The spree of recent 60+ yard field goals in the NFL in the past seven years or so makes me wonder if we’re starting to see a Steph Curry type of trend in NFL kicking.
I suspect it’s the new rule on kicking balls that started this year.
Until this year, following the post-microwave rule changes, the NFL has been making specialists use balls that were ripped out of the box on site and then were broken in for 30 to 90 minutes during pre-game prep. Now, though, the league is going back to prepared K balls, which should mean a boom in special teams play.
Basically, for over 20 years the league made kickers use brand new balls fresh for each game. But starting this year, the kicking balls can be manipulated and worked on long before a game, so there was an expectation that kickers would suddenly look better. But it’s not because they actually are better.
That doesn’t explain the last handful of years, but this year in particular you will probably see records broken.
I believe we will.
Many (if not all) of you likely already know that the longest FG ever is 66 yards by Justin Tucker of the Baltimore Ravens. He kicked that in the 2021 season.
And the second longest is 65 yards by Brandon Aubrey of the Cowboys, in 2024.
And the third longest is 64 yards by two kickers, Matt Prater of the Broncos in 2013, and by Brandon Aubrey of the Cowboys against the Giants on Sunday. I had to look these up.
By my eye, Brandon Aubrey’s 64 yarder on Sunday would have been good from 70 yards.
On top of that, a Jaguars kicker already made a 70-yard field goal in a preseason game this year. It didn’t count towards the official NFL record books because of it not being regular-season, but the potential is clearly there.
In their Week 2 game against the Baltimore Ravens, the Cleveland Browns:
Held Derrick Henry to 23 yards.
Held Lamar Jackson to 2 rushes for 13 yards.
Ran 19 more plays.
Outgained the Ravens by 80 yards.
Converted 4 more third downs.
And lost by 24 points.
The Browns are cursed, and I’m here for it. Anyone who would sign DeShaun Watson to that kind of a contract deserves to be cursed.
The Raiders appeared a touch incompetent to me, sort of like what the Jets are famous for. I don’t remember the last time I saw the Raiders. Are they normally a little Jetty?
I know it sounds absurd to say about a game where the ravens scored 40 but it was actually an incredible defensive performance. They held them to very few points throughout most of the game, the D-line play was dominant stuffing runs and containing Lamar, what scoring there was until the end was crazy ass “DeAndre is down there somewhere” passes that were well defensed but were spectacular catches anyway. A lot of the points were scored by the Ravens defense and special teams and by the offense on short drives after a Browns turnover, and in the last quarter where the defense was worn down/gave up from getting nothing out of their performance.
It was actually probably the best defensive performance in the history of the NFL in a game where the other team put up 40+ points.
League average offensive performance and the Browns crush the Ravens.