Twitter: Zuerlein isn't getting enough credit and Falcons ST is getting too much blame

[CWR]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

I heard the theory that the Atlanta coaches saw how the ball was positioned and called time out. They told the Falcons not to touch it if it doesn't travel 10 yards and the thought was it wasn't going to make it 10 yards therefore its a bad gamble jumping on that oblong ball.

You're right. It was a hell of a kick.

 

[rnr_honeybadger]

I disagree, yes it was interesting to see him kick it that way but the falcons special teams were incredibly stupid to just stand around watching that thing spin instead of dropping on it and ending the game.

 

[Established1971]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

more like a knuckle curve

 

[SteveTheCowboy]

Not sure many kickers will adopt Zuerlein's technique even if they want. Kickers are much criticized but their job comes with a good bit of skill. Many fans would compete as kickers for NFL rosters if it was easy.

All kicking is not the same. Kickers have their own involuntary physical and mental approaches to kicking both innate and learned over time. Every kicker would not automatically adopt Zuerlein's example into their repertoire without possibly altering another aspect of their kicking style at the same time.

There is a golden rule with kickers. Do not mess with what they do best.

That's a good point they are a superstitious lot to boot.

 

[nightrain]

It was a one of kind attempt. Every team in the league will be spending an extra 20 minutes a day defending it starting Wednesday.

 

[ClappingCarrot]

What an emotional rollercoaster.

Two failed fake punts, then a successful onside kick and game winning field goal.

I still can't believe it.

 

[BotchedLobotomy]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

There's an article on NFL.COM where the Cowboys are calling it the watermelon kick.

 

[gimmesix]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

I give our special teams coach and Zuerlein a lot of credit for this kick.

The problem with onside kicks since changes were made to kickoffs is that the coverage cannot get there in time. Just look at our onside attempts the past couple of years. The kicker bounces the ball along the ground. A member of the return team falls on it and then the coverage team gets there too late to do anything about it.

It's clear that Fassel and Zuerlein designed this kick to move slowly along the ground to allow the coverage team the opportunity to get in position to contend for it. They also knew that by putting a spin on the ball that the return team isn't used to seeing that the return team would be less likely to want to try to field it if it wasn't going to go 10 yards. Why risk jumping on a spinning ball and flubbing it if it wasn't going to make it the required distance? If the return team had jumped on the ball, at least we would have been in position to try to dive in and dislodge it.

We had also spent time on this kick learning how to jump on it and secure it, so the spin favored our special teammers. You could tell when Goodwin jumped on it, he knew to field it with his hands instead of trying to jump on it with his body, which likely would have caused it to squirt free.

Brilliant design and execution IMO. I think it was a great solution to the onside kick problem that was created with the rule change. It likely won't ever work again because anyone facing us is going to practice for it, but you want every advantage you can get going into a game, and the special teams group created one.

 

[gimmesix]

There's an article on NFL.COM where the Cowboys are calling it the watermelon kick.

I'd prefer that they call it the twister, because Atlanta got sucked in.

 

[gimmesix]

Pretty amazing. Last year absolutely awful special teams cost us games.

this year we get a win basically as a direct result of special teams.


What a difference having an actual special teams coach makes.

Well, the two fake punts that failed didn't help our predicament, but I liked the aggressiveness. The second should have been called off based on alignment, but Fassel and his group were at least trying to turn things around.

 

[gimmesix]

I disagree, yes it was interesting to see him kick it that way but the falcons special teams were incredibly stupid to just stand around watching that thing spin instead of dropping on it and ending the game.

They would have been considered even more stupid if they had tried to jump on the spinning ball early and it had squirted free.

IMO, what they should have done is as soon as they saw it was going to go the required 10 yards to jump on it then (around 9 yards in). At least then they could have made the first move instead of allowing Dallas to do it. But since I don't think they have practiced that scenario where the ball is moving that slowly and spinning that much, I'm not surprised that they waited too long.

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

That was a beautiful onside kick!! Z kicked that perfectly.

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

Lol

It seemed like it didn't have enough distance then just randomly turned and crossed the 10 yards

I've seen that in English football tbh. I've seen where a player will kick a free kick on the ground when the wall is expecting the kick taker to try an airball, it goes one way confusing the opposition, and a teammate comes out of nowhere to punch it into the goal. As a former kicker, I had no idea you could do that with an American football as well. That's brilliant!

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

It was a one of kind attempt. Every team in the league will be spending an extra 20 minutes a day defending it starting Wednesday.

Probably haha, just glad it worked.

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

Harry Kane (Tottenham and English national team star) would've been proud of Z's kick!

 

[SteveTheCowboy]

They would have been considered even more stupid if they had tried to jump on the spinning ball early and it had squirted free.

IMO, what they should have done is as soon as they saw it was going to go the required 10 yards to jump on it then (around 9 yards in). At least then they could have made the first move instead of allowing Dallas to do it. But since I don't think they have practiced that scenario where the ball is moving that slowly and spinning that much, I'm not surprised that they waited too long.

Yep...can you imagine the outcry had the jumped on it and fumbled? Ah...human nature...a wonderful thing.

 

[OmerV]

That was a great onside kick.

It was almost like a change-up.

We never see onside kicks like that and that's what confused the Falcons Special Teams.

Most kickers try to get the ball as high as they can in the air to allow players time to get there, but this kick was something different.

Beautiful onside kick by Zuerlein.

I agree. What I said at the time, and Tony Gonzales also said in the studio, is that it appears the Falcons thought the kick would never reach the 10 yard mark. If a person looks at the direction and speed of the kick it's very understandable why they thought that. And if that was the case, why try to recover it and risk not receiving it cleanly when leaving it alone meant they got the ball anyway? What they didn't realize is that because of the unique way it was kicked the ball was going to change direction just enough to head toward the line marker, and with just barely enough speed to get there. The uniqueness of the way it was kicked absolutely did matter.

 

[FrankM]

What's getting lost is that Zuerlein still had to make a 46 yd fg. Well within his range; however a 46 yd fg is not a chip shot.

 

[joseephuss]

Exactly. No one wants to jump on a ball that isn't going to reach 10 yards and pull a Leon Lett type disaster. By the time they realized it might make 10 it was a yard or two away. What to do here is not something you can teach. Maybe now they can try, but like you said, when was the last time we saw a kick like that? That was just a Zuerlein vortex special.

It is going to depend on the exact circumstances. In the Leon Lett case, his blunder kept the Dolphins in FG range. An onsides kick with very little time remaining might just be the time to try and pounce on the ball. Best case is you recover it, worst case is the other team still has work to do to get into FG position. I'd say with mere seconds on the game you instruct your team to jump on the ball. If there is more than say 20 or 30 seconds maybe you don't. Or train your guys to dive at the ball and "accidentally" bat it out of bounds.

 

[joseephuss]

I agree. What I said at the time, and Tony Gonzales also said in the studio, is that it appears the Falcons thought the kick would never reach the 10 yard mark. If a person looks at the direction and speed of the kick it's very understandable why they thought that. And if that was the case, why try to recover it and risk not receiving it cleanly when leaving it alone meant they got the ball anyway? What they didn't realize is that because of the unique way it was kicked the ball was going to change direction just enough to head toward the line marker, and with just barely enough speed to get there. The uniqueness of the way it was kicked absolutely did matter.

How much crown is in AT&T? Old Texas Stadium had quite the pronounced crown in the field. I'd think there is some amount of crown in the field for drainage. Any small amount probably contributed to the way the ball seemingly sped up as it traveled closer to the numbers and sideline.