The Kicking Game

One player that has flown under the radar this year is Shaun Suisham. It has been a long time since we had a realiable kciker to lean on. By the time we had John Hall he was servicable at best.
S.S. stats going into tonight

5th FG made-22
16/19 fgm 30-49 yds
85% total fg made

Since 1997 only 2 Redskins kickers have made over 16 FG's in one season:
Brett Conway 21/33 2001 only 63%
Brett Conway 22/32 2004 69%
John Hall 25/33 2003 76%

At this pace Suisham should easily kick over 80% and make close to 30 fg's.
Hes no Mark Mosely, but definaltely has done a great job taking over a position weve struggled with.

While that position isn't one with a lot of long-term security, "Shazam" has put himself in a good position for this year. I'd love longer kickoffs, but Shaun has earned the faith of this staff, justifiably.

He's been pretty solid. Seems like a keeper.

I got him on the fantasy roster. He seems good enough to keep around.

I'd love longer kickoffs, but Shaun has earned the faith of this staff, justifiably.

Yeah, I like Suisham a lot, especially after the rough stretch we've had at the position. Those kickoffs that land at the 15 yard line do kill me though. He does seem pretty good at directional kickoffs, though, and even when his kicks are short they often seem to land by the numbers rather than in the middle of the field. I'm assuming that is planned.

I'm curious to see how they deal with Hester this week. It seemed like they were trying some things with McGee last week, really trying to pin him between the numbers and the sideline. All the kicks seemed to land on about the 10-15 though. I think I'd just pop it up to the up man and try to force them to just call a fair catch.

very satisfied with our kicker. like you have said, it seems like forever since we had a kicker we could depend on. anyone think Conway makes the kick against Tampa if Johnson doesn't fumble the snap?

Suisham went through a mini funk mid-season with the hooks, but he seems to have straightened himself out. Quietly, he's had the second best year by a Redskins kicker that I can remember.

As to Hester, my view is why take a chance? If you kick to him, he has the potential to score as many points as the Bears offense does on their own. You hate to give up field position, but I would rather take my chances with our defense against Grossman et al than I would kicking to Hester. He has 10 TD returns in 28 games. Brian Mitchell had 13 in over a 100 games and he was considered a great return man.

i have to disagree with you all here. his kickoffs are far too short and hes not reliable on field goals past the 45. anything over 50 yards forgetaboutit.

It's kind of hard to judge him on 50+ when he's 1-3 in his career. Plus there aren't too many kickers out there that are very consistent on anything over 50.

Kickoffs on the other hand are ridiculous...however one begins to wonder if it's on purpose. When he first got here, he was booming them inside the 5, and from time to time, you will see a deeper kickoff. But now he's consistently around the 10-15 yard line. Is he kicking it higher and shorter to allow his coverage team time to get down field? A good question for Danny Smith...

very satisfied with our kicker. like you have said, it seems like forever since we had a kicker we could depend on. anyone think Conway makes the kick against Tampa if Johnson doesn't fumble the snap?

Someone might get on me for taking it way back to 1999, but since you bring it up... Am i the only one who still has nightmares of Kip Vickers getting beat all day long in that game? My position was always that if Andy Heck was healthy he would have been able to slow down the pass rush enough that the Skins could have won. And, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Vickers give up a sack just before that field goal attempt that made it much longer than it would have been otherwise?

I got a chance to work with Heck a bit when I was at UVa and mentioned that to him once. He agreed (of course), though he also said that he thought that if they beat Tampa then they would have taken out St. Louis and gone to the dance. Not sure about that one.

Sorry for the digression. That one sticks with me for some reason. Maybe I need to get some counseling or something :)