The Kicking Issue

For a few years now, when Clemson reaches a 4^th down, you would almost wish they would just go for it every time. Clemson’s kicking recently from Jackson, Benton, and Catanzaro has been underwhelming to say the least. Jackson could not hold off the walk-on Catanzaro last year during camp and Chandler won the job. However, like one may have expected from a walk-on freshman, Catanzaro struggled and only came away with a 14/22 year. This is especially tough to take when you look back at games such as Auburn, BC, and FSU. Having two missed field goals in the BC and FSU games are completely unacceptable when those games were decided by six points or less and would have most likely resulted in an Atlantic Division title had the ball gone through the uprights. He may be pushed by Lakip in camp and as the season nears but the odds are highly in Chandler’s favor to come away with the job for now. He was awarded with a scholarship this offseason as the departure of Tyler Fowler freed one up for use. Word has been that he has worked with former Falcons kicker Morten Andersen and tweaked his kicking technique. This is one of those things we will have to see in a game before we are sure of any real change. Expect Lakip to jog on the field at the first stretch of trouble for Catman.

Benton will handle kickoffs and will most likely not challenge in the PK competition. Benton has done just fine in that department and we hope to see continued success this season. However, Benton is taking up a scholarship as well. That is the major problem in this whole situation as Benton, Catanzaro, Lakip, and Zimmerman are all on scholarship with one tied to Bradley Pinion for next year (most likely just be Punter). That is 4 schollys that are being used up for a group that can’t put the ball through the uprights. While I applaud Dabo’s initiative to offer Lakip last cycle to try and remedy this problem, one of the 3 PK’s really needs to become reliable. It is not a good precedent for a team that has a penchant for close games to have poor kicking. For Clemson to see more wins this year, Chandler MUST perform better. While he won’t be a Lou Groza Award winner, I believe Chandler will kick better with experience and offseason work on his side. Hopefully, this will result in less cursing at the television and in the stands.

As a side note, punting was not mentioned in this post because frankly, there is not much to say on the topic. We have one of the best punters in the country. Zimmerman is an absolutely stud and a Ray Guy candidate. He had a great year last year and also a remarkable Spring Game. Zimmerman also has incredible athleticism for a Punter as we saw him save the NC State games last year (3:01 in the video below). He will have more success this season and barring any long snapping difficulties, Dawson will take care of his business.