890s, when placekicking began to overtake dropkicking as the surest form of making field goals.
Gogolak debuted the “side-winder” or “soccer style” at Ogdensburg Free Academy (high school) in upstate New York, in his junior year in 1958 – his second year in America.
“The first time I tried it, I lined up from the side, as I would kick a soccer ball back in Hungary,” Gogolak said in a telephone interview from Connecticut. “Our coach had trouble finding me a holder, because everybody thought I was going to kick them right in the face, or in the butt.
“They’d tell me, ‘The goalposts are straight ahead -- you’re going to kick the ball on an angle, into the stands.’ It was a totally unknown thing.”
Gogolak introduced his style to the college level at Cornell University from 1961-63, then in the pro ranks with the AFL’s Buffalo Bills in 1964.
In his first game as a pro, an AFL exhibition game against the New York Jets in Tampa, Gogolak nailed a 57-yarder. The long-standing NFL record then was 56 yards, set by Bert Rechichar of the Baltimore Colts in 1953.
In 1964 and ’65, Gogolak helped the Bills to win back-to-back league championships as the AFL’s second leading scorer.
“Then everybody started kicking soccer style,” Gogolak said. “Scouts even went to Europe looking for kickers.”
In 1966 Gogolak controversially jumped leagues, signing with the New York Giants at the height of hostilities in the AFL-NFL war.
Garo Yepremian that year became the NFL’s second soccer-style star. With the Detroit Lions, the left-footed Yepremian broke the league’s single-game record by sidewinding six field goals through the uprights.
That was the final validation. Within a decade, toe kickers would become practically obsolete at the pro and college levels.
The NFL’s relocation of the goal posts in 1974 from the goal line, where they’d long been, to the back of the end zone briefly interrupted the rising success rate of the sidewinders; 1973’s then-record rate of 63.1% wasn’t eclipsed until 1980 (63.6%).
Then began the steady rise.
The world of sports has changed so much.
I remember back in Cleveland my Dad bought insurance from Lou “the toe” Groza Browns star place kicker.
Not from some agency that used his name, from Lou himself.
Because back then most NFL players had jobs in the off season.
I’d like to see the place kick replaced with the drop kick.
The reason the percentages are way up is the rule change that gives the other team the ball where it was kicked from. On long field goals it is near the fifty which is too risky so coaches no longer try long kicks unless the game is on the line.
I remember Len Dawson doing the sports when I was a kid in Kansas.
Remove “roughing the kicker” penalties. Issue fixed.
NFL football is a complete BORE. Gameplay for 3 minutes followed by 5 minutes of light beer commercials... I’ll pass.
On a related note: No Punter Left Behind: How One Guru Made The Art Of Kicking A Science
http://deadspin.com/no-punter-left-behind-how-one-guru-made-the-art-of-kic-1259585520
...must be a Michigan thing...1942 against Notre Dame or a couple weeks ago against Penn St., UM placekickers pushing the kicks off to the side...
Put the posts back on the goal line and make a missed field goal a live ball.
Extra points from the 20. And get rid of the ridiculous rules of pushing players forward or jumping on backs to get higher.
Higher field goal points the longer the kick starting with a 55yd.
It would be interesting to see some statistics on how many kicks are attempted at different ranges. Does the typical kicker no longer attempt 50 yard kicks except in end of game desperation kicks.
Typical. Let’s punish success.
These days there are quite a few female place kickers in high school and a couple in small colleges.
The NFL solution may be to require that every place kicker be a female.
Tell it to Scott Norwood.
Higher field goal points the longer the kick starting with a 55yd.
...actually, the opposite is preferable, and more in keeping with the purpose of the game...the further a team drives the ball into opposing territory, the more points should be awarded...a fifty yarder should count no more than one point...
Kicking for points is the most ridiculous way of scoring in all of sports.
Eliminate kicking to tie or go ahead and suddenly the game gets interesting.
My favorite kicker was George Blanda. Still holds the record for most PATs. Pretty good for a QB. Many of his kicking records lasted a long while.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Blanda
Know why the kicker was always the most hated guy on the team? Wasn’t the hero or goat thing. A kicker could wear clothes off the rack and dress like everyone else. Most other players had to go to big and tall shops for clothes.
Make the Kickoff land inside the Red Zone, touchbacks are a waist. ...or make them run it out of the endzone. Starting from the 15 or 10 might add a little excitement.
Most importantly ...just admit it and turn it into touch football, that’s where its going anyway.
I remember Qbs use to be tough. Now, little pretty boys like RG3 can’t make it through half a season of touch.
Isn’t the distance record still held by a straight on kicker?
Field goals should be eliminated. total waste of time and that an entire game is oftentimes dependent on a kick has always been ridiculous.
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