Finding placekickers

Submitted by crg on
This was briefly mentioned in a comment somewhere, but I would like to open this up for greater discussion. Why is it so difficult to find kickers that can hit moderate field goals? I am NOT suggesting that any kid can just walk on and hit 35 yarders reliably, but it seems as though any respectable college team can open up the competition to their soccer players (men and women) as well as others with reasonable leg strength (cyclists, wrestlers, martial arts, etc.). One would think that would lead to a few reasonable back up options to supplement (not replace) scholarship kickers. They would not even need to make a significant time commitment compared to other positions. Maybe I'm way off here, as I do not have much familiarity with kicker development, but it seems plausible. Additional insight is appreciated.

Also, this is not a call to bench Allen or Trice. They obviously earned their time in practice and probably just had some bad luck.
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Ali G Bomaye

October 3rd, 2016 at 9:53 AM ^

Honestly, I think it's pretty difficult for one player to both placekick and punt, like Allen is this season. They're two different motions. There's a reason that almost all teams have a different placekicker and punter.

I remember when Michael Koenen tried to do both for the Atlanta Falcons a couple years ago. He was a great punter, but his punting suffered and he didn't do that well at kicking either.

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Danwillhor

October 3rd, 2016 at 10:19 AM ^

great teams seem to find them in the jungles of Burma or the library or something? They just "find" them, these tiny dudes with crazy legs and zero experience.

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