When most people think of football players, they aren’t usually thinking of 5’10”, 170 pounders. Most NFL kickers look like they could be accountants or professional poker players, not professional athletes.
Did you realize that kicking in the NFL has never been better? A lot has been made of the quality of the NFL game lately, with Tom Brady recently commenting on the mediocrity prevalent in the game. It’s probably safe to assume that he was talking about offense and defense, and not the kicking game.
As of last night’s game, Younghoe Koo is now the most accurate kicker in NFL history:
1. Younghoe Koo: 90%
2. Justin Tucker: 89.9%
3. Harrison Butker: 89.3%#Falcons pic.twitter.com/osb2IEIYdu— Rise Up Penix (@RiseUpReader) November 27, 2023
To put this into perspective, 3 of the 4 highest league-wide kicking percentage seasons all time have been in the last 3 seasons. Why are kickers all of a sudden that much more accurate? For one, more and more young players are zeroing in on a career as a kicker. As recently as a decade or two ago, a lot of NFL kickers were simply failed soccer players. With the explosion of football in the United States over that time period, kids are training to be football kickers from a young age, perfecting their craft and getting used to kicking the prolate spheroid shaped ball.
Another crazy fact is that the top 5 kickers in all time career field goal percentage are active players. After a missed kick on Sunday night, arguably the best kicker in the game, Justin Tucker, fell to 2nd place with an 89.93% average. Passing Tucker with an even 90.00% mark was Atlanta Falcons kicker Younghoe Koo, just the 4th South Korean born player in NFL history.
Koo moved with his parents to the United States in the 6th grade, where he was convinced by classmates to take up football after displaying a ridiculous kicking leg at recess. After setting the career field goal percentage record at Georgia Southern University, Koo got a chance with the San Diego Chargers in 2017. As he quickly found out, the life of an NFL kicker can be a rough one. He was cut after just 4 games, starting a journey of building his resume back up in the Alliance of American Football League. After the league folded, Koo had some chances with some other teams, before finally latching on with the Falcons. Flash forward a few years, and Koo is one of the top kickers in the league.
It’s crazy to think that for how good Tucker and Koo have been, Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker has an argument for being better than both. He sits 3rd in all time kick percentage at 89.30, aided by a perfect 20 for 20 in field goals this season. He’s been riding a high for awhile now, ever since kicking the game winning field goal in the Super Bowl last February.
We’re living in the golden age of NFL kicking, and there’s a good chance that efficiency and kicking power will only increase as the years go by. Tucker holds the all time longest field goal record of 66 yards, but I believe it’s only a matter of time before somebody hits 70. At any rate, there’s a good chance that the days of a team’s kicker being called an idiot are long over.