Kicking the can: Digesting the Dallas Cowboys kicking situation

ARLINGTON, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 28: Brett Maher #2 of the Dallas Cowboys walks the sideline in the fourth quarter against the Buffalo Bills at AT&T Stadium on November 28, 2019 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images)
ARLINGTON, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 28: Brett Maher #2 of the Dallas Cowboys walks the sideline in the fourth quarter against the Buffalo Bills at AT&T Stadium on November 28, 2019 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images) /
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(Photo by Julio Aguilar/Getty Images)
(Photo by Julio Aguilar/Getty Images) /

Other options

As far as available kickers, there isn’t much. Veteran kicker Nick Kovak is available. He has had only four out of ten seasons where he kicked under 80 percent.

There are also unproven kickers such as Elliott Fry, Giorgio Tavecchio, and Nick Rose. Rose was a part of the workouts that Dallas held to find a replacement for Maher but ultimately the Cowboys staff felt more comfortable with Forbath.

Fry has yet to attempt a kick in the NFL, while Tavecchio kicked for 76 percent in a full season back in 2017 and 100 percent last season in three games. These two are bigger risks since you don’t really know what you have. They would need to be looked at before a season, not right before the playoffs.

Moving forward

Well, now there is pretty much no getting Maher back … at least for this season. Kai Forbath is now officially the new kicker for the Dallas Cowboys.

Whether this is a good move or not will be determined in the next three games. Was there a good reason Forbath couldn’t convince a team to stick with him? I guess we are going to need to find out.

Regardless of how Forbath performs over the next three games, I would expect the Cowboys to have other kickers attend training camp and preseason. This is to not only push Forbath but also to see if Dallas can make another change for the better.

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This Sunday will be Forbath’s second game this season, but his first as a Cowboy. The Los Angeles Rams will give him a test, and will surely make him pay for any mistakes. This will have to be a week-to-week assessment as to if Dallas made an upgrade at the kicking position.