Roberto Aguayo: Accurate Kicker
Kickers are all the rage lately! Josh Brown hit his wife and Roberto Aguayo can’t hit anything!
I laughed my ass off when the Bucs drafted Aguayo. I think as a football fan it was impossible not to, because holy shit, the Bucs spent a second round pick on a kicker. A KICKER. Goddamn, Bucs, you dumb. You so dumb.
I’ve seen plently of rationalization from Bucs fans about it, the usual type when a team does something this stupid. I tried it myself, to see the sense in drafting a kicker that high. I can’t do it. I just can’t. The arguments are not good enough. Drafting a Kicker anytime before round 3 is stupid. The Bucs were stupid. I haven’t even mentioned the best part. They didn’t just draft a Kicker in the second round, they traded up to draft a kicker slightly higher in the second round. The Bucs gave away a 3rd and 4th round pick for this 2nd round kicker. Hahahahahahahahaha Bucs. Hahahahaha. Haha. My ass has officially been laughed off. Great weight loss plan. Laugh that ass off baby.
The biggest argument I hear is the “Well if you can lock up this position for a decade, wouldn’t you do it, even if it is a kicker?” Kickers are just not valuable enough for that level of investment. It’s easy to find kickers. The gap between a Gostowski or Tucker and a Cundiff in the NFL doesn’t feel that large. It might cost you some games, but really games shouldn’t come down to field goals in the first place. Kickers are very inconsistent. Remember a few years ago when Mason Crosby couldn’t make a kick to save his life and Packer fans openly called for his head? Yeah, bad year. He’s fine now. Move along everyone. The Raiders spent a 1st rounder on Seabass and I don’t give a shit how good Seabass has been for the Raiders. They could have drafted a more important position in that first round and probably landed Seabass in the 3rd or later. QBs always go too high because of how important that position is. Kickers are the opposite. It’s a rare skill, which puts them all at about equal footing, which means you can pretty much get a decent one at any point.
After the third round? That’s fine. After the third (And even sometimes the third round itself) teams are mostly throwing darts at a wall of potential and seeing what lands where. That’s a great spot to draft a kicker. Punters and Kickers should go in the 4th more often, honestly. Great value and good chance of finding contribution there. Just not in the first two rounds. Bucs. you dummies. I laugh at every Bucs fan who defies this opinion because they are stuck in a web of their own homerism unwilling to admit their team is stupid because the move was actually brilliant (Nope). If the Bucs traded up because another team was threatening to take Aguayo, then that team is also stupid.
My roast of the Bucs complete, let’s laugh at Roberto a bit. THE MOST ACCURATE KICKER IN COLLEGE FOOTBALL HISTORY (under 40 yards cough cough a rather important caveat) is having a hilarious case of the jitters. His very first kick ever, an Extra Point (33 yards, otherwise known as under 40) and he missed it oh man that was the best thing ever. My welcome back to Football 2016 moment was that shank and it was glorious. Then, he missed a field goal in week 2! And now he’s shanking practice field goals! It’s far from panic time for Aguayo. He’ll mostly likely be fine. But after trading up in the second round because THIS GUY was apparently worth it, the misses are goddamn hilarious.
Bless you, Buccaneers, you magnificent bastards.
And as a Panthers fan, I can just sit back and take it all in.
Just don’t ask me to fall on it.
I just went back to this comic to point out that Roberto Aguayo just beat your team, #GOBUCS
You know you’ve made it as a player when you’re featured in a Draw Play comic.
Rich Eisen freaked out on NFL Network when Roberto got drafted
The kid’s got a bad case of the yips.
It’s a Buc life
As a Ravens fan, I disagree with your point that there is not a big difference between Ghost or Tucker and Cundiff
You know a good place to get kickers? Arena League.
Sunday is Arena Bowl XXIX (29) As (for the 3rd time in the last 5 years) The Arizona Rattlers (15-3) will host the Philadelphia Soul (also 15-3). The game will be played Friday night, 7pm on ESPN in Glendale, Arizona (at the Coyotes arena, not the Cardinals). Philly bear Tampa and J’ville (55-50) to get here, while Arizona beat Portland and Cleveland (82-41) to get here. Arizona won Arena Bowls XXV (25) and XXVI (26) over Philly, and looking for their 6th title, breaking Tampa’s record of 5. Philly is going for title #2. I’ve got Arizona by 20
Some examples of Arena-to-NFL kickers are Rob Bironas (San Jose, 2003-2004), Mike Vanderjagt (Tampa, 1995; Portland Forest Dragons, 1997-1998), and José Cortéz (Detroit Fury, 2005).
By bad on Bironas, he played for the New York Dragons in 2005, not the Sabercats in 2003-04
Ah, yes, the Flordia State University.
Remember Russell Erxleben? The Buccaneers don’t…
I get that it is the preseason and thus you’re hurting for material, but this is pretty weak: https://i.redd.it/7p00n182fbhx.png
Kicking is more important now than it ever has been. If you think there’s no strategic value in taking a very accurate kicker in the second round after we already got our guy (#28) then you don’t have a very strategic mind me thinks.
They could have had him in the third or later. He could turn out to be the best kicker in history, it doesn’t change that they could have drafted him in the third or later, and used that #2 pick on filling one of the many other holes, and certainly they could have not traded up and given away two future picks for him.
Here is a list of current kickers that weren’t even drafted:
Dan Bailey
Steven Hauschka
Adam Vinatieri, likely the first HoF kicker
Matt Prater
Justin Tucker
Chris Boswell
Chandler Catanzaro
Phil Dawson
Out of the top 10 ranked Kickers from last year, only 3 of them were actually drafted. Gostowski (4th), Josh Brown (7th), and Dustin Hopkins (6th). No one higher than 4th round, which was my argument for the best time to pick one.
Now let’s go even further. the next 10 best kickers on that list.
Travis Coons – UDFA
Ryan Succop – Mr. Irrelevant
Blair Walsh – 6th
Jason Myers – UDFA
Brandon McManus – UDFA
Mason Crosby – 6th
Nick Novak – UDFA
Dan Carpenter – UDFA
Robbie Gould (Currently the most accurate kicker in NFL history) – UDFA
Graham Gano – UDFA
Fuck it, lets go through them all, bottom 12.
Randy bullock – 5th round (And he’s kind of viewed as broken already)
Mike Nugent – 2nd
Connor Barth – UDFA
Caleb Sturgis – 5th
Andrew Franks – UDFA
Nick Folk – 6th
Josh Lambo – UDFA
Cairo Santos – UDFA
Seabass – 1st
Matt Bryant – UDFA
Greg Zuerlein – 6th
Look at that list of kickers. 1 drafted in the first, 1 drafted in the second, no others drafted above round 4, and the vast majority are UDFA, including several of the best kickers ever like Phil Dawson, Robbie Gould, Vinatieri. And you are saying that spending a 2nd rounder and giving up a 3rd and 4th for a kicker was Having a good strategic mind? NOPE. It was fucking stupid as shit no matter how good Aguayo ends up being, and you better hope he gets over his problems. This list proves you can find a good kicker very easily without even spending a draft pick. It doesn’t matter that kicking is slightly more important now, Aguayo was never worth 3 draft picks.
The Bucs did something stupid, at this point just admit it and hope he works out.
Jan Stenerud, chiefs kicker in the 60s and 70’s, is in the hall, Vinatieri deserves to be the second, with maybe Seabass as the 3rd
There is literally no advantage to giving up early picks for a guy that can hit kicks within 40-45 yards (spoiler alert: so can everyone else) whose position rarely gets drafted and when do it’s in the 7th. Instead of saying “well we got our guy, now there’s nothing else good in these 6 rounds so we’re gonna make a batshit crazy move” say something like “hey, Andrew Billings is here. Let’s take him because he’s actually extremely valuable.”
bucs sucs
;(
Mistake on the pick. Aguayo was taken 59th overall, not 47th.
Great article on kickers.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/sports/playmagazine/28lewis.html
Its long as hell, but a good read.
BECAUSE THE BUCS TRADED FOR A KICKER WHICH IS SOMETHING YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO DO AND THEY ENDED UP WITH A PRETTY MEDIOCRE KICKER, YOU SEE.
The bucs are going 16-0 this year. All their wins will come on last second field goals by Aguayo.
They’ll lose in the divisional round when he shanks 5 field goals
Flordia State, Dave 🙂
One placekicker taken in the entire 2016 draft, and he was taken at #59 after trading two mid-round picks. Meanwhile, the Ravens and Cowboys are sitting in the corner with their undrafted 87%+ Pro Bowl kickers laughing their asses off.
I was one of the Bucs fans that thought it was wasteful at best and pure dumb at worst. And the Bucs’ had a pretty good draft before then (and even after), too.
As you said…never draft kickers before the third.
I agree with 99% of what you said Dave, but I have to disagree with one specific line,
“It’s easy to find kickers. The gap between a Gostowski or Tucker and a Cundiff in the NFL doesn’t feel that large.”
Again, the rest of what you’re saying I agree with, the Bucs were stupid, kickers aren’t worth a pick in the first three rounds, and that’s hilarious. But I think you’re underestimating the value and rarity of a good kicker. In a game where pretty much every player is an Olympic-calibre athlete and both coordinators have spent a ridiculous number of hours analyzing film and developing strategies to exploit an opponent’s weaknesses, games regularly come down to the smallest margins. Having a kicker you can count on, especially from long-range, is a massive boost, gives you much more flexibility in your game-planning, and is much harder than it seems.
Specialists, even at the NFL level are too highly variant to invest heavily in. Outside of maybe three each kickers and punters at any given time, no specialist is worth more than twice the veteran minimum or a contract longer than two years, because they’re unreliable year to year. That’s why there isn’t a great deal of difference between a top ten and a bottom ten kicker in the league. I would separate the absolute best, like Tucker, and the absolute worst, like Scobee, but the margin between a Boswell and a Cundiff is much tighter.
Third? I’m in the camp of 7th round at the earliest. Maybe a compensatory 6th. Maybe.
I disagree, generational talent should get the nod it deserves, the kicking game is vastly underrated, SeaBass was a great pick for the Raiders, still boots 50yarders in with relative ease dispute being old.
That said you could pick up a Vinitieri up without drafting him so what do I know.
To be fair, that’s true with any position. Granted you see a much higher percentage of great kickers who’re undrafted because kickers are such a low-value position, but Romo went undrafted, as did Antonio Gates, and Chris Harris, just to name a few recent ones. Brady barely got drafted, and Marques Closton, Antonio Brown, and Shannon Sharpe were all sixth-rounders or later.
I don’t remember which coach said it, but most scouting departments don’t know what makes a great player great, they just know it when they see it. Some people make more educated guesses, but everyone’s just making educated guesses in the draft.
The one thing I will miss getting to say now that he’s been traded, although the trade makes it more relevant than ever:
Mingo only pawn in game of life.
Also, kickers as a group are highly consistent, and as individuals, with very few notable exceptions, are highly variant year-to-year. That’s why kickers are fungible assets until they prove otherwise, and it’s why you never ever draft a kicker or sign one to a contract you can’t get out of.
Despite addressing the situation in the last comic, should a Giants fan be continuing to draw attention to a kicker, particularly an inaccurate one that cant differentiate between kicking a football and a Pregnant woman?
Hit all of his kicks against Cleveland, and the home crowd went nuts a la Shaquille O’Neal hitting any free throw.
Busc fan here. It’s just one in a long list of bad picks (though they have been better Licht era, which makes this pick even more confusing), and one made more noticeable because they traded up for it. There was no reason to do so, as they more than likely would have gotten him in the 3rd round (if they really wanted him that badly), and honestly, it’s probably one of the worst picks by them in their history (and that’s saying something).
When they picked him, my jaw dropped, and I was so pissed I stopped watching the draft……of course him missing so many FGs/extra points and the whole yips thing is just one of the most typical Bucs thing ever.