It's never a good thing whenever a kicker is a talking point. Unfortunately, that has been the case with the Philadelphia Eagles' Jake Elliott way too many times this season already. He hasn't been reliable, and he might be a major liability come playoff time.
Nevertheless, the Eagles refuse to hold him accountable. If anything, they seem to enable him. At least, that's what one can tell from special team coordinator Michael Clay's latest statement. When Eagles insider Cayden Steele of NJ.com asked him about Elliott and whether he had made some adjustments before the start of the playoffs, Clay's response raised more questions than answers.
“Yeah, I don't know if correcting his issues is the right term. You saw (on) Sunday night... It's hard to kick in the NFL, especially here in the northeast," Clay said. "I mean, you could see (Washington Commanders K) Jake Moody, doinked one off from, well, the eight-yard line, something like that. But having Jake (Elliott), a nine-year veteran, has plenty of huge kicks in this stadium, around the NFL. You're always going to feel confident when he is on your team, and he still exudes that confidence every day."
Eagles Won't Try to Fix Jake Elliott Problem
Granted, Elliott has earned some slack as a two-time Super Bowl champion in Philadelphia. That being said, he also needs to be held accountable for his many miscues this season. Instead, Clay stated there's nothing to fix about his game.
"He walks into this building, doesn't change anything from himself," Clay added. "He's going to go out there and put his best foot forward to help this team, and it's not just those field goals, those extra points. It's also in his kickoffs this year have allowed us to be a pretty good kickoff coverage unit. So Jake's going to keep doing what he does."
Numbers don't lie. Elliott has been pretty solid when it comes to extra points, missing just one in 42 tries. However, he's 20-of-27 (74.1%) in field goal attempts this season, with three of his misses coming in the 40-49-yard range and the other four in 50-plus-yarders. He's also two years removed from a career-best 93.8 FG%, hinting that his best days might be behind him as concerns keep mounting.
That can be a major factor in the playoffs. The Eagles will face a stout San Francisco 49ers defense that's not going to allow many scoring opportunities, and they will either have to go for it on fourth down to get the ball closer to Elliott's range or just punt instead of attempting a field goal. Otherwise, they risk handing the ball over near the middle of the field.
Football is a game of details, and you need to excel in all three aspects of the game to go the distance. A lot has gone sideways this season, and with an offense that's not as reliable as it used to be last season, the Eagles can't afford to have Elliott wasting opportunities to put up points on the scoreboard.