Buffalo Bills kicker Dan Carpenter is among those not too pleased with the league's changes to PATs. Unlike some other kickers, however, Carpenter is more worried about the safety of his team's offensive lineman than games potentially being decided by missed extra point attempts, according to ESPN.
Does the new NFL extra point rule compromise player safety?
Bills kicker Dan Carpenter is worried about the risk the new rule poses to his teammates.
Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
In an interview with SiriusXM NFL Radio on Tuesday, Carpenter said that he “feels bad” for Buffalo’s offensive linemen because the rule change -- which moves extra point attempts back to the 15-yard line to make them more difficult and allows defenses to score in the result of a turnover on either an extra point of two-point conversion attempt -- will create more collisions in games.
Carpenter went on to say that blocking on field goals is “probably the worst job in football,” and that the NFL has only created a situation in which defenses go after the plays much harder than before. “For a sport that was trying to cut back on collisions, I think that you’re probably just going to add a few more on those situations,” Carpenter said.
It’s an interesting perspective, and not one we’ve seen thus far. Many are wondering how this will affect teams’ decisions when it comes to whether they should go for the two-point conversion, but it’s probably not up for debate that defenses will play harder to block kicks if there’s a potential for two points going the other direction.
For kickers themselves, it’s probably not as big a change as you might think. Kickers haven’t had much issue hitting field goals from the longer range, hitting 95.3 percent of all field goal attempts from 30-35 yards in 2014. That’s also including attempts from the right and left hash marks.
As noted by ESPN, some kickers still aren't fans of the move. Justin Tucker doesn't like that his job is being made a little bit harder, while Dan Bailey criticized the league for its intentions in making the move. Whatever the case, Carpenter looking out for his offensive line is an interesting take on the matter, and one that shouldn't be overlooked by the NFL.
See More:
