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Originally Posted by OverAndBack
What do you think the difference in average field position after a kickoff is between the teams who have a guy who only kicks off and the teams who have their regular kicker do it? Significant enough to justify the roster spot?
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Apparently it is for some. Back in the day when they used to be able to kick off of the 3" tee the goal was not to have touchbacks. They wanted the ball in the air as long as possible but to come down inside the 5 so that it had to be returned. Then they eliminated the tee, well made it hold the ball so that the ball was touching the ground, backed up the kick off, and went to kicking-only balls. All of these changes happened since the third kicker came into existence.
The skill level of all players has greatly advanced over just ten years prior. If you look at the all-time list of field goal percentage you will find it dominated by current or very recently retired players. In fact Jan Stenerud, the only kicker-only player in there, would have no chance getting into the Hall of Fame today.
Points are so valuable that whenever a team is close enough to kick a field goal they must make it. So no matter how well a kicker can kick off a team will almost always take the kicker that can score points. However field position is also so important that if they can gain 10 yards every time they kick off it is worth a roster spot.
This is far more common in college as they have 85 scholarships to work with. It is the only reason I have 4 letters from college. The other guy may have never kicked a touchback if he had been doing it but I had touchbacks 40% of the time. Knowing I was going to the road games anyway they also made me the back-up punter so as to not have to have another player traveling. It even got to where I was the starting holder for 6 games, the starting kick off guy, and the back-up field goal kicker.