Have U ever seen a poorer kicking game?

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GRGOPHER

One of Kill's Krew
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If a coaching candidate was watching any of our games this year they would see:
1. Offense has at least some potential.
2. Defense needs a good coordinator and some new players.
3. Kicking game has to be the worst ever.
What happened to our punter? He was great the 1st game or 2 last year. We might as well go for it on 4th down every time!
What happened to our kicker? He wasn't this bad last year.
Obviously they have lost their confidence and/or been coached into changing things that at least worked somewhat.
The kicking game has killed us over and over again...you can't win anything with the kind of kicking game we have. What's the solution?
 

I've never seen a team with special teams just completely poor in every single aspect it's amazing to watch...
 

What about 1991. Didn't we have to go for 2 because we couldn't even hit an extra point?
 


Isn't Stoudermire the greatest return man in the history of B10 football?
 




Reminiscent of 1992 the kicking game

Punt's are well short and take far to long to develop. The timing is terrible at this point, that speaks to the coaching of the special teams guy "Butler" as much as it does the kicker. He has yet to fix this mess. This punters biggest problem is not that he does not have the leg, it is holding onto the ball far to long and over thinking the play.You have to get rid of the ball a full second to half second faster than they do. The current punter is not without talent and ability he just lacks confidence and corrective coaching right now. If it is not corrective coaching than the bench is where the punter needs to be, because they are not executing right now. Kick offs are not bad but the field goal attempts are brutal. They have to be one of the worst success ratio's in the programs history. That will be a challenge for the next coaching staff finding and developing a decent "Big 10" level placekicker.

Currently the Gophers do not have that quality placekicker, and that hurts the overall performance of the team. How many times can you drive the field and get close and then completely botch the kick and come away with no points. Way to many times this season. That is one thing you can hope for with future teams that they can find a kicker that can make field goals and get good kickoffs.
 

The punting is really bad and it's costing us field position. On an exchange of punts (each team punting) the last 2 weeks, we probably lost 40 yards each time. When we need every break we can get we can't be giving up these hard needed yards.
The kickoff return yardage isn't great, but they still probably average the 30. Since he's so worried about kicking it OB, he's kicking it short and "saving" 10 yards...they start @ the 30 instead of the 40. Nonetheless that part of the game is better than our punting. For him it's a matter of confidence.
Hope the new guy recruits for both positions!
 



Elestad has been horrific this season and at times throughout his career.. Punt game, brutal.. I think the offense has a chance to be decent next year and the defense returns pretty much everyone, so at least have some experience, even though it is bad experience..
 

the only thing about having a kick returner with huge statistics is that the opposition is scoring a lot and kicking off a lot, the real goal should be having only one kick return per game and having your place kicker leading the league in number of kickoffs
 


Don't like it...how about "lousier"
poor (pr)
adj. poor·er, poor·est
1. Having little or no wealth and few or no possessions.
2. Lacking in a specified resource or quality: an area poor in timber and coal; a diet poor in calcium.
3. Not adequate in quality; inferior: a poor performance
 



When Ellestad kicked a 55 yarder in the spring game, I expected a decent kicker. I guess the pressure gets to him
 


The returns aren't too bad, but the kickers and the coverage teams aren't very good.
 

I would like to point out that this weekend the Detriot Lines had a Defensive Lineman miss a PAT, but he at least hit the upright.
 

No, not in 40 years of watching Gopher football have I seen two kickers this inept. It is actually hard to accomplish given they were both better than this in high school or we would not have recruited them.
 

I think you need competition at both positions to keep players working hard. If you have only 1 true kicker and punter and they are basically handed the jobs in the spring before the season starts they will not work as hard on their technique. There should always someone be pushing the starter.
 

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