Kickers are generally one of the least important positions in the NFL. However, when the game is tied in the final seconds and your team needs a 55-yard field goal to win, that's when these seven kickers come in handy. So here are the best NFL kickers for the 2024 season:
No. 1: Chris Boswell
This NFL season, the title of the NFL's best current kicker has swiftly been passed from Justin Tucker to Chris Boswell. Following a 6-year hiatus, Chris Boswell is finally part of a Steelers' offense that gains substantial yardage and puts him in a position to attempt a career-high amount of field goals. And as a result, Boswell leads the NFL with 36 field goals made, making a 4th-highest 92.3% of those kicks.
Since the Steelers have locked up a playoff spot, the team will rely on Boswell to make a crucial kick in a tight postseason matchup. Hopefully for Pittsburgh, their elite kicker can continue his perfect 17 for 17 streak of playoff field goals.
No. 2: Brandon Aubrey
The only consistency the Cowboys' have been able to find this season has been their kicker, Brandon Aubrey. Brandon Aubrey is easily the NFL's most powerful kicker, as he has not only kicked the longest field goal this season but tied Justin Tucker's 66-yard record in week one until the kick was nullified thanks to a false start penalty. However, Justin Tucker bounced the 66-yarder off the crossbar, while Aubrey's 66-yard kick sailed well over it.
The NFL has never seen a kicker with this much power coming from a second-year player, and Aubrey will likely break Tucker's all-time record at some point during his career. Although the reason Brandon Aubrey isn't the best NFL kicker in 2024 is that his accuracy has dipped slightly this year, missing three more field goals than in the season prior.
No. 3: Cameron Dicker
Cameron Dicker, a kicker out of Texas, went undrafted in the 2022 draft, before the Rams signed Dicker as an undrafted free agent shortly thereafter. The Rams released Dicker just a few months later, who was then signed by the Ravens. After just two days of being a Raven, Baltimore waived Cameron Dicker, who was subsequently signed to the Eagles practice squad that October, to replace an injured Jake Elliot. After Dicker was then released by the Eagles, he was signed by the Chargers, where he quickly cemented himself as one of the league's best kickers during his three seasons in LA.
We've seen the same elite level of accuracy from Dicker in 2024, making a 2nd-highest 93.3% of field goals this season. Those three teams are now all kicking themselves for writing off Dicker the Kicker, especially the Rams, who have been struggling with kicking problems during the last couple of seasons.
No. 4: Jake Bates
Coincidentally, Jake Bates had a similar story as Cameron Dicker. Lions' kicker Jake Bates didn't even play football in high school, and only handled kickoffs in college. After going undrafted in the 2023 NFL draft, Bates signed with the Texans until his subsequent release just 11 days later.
Bates then played in the UFL during the spring of 2024, where he proved that he was a big fish in a small pond, kicking a league-record 64-yard field goal. This performance attracted a Lions' team in desperate need of kicking, thus signing Jake Bates ahead of the 2024 NFL season. Not only has Jake Bates been the NFL's most accurate kicker this year, but also the most clutch, kicking three game-winning field goals. One of these field goals included a 52-yarder against, coincidentally enough, the Houston Texans.
No. 5: Nick Folk
Nick Folk is far and away this list's most veteran kicker, with his NFL tenure dating back to 2007, and tying Aaron Rodgers and Marcedes Lewis as the NFL's oldest player. And Folk's impressive 2024 campaign proves that father time has not yet caught up to the 40-year old Titan's kicker. However, Nick Folk hasn't merely "stayed consistent" at age 40, but Folk is recording a career-best season, leading the NFL with 95.5% field goal accuracy, with only one miss this season. In year 15 of Folk's 17-year career, the then Patriots placekicker set an NFL record for most consecutive field goals under 50 yards, with a whopping 57.
No. 6: Ka'imi Fairbairn
Unlike most kickers in general and on list, Ka'imi Fairbairn has spent the entirety of his 9-year career on one team, the Houston Texans. Houston's longtime kicker has consistently been one of the NFL's strongest, as observed by his league-leading 13 field goals from 50+ yards in 2024. While Fairbarn's accuracy has remained league average throughout his career, his accuracy is good enough to make a 55 or 60 field goal a safer bet than going for it on 4th & 3. And the Texans will likely be faced with that decision during the upcoming playoffs, thus relying on their long range kicker to propel them to a playoff win.
No. 7: Chase McLaughlin:
Despite playing in the NFL for only 6 seasons, Buccaneers' kicker Chase McLaughlin has spent those six years playing for seven different teams, which is 1.16 teams per season. Considering how much McLaughlin has been around the league, he's not far removed from a 40 year-old veteran like Nick Folk.
And despite McLaughlin constantly traveling and adjusting to 7 different systems and cultures, his accuracy between the goal posts has stayed consistent no matter what team he's been on. 2024 has been no different, with the Bucs' kicker recording a 5th-highest 92.6 field goal percentage, an 8th-highest 7 of 9 field goals made from 50+ yards. Tampa Bay should probably end Chase McLaughlin's constant traveling, as he's provided impressive production that the Bucs should hold onto.
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