"Icing" the Kicker

[Heyseed]

Did the Vikings ice their own kicker by running the game clock down?

 

[SeaChase]

I think the weather may have helped with that..

 

[Polaris]

Did the Vikings ice their own kicker by running the game clock down?

Lol. The one game where "icing" the kicker was quite literally true.

 

[pmedic920]

He kicked the laces.

Anybody here know for a fact, how much that effects the accuracy of kicks?
I know that no kickers want to kick the laces but how much does it effect where the ball goes?

 

[sc85sis]

That article someone posted in another thread really gave great info as to what likely happened. It basically boiled down to a crazy combo of less than perfect rotation on the snap, the holder not going laces out and Walsh's plant foot ending up too close to the ball.

 

[Hawks46]

He kicked the laces.

Anybody here know for a fact, how much that effects the accuracy of kicks?
I know that no kickers want to kick the laces but how much does it effect where the ball goes?

Typically it screws them up pretty bad. I read somewhere (not recently) that kicking the laces is around a 46% success rate.

That said, Walsh kicked one for 40 something yards that game with the laces in. Just goes to show you if you kick the laces, it's an uneven surface and you might not get a clean hit.

 

[Cartire]

He kicked the laces.

Anybody here know for a fact, how much that effects the accuracy of kicks?
I know that no kickers want to kick the laces but how much does it effect where the ball goes?

From what I've been reading, Laces do more to effect distance than accuracy. You cant get a clean trampoline effect on the laces, so the ball doesnt travel as far. In fact, on Moving the Chains today, they were saying that the holder was specifically told NOT to spin the ball, because they were afraid he would drop it in the cold.

Walsh's plant leg was to close the ball and he just shanked it. Pretty sure it was all on him.


But the Laces Out memes were worth it regardless.

 

[sutz]

He kicked the laces.

Anybody here know for a fact, how much that effects the accuracy of kicks?
I know that no kickers want to kick the laces but how much does it effect where the ball goes?

Typically it screws them up pretty bad. I read somewhere (not recently) that kicking the laces is around a 46% success rate.

That said, Walsh kicked one for 40 something yards that game with the laces in. Just goes to show you if you kick the laces, it's an uneven surface and you might not get a clean hit.

At that distance it probably shouldn't have mattered. Like sc85sis said, there was another article posted about that and there were several things that went wrong on that attempt. But again, at that distance there is actually quite a bit of wiggle room for those factors. He still should have made it 75% of the time I would think.

One thing is I never heard if the kicker requested the left hash or not. They could have run the ball to the other hash before the kick if he'd wanted that.

 

[Cartire]

One thing is I never heard if the kicker requested the left hash or not. They could have run the ball to the other hash before the kick if he'd wanted that.

Peterson tried for the 1st down, so he was juking around and went left. They werent thinking FG yet, they wanted the 1st down to make sure there was 0 secs left. I dont blame them for going for the 1st down instead of trying to line up the ball. At that distance, it shouldnt have mattered.

 

[BlueOne]

I have kicked one or two footballs. Laces effect distance and can also over-exaggerate shanks a little. (Not much at all from that distance and it won't cause obvious shanks). The rotation of the ball on the snap only matters to the extent it caused the laces to be in.

The real issue was as stated, his plant foot was too close to the ball, which caused his kicking foot be further right when contact is made with the football. The foot is at an angle for soccer style kickers (the only kind these days?). In essence he hit the ball both with the too high up on his foot, maybe in part of the ankle, instead of the hard bone that's on the inside/top, and he also hit the ball off center on the right side of the ball, unsurprisingly causing the ball to move left.

NOW, in theory this could be the holders fault if he placed the ball closer to the kicker than the kicker was expecting causing the plant foot issue. But either way, the issue was the location of the plant foot relative to the ball.

 

[Hawk-A-Loogie]

If we had a timeout left. I wonder if Pete would have iced their kicker. ATL game all over again? Who knows. But glad we were out of timeouts after seeing the results.

 

[Jville]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/gbellseattle/status/686687634941321216[/tweet]

Sherman nearly blocked an earlier kick. I am inclined to acknowledge pressure from kick blocking scheme.

So ..... that missed field goal was a forced error. Special Teams! :th2thumbs:

 

[idahawks]

I also heard that since Sherman almost blocked the previous kick that one may have been adjusted or at least he got in his head. Today Walsh said he didn't follow through with his foot and he didn't know why. It may not be a coincidence he kicked left and Sherman was coming from the right. I'd like to think it was a forced error and I think it makes more sense than a great kicker shanking a 27 yarder.

 

[evergreen]

If we had a timeout left. I wonder if Pete would have iced their kicker. ATL game all over again? Who knows. But glad we were out of timeouts after seeing the results.

Was thinking same thing. Let him ice himself. Or a fake icing.

 

[zhawk]

probably could call this the "Ace Ventura" game. :th2thumbs:

 

[Heyseed]

If we had a timeout left. I wonder if Pete would have iced their kicker. ATL game all over again? Who knows. But glad we were out of timeouts after seeing the results.

Yes,
I was so happy we didn't have any more timeouts or do something really stupid :mrgreen:

 

[Hasselbeck]

I think the reason for the miss was two-fold..

1) He still had Richard Sherman in the back of his head and figured with the game on the line, that he would try to time the snap and get in there again.. causing point two....

2) It was the biggest kick of his life and his nerves were probably through the roof.. this caused him to rush the routine, he got too close to the ball and just shanked it. I really don't think the laces played a role from that distance. Like Collinsworth said, there is no way to practice a 3 foot putt to win the Masters.. its one of those moments where there is no amount of preparation mentally or physically you can do in that moment. You just do it, or you don't.

The OP does bring up an EXCELLENT point though that having no timeouts helped us avoid icing him. I've always believed that icing the kicker benefits the kicker more than the opposition. Had we called timeout and he shanked it.. oh man. Brutal.

 

[HawKnPeppa]

He kicked the laces.

Anybody here know for a fact, how much that effects the accuracy of kicks?
I know that no kickers want to kick the laces but how much does it effect where the ball goes?

Typically it screws them up pretty bad. I read somewhere (not recently) that kicking the laces is around a 46% success rate.

That said, Walsh kicked one for 40 something yards that game with the laces in. Just goes to show you if you kick the laces, it's an uneven surface and you might not get a clean hit.

Hauschka said that the cold temp brought the air pressure inside the ball down to about 8 psi, which made it feel 'flat' when you kick it, and it took longer to leave your foot. In that condition, I would guess that kicking the laces has much less of an effect because the ball basically has no resiliency to begin with.

 

[BlueTalons]

The OP does bring up an EXCELLENT point though that having no timeouts helped us avoid icing him. I've always believed that icing the kicker benefits the kicker more than the opposition. Had we called timeout and he shanked it.. oh man. Brutal.

No way we would have called a time-out in the situation anyway...there was time on the clock and had he made it, we would have needed it for a potential counter drive/kick.

 

[Cartire]

The OP does bring up an EXCELLENT point though that having no timeouts helped us avoid icing him. I've always believed that icing the kicker benefits the kicker more than the opposition. Had we called timeout and he shanked it.. oh man. Brutal.

No way we would have called a time-out in the situation anyway...there was time on the clock and had he made it, we would have needed it for a potential counter drive/kick.

This