Joseph has the statistical edge right now and seems to have a handle on the mental part of the kicking game. Carlson has the stronger leg, a higher ceiling, and a better history in cold weather. I think that puts them generally even right now with neither rising to the occasion. Carlson being a draft pick no longer has any weight in my opinion. He was only a 6th round pick, and a struggling 6th rounder at any position can be a cut candidate especially by Year 2.
One of the podcasts that I heard this week expressed that they believe that the Packers 2024 kicker is not currently on this roster. He said that if neither kicker distinguishes himself in the preseason, they believe that an outside veteran will likely be brought in. He made the point that half of the teams currently have two kickers in camp, and that at least one team that isn't in contention will cut a veteran kicker in favor of a younger kicker with upside and a lower cap hit.
That's possible. Its pretty clear that Gute is not completely happy with making a decision between simply Carlson or Joseph. Depending on who is let go and who lets them go they could bring in another vet.
Its all fun n games until Carlson misses another short fg to end the season. Then itll become a huge problem.
Or Joseph or any of the other kickers they are looking at. If that happens we are going to be second guessing no matter who we go with. Also, define "short fg" because Carlson was 20/20 under 40 yards last year.
My thing is that Carlson is young and they thought enough of him to use a draft pick on him. I'm not saying a draft pick is untouchable and certainly not a 6th round kicker but I would think that in order to give up on him this soon at least one of two things would have to happen. One, he would have to completely suck and/or two, someone else would have to come in and clearly out kick him. I don't think either of those things have happened.
In addition when you look at Joseph he is a career 83% FG kicker. That's roughly 29 out of 35 attempts ( I figured 35 was a nice average number for attempts). Lets say he goes off sets a career high mark of 87% That's 31 successful kicks (rounded up.) Or lets say he goes into a funk and hits his career low mark of 78%. That's 27 kicks (rounded down) So the difference between a career low and a career high is 4 missed kicks.
Now look at Carlson. His career high, and career low, in FGs is 1% lower at 82%. If I had to bet on one of those two kickers hitting higher than his career average I'd bet on Carlson. Its not as if Joseph was a great kicker let go by some crappy team in a cap saving move. He is probably an average NFL kicker and what you see is what you get.
Having said that I will admit that Joseph is not an old timer by any means and there is still time for him to hit a groove and improve upon his past performance. However, If I'm going to bank on that and go with him over Carlson I am going to have had to see something that clearly outdistanced him in camp and I did not see that. Maybe the coaches have but I haven't
The wild card in the race for me is extra points. Like I said in a previous post I was not entirely put off by Carlson's FG kicking last season. Even the best have missed potential game winners and I am willing to chalk some of his misses up to him being a rookie. What might have bummed me out even more was the missed extra points. I don't know why but for some reason missing out on those 5 extra points (6 if you count the block) was somehow more disappointing than missing out on the 18 missed points from missed FGs.
Maybe its because EPs are supposed to be automatic. Maybe its because Carlson was automatic on his FGs from under 40 and EPs are essentially 33 yard FGs, I just don't know why they bothered me so much. Probably because he missed 5 and no one else missed more than 3 and half the kickers in the league missed no more than 1 and 1/3 didn't miss any.
And just because I don't want to do anything else today Carlson missed kicks in 6 regular season games last year. The Packers still won 4 of them. In the other 2 the margin of loss was 2 points so IN THEORY we would have won those games if he had made the kicks. In the 5 games where he missed an EP we won 4 of them.
Obviously the most important one and the one that hurts the most is the playoff game. Had he made that kick IN THEORY we would have been tied during that final drive and perhaps Love would not have been so inclined to make the ill advised throw that ended our season. Keep in mind however that Jake Moody also missed a FG earlier in the game so if he doesn't miss we are right back to the same situation...IN THEORY
I know where the spoof came from. I was trying to be funny because of the ending where the guy loses his head. #failed
