Vanderbilt uses female kicker in 2nd half
- Thread starter Dan1911
- Start date
well if you did that casually and could do it consistently I’d have to wonder why you didn’t kick. Most HS kickers are lucky to get it to the 10. Sure the best of the best do but I’d bet 80-85% of HS kickers don’t kick touchbacks regularly. Now that some maybe all? have gone away from kickoffs and just starting at the 25 I wonder how that will translate to the next level if you never practice it in HS.
I wouldn’t take that bet. It’s not damning for any kicker but I would be shocked if she could kick it through the end zone.
Yeah, I don't think that she would put it through the end zone either. There's a lot of college kickers that don't do that. But she can absolutely kick the ball further than a squib to the 35 yard line (or whatever yard line it was exactly).
The problem, as I said before, is that they didn't have her practicing kick offs. So they had no idea how far to expect her to kick the ball, or how much hang time she would have gotten on it. That's why they had her squib it. Safer. No chance of a big return.
See to me that makes it somewhat of a gimmick. I don’t expect we will ever see it in the NFL where there are only so many roster spots, but I would think there will be a place for a short range female kicker in college for kicks maybe 40 yards and in. As Pitt fans we have certainly seen that need where you have a guy with a huge leg that has missed multiple chippies over the course of his career.
Teams should never have anyone kick off that they aren’t prepared to have make a tackle or at least get in the way of the returner. Not saying that’s what happened here, but over the length of many kickoffs playing essentially with a man short on returns is highly -EV.
Im sure no one is remotely surprised by this, just seems a little odd they didn’t wait until after the final game. Very un Vanderbilt-ish.
I think that it ended up that way, because I think the only reason she kicked off was because the coach realized that with how pathetic his team's offense was they weren't going to be kicking any extra points or field goals. And with all the fuss they made he wanted her to get into the game.
Definitely agree with that, if she has the talent to be part of the team there was no sense rushing it. Either wait until next week against Georgia or have her compete for a job next season. Social justice for the sake of social justice never works.
From what some have said she has some legitimate skills, and their kickers have been bad. It probably won’t be her, but there are teams out there with horrible kicking situations yearly, no reason a female can’t fill that role, albeit in a shorter range capacity.
I saw something yesterday that said that their kickers were something like 3-7 on field goals further than 30 yards this season. Assuming that was mostly kicks in the 30-45 yard range (because if your kicker is that bad why are you trying long ones?) that's really bad. There is no doubt in my mind that a good female kicker who practiced it all the time could regularly make 40 yard field goals.
You would definitely think so, and I expect that will be their niche if the idea ever gets traction.
gimmick...probably 4 or 5 guys on the team that kicked for their high school teams who would put it down the field much further...
that being said, I'm sure she is significantly more accurate than Kessman inside that tricky 35 and in field goal range..
Last edited:
agree she definitely could have kicked it farther than she did. It’s a shame she didn’t get a shot at trying a 40 yarder
It was too bad she didn't get a chance to score some points, but I suppose when your team is that bad it shouldn't be unexpected.
I don't think they wanted her to kick it deep because it would have put her in play to get blocked or make a tackle. You wouldn't want to put anyone who put on the pads for the first time in that situation. It was a smart play and well executed.
Judging by her warmup kick from XP range, I doubt many criticizing her would even be able to make it to the uprights from this distance.
I don't think they wanted her to kick it deep because it would have put her in play to get blocked or make a tackle. You wouldn't want to put anyone who put on the pads for the first time in that situation. It was a smart play and well executed.
Judging by her warmup kick from XP range, I doubt many criticizing her would even be able to make it to the uprights from this distance.
