It's easy to forget about kickers.
They are barely on the field.
Yet, the Packers are currently in the middle of a kicking quagmire right now. When teams have one spot reserved for a kicker on their 53-man roster, the Packers go against the grain and have two.
On Oct. 9, Packers coach Matt LaFleur said that Brandon McManus’ right quadricep was a “major concern.” McManus was then declared inactive vs. Cincinnati. The Packers then brought in this guy by the name of Lucas Havrisik. He made a 43-yard field goal and a 39-yard field goal with 1:52 left to seal the 27-18 win over the Bengals. He then nailed a 31-yard field goal and a 61-yard field goal — which is a Packers franchise record en route to beating the Cardinals 27-23.
Havrisik is 4-for-4 on field goals and is 6-for-6 at extra points. What else is a guy supposed to do?
Yet, the Packers have continually trotted McManus out there. Since returning from injury, McManus is 4-for-8, having missed at least one field goal against Pittsburgh, Carolina and Philadephia.
“As you work through the progression of being injured, obviously, the pain tolerances and everything get better and better,” he said. “Last week was when I felt almost back to normal — pretty much back to normal. Pretty much no pain, didn’t feel anything in my leg.”
That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement and it actually makes things even murkier. Why play a guy that isn’t 100 percent right? Not to mention, the other kicker has proven himself and also has a booming leg. To put this in perspective, McManus made 95 percent of his field goals last year with only one miss and this year, he’s sitting at 65 percent.
Just because the Packers signed McManus to a three-year, $15.3 million deal this past March doesn’t mean he should be kicking no matter what. At some point, LaFleur has to step in and put a priority on winning.
The Packers are 5-3-1 right now. They will need to win five of their remaining eight games to sniff the playoffs and six if they want to win the NFC North. Now is not the time to be worried about who’s playing and who isn’t playing based on contracts.
Now is the time to simply put the best team on the field and stack wins. The last thing the Packers need is to worry about anything other than peaking for the playoffs and getting as many wins as possible.
I think the guy for that right now is not a multi-million dollar guy but the guy who nobody has heard of. The guy that was talking about going back to substitute teaching after calmly making all of his kicks and the guy that made the Packers fans scream in the desert because he made a kick from practically Nevada.
It isn’t just time for Havrisik, it’s past time.
Put the best players on the field. Right now, Havriskik is the Packers best kicker.