Old Hands Give Titans a Leg Up When Weather Turns
Experience pays dividends late into an NFL season. And the Tennessee Titans kicking game is flush with it.
No NFL team boasts the combined experience with their kicker and punter that the Titans do with Stephen Gostkowski (15th year) and Brett Kern (14th year). By comparison, Baltimore is next with Justin Tucker and punter Sam Koch, who have a combined 24 years of NFL experience. That is still five fewer years than what Tennessee puts out on the football field every week.
At this time of the year, that experience can be meaningful.
“Honestly Brett being in the league, and Stephen being in the league for quite some time, they’ve basically seen it all,” special teams coordinator Craig Aukerman said. “When it comes down to December the conditions are going to be a bit different. There is going to be wind, and it will be a bit colder.”
Gostkowski started the year off on the wrong foot, opening up week one with four missed kicks. Through 13 games, he has made 67 percent of his field goals (16-24). He is tied for fifth in the NFL for the long kick with a 55 yarder this season and has made a career-high seven from 50 yards or more (eight attempts). He has made his last 19 kicks (14 PATs, five field goals) over the past four games.
“Stephen, when he was in New England, he had to deal with a bunch of different things: cold weather, wind, all that different type of stuff,” Aukerman said. “I think Stephen is kicking the ball really well. Not just in extra points and field goals, but also on his kickoffs.”
Through 10 games (he missed three with a wrist injury), Kern has averaged 46.1 yards on 31 punts. His longest punt this season sits at 66 yards, and he’s placed 19 punts inside 20-yard line with two touchbacks. Twice in the last three games (at Indianapolis, at Jacksonville), he was a perfect 4-for-4 on punts inside the 20.
“We just continue to get him back in rhythm, where he left off at, so we are just excited,” Aukerman said.
The experience both Kern and Gostkowski possess instills confidence in those involved with the Titans special team unit. There are elements of the game where Tennessee trusts its two kickers to make the call on whether to punt or to kick a field goal depending on the weather and situation in the game.
“The games, especially when you get into cold-weather games and there is wind involved, you’re not going to be able to kick a 55 or 56-yarder,” Aukerman said. “You got to trust the kicker to say, ‘Coach, it’s probably better off if we punt the ball here.’”
Typically, with younger kickers, they are eager to attempt every kick possible, Aukerman said.
Yet, Tennessee is different because Gostkowski’s experience allows him to tell the staff when he feels that punting the ball is a far better option. And with the experience of Kern, the individuals on special teams are confident that, on his punts, he can place the ball within the opposing team’s 10-yard line consistently.
“That experience is huge,” he said. “We will continue to rely on those guys giving us good information on where they feel they can make a kick or punt the ball in different types of situations.”
