Fromal’s Kicking Notebook: Assessing Nick Folk panic and NFL Week 1 standouts

It matters that Trey Smack debuted with a 59-yard field goal sent straight down the middle. It matters that Brandon Aubrey went 2-of-3 on his extra-point attempts and that even the two makes weren't exactly confident strikes. It matters that Nick Folk missed as many kicks in his Atlanta Falcons debut as he had during the two previous seasons combined.

But how much does it matter?

The beginning of the 2026 NFL regular season means a continuation of both the kicking notebooks that ran during the preseason and the overarching goal of furthering the level of analysis devoted to this increasingly important position. The numbers are now real. The stakes are high. So, too, is the level of scrutiny we're applying to each and every kicker who steps onto the field for a kickoff, extra point or field goal.

The NFL kicking numbers that mattered in Week 1

Remember when a 42-yard field goal was considered a longer attempt?

That's now the distant past after 28 kickers — Cameron Dicker, Brandon Aubrey, Harrison Mevis and Dominic Zvada only took extra points — combined to take 58 field-goal attempts from an average of 42.24 yards in the opening week of the 2026 campaign. They connected on 49 of them, good for a solid 84.5 percent to pair with a 94.3 percent hit rate on extra points. Offenses in Week 1 were shattering scoring expectations with a seemingly endless parade of touchdowns, so the ratio of field goals to PATs was rather abnormal.

For the sake of comparison, Week 1 of the 2025 NFL season saw 70 field-goal attempts. They came from an average of 40.91 yards and with an 85.7 percent conversion rate. So if you thought the current crop felt like it was setting up camp farther from the uprights than usual, you were exactly right.

My proprietary kick value added (KVA) metric, which looks not just at a kicker's makes and misses but also at the distances from which they kicked and the overall league's level of success from each area during the season in question, helps us make sense of all the 2026 numbers. Because the sample is only going to grow from here, the league average against which all kicks are measured will change materially in the coming weeks, but we can already get some early, post-Week 1 insight.

First, the individual leaders from Week 1:

On the flip side, five kickers dragged the overall numbers more than anyone else, though some of their performances are more defensible than others. We'll dive deeply into Nick Folk's numbers shortly, but even Daniel Carlson deserves a reprieve after the New Orleans Saints asked him to try a 62-yarder that really tested his range.

Biggest NFL kicker takeaways from Week 1

As always, the raw numbers pale in importance to the kicks themselves. So let's dive into the storylines and observations.

Nick Folk deserves the benefit of the doubt

Nick Folk will celebrate his 42nd birthday on Nov. 5, three days before the Atlanta Falcons take the field against the Cincinnati Bengals. Folk also missed two field goals during his 2026 debut with his new squad, leaving the ball just outside the right upright from 45 and 54 yards. It's not hard to connect those dots and allow worry to enter the equation.

Is this the beginning of the end? Has Father Time finally caught up to a kicker with nearly two decades spent in the NFL? Did the Falcons sign a dud? Did Folk overstay his welcome at the sport's highest level and doom himself to become the latest player whose career numbers look worse because he misjudged his retirement date?

Allow us to answer those pseudo-rhetorical questions. What isn't the beginning of the communal and inexorable march to the end undergone by every person on the planet? Father Time might be catching up, but he hasn't fully closed the gap. The Falcons did sign a dud, but that happened at a different position. And most importantly, Folk has earned the benefit of the doubt after so many consecutive years of upward momentum.

Atlanta deserves to feel disappointed that Folk's initial encore to his podium placement in the 2025 KVA standings came with the worst numbers of the entire Week 1 kicking landscape. But one game is an awfully thin sample, and the opening week tends to come with hyperbolized overreactions not found when a middle-of-the-season outing goes just as poorly. Plus, Folk didn't even wait until the final whistle to start turning things around. He instead responded by drilling a 51-yarder from the left hash that closed the Atlanta deficit to three points, then he tacked on a fourth-quarter field goal from 43 out for good measure.

Beyond that, nothing suggests that this was anything more than an off day. We've all had 'em.

During the 2025 season, 65 percent of all non-blocked misses ended up on the right side of the uprights. That didn't materially change when looking at different age buckets, either. Kickers under 28 years old erred right on 67 percent of their misses; kickers who were at least 32 years old erred right on 64 percent of their misfires. That lets us rule out the theory that missing right is indicative of Folk feeling his age. Well, that, and the incontrovertible fact that he also had the leg strength necessary to get beyond the crossbar on all of his kicks.

Folk missed a grand total of three attempts over the last three seasons. He came up short (and right) on a 55-yarder with the New York Jets last year. With the Tennessee Titans, he misfired from 49 yards (just outside right) in 2024 and 51 yards (also outside right) in 2023. It's almost like this is his consistent miss pattern, not a new development that hints at a changing level of ability.

Even if any current concern feels reasonable, stemming from multiple misses in the opening week of a season, Folk is dealing with the continuation of an established pattern that aligns with league-wide trends and is coming off both that third-place KVA finish in 2025 and a preseason in which he made all of his attempts while showing laudable accuracy. He deserves faith that he'll turn this around.

Trey Smack, Drew Stevens and Dominic Zvada debut check-ins

Kickers always carry plenty of volatility, and that's especially true for first-year options who are only just growing accustomed to the immense weight of responsibility derived from stepping onto the field for an NFL organization during a game that actually counts. Practice-field exploits in a controlled environment? Child's play. Preseason games? You might as well throw on a meditation playlist.

The 2026 rookie class, even if it doesn't grow beyond the three primary members, is a talented one. Trey Smack is the biggest name of the bunch after a strong career at Florida led to the Green Bay Packers trading up and using sixth-round draft capital to secure his services. The New York Giants' Dominic Zvada was inconsistent in college, but he reached some awfully lofty levels at Michigan thanks to the booming power of his right leg. Drew Stevens doesn't carry the same level of name recognition for the Washington Commanders, but his experience at Iowa makes him a battle-tested option accustomed to both dangerous rushes and questionable weather conditions.

All three made their official NFL debuts in Week 1, and they — unsurprisingly — provided both ups and downs. Based on the progressive KVAs we've seen for rookies over the last three seasons, the roller-coaster ride is only beginning.

Zvada had the steadiest opening performance of the 2026 crop, albeit without a single field-goal attempt to his name. He took four extra points, all from the left hash, and put all four safely between the uprights. The middle two went straight down the pipes, sandwiched between attempts that leaked left and pushed right, though still with plenty of room before getting into more dangerous, upright-filled territory.

Smack was by no means limited to extra-point duty. Just two minutes and 49 seconds into his first game, the Packers asked him to line up a 59-yard attempt.

The rookie drilled it, putting it dead-center through the uprights in a continuation of his exemplary preseason efforts. Unfortunately, he missed a PAT wide right only five minutes later before settling in with a made PAT and two more successful field goals from 26 and 43 yards. He also made a 40-yard field goal in the fourth quarter that would've extended Green Bay's lead to eight points, but the Packers instead opted to take the points off the board following a defensive offsides and then failed to convert a quarterback sneak on the ensuing fourth-down attempt.

Drew Stevens followed a similar pattern. His first kick came just under five minutes into the proceedings, and he smoked it straight down the center from 55 yards — through a slight crosswind, no less. But then the roller-coaster ride plummeted. First came a second-quarter PAT that featured a high snap, a low kick and a Jalen Carter rejection. Then, in the third quarter, Stevens lined up from 54 yards and left the kick out to the right. He rebounded in the final period by making a long extra point after an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Stefon Diggs to put the finishing touches on his NFL debut.

All three clearly have the stuff necessary to be successful at the professional level. But the flight attendants have advised their fanbases to remain seated with their seatbelts fastened. The turbulence won't stop for a while.

Evan McPherson and Chase McLaughlin put on a kicking masterclass

Despite the crosswind blowing through Paycor Stadium for most of the night, Evan McPherson and Chase McLaughlin put together tape that would make any special teams coordinator swoon. It wasn't just that they went a combined 6-of-6 on extra points and 6-of-6 on field-goal tries. It wasn't just that they combined to make 448 yards' worth of kicks. It was all of that plus the remarkable accuracy on full display.

Just look at that cluster in the center. Whether it was a season-opening 34-yarder from McLaughlin that went straight down the middle, a McPherson 20-yarder that came after a high snap, a McLaughlin 51-yarder that looked like a chip shot, or McPherson's two makes from 50-plus that successfully navigated the strongest winds of the game, they were borderline perfect.

McLaughlin and McPherson entered the season ranked Nos. 7 and 12 respectively, in my positional hierarchy. Both also have clear paths to ranking even higher. The Tampa Bay kicker gets blocked too frequently and could stand to sacrifice some distance for a little more loft. The Cincinnati specialist is seeking out consistency, which could come now that he enjoys continuity throughout the field-goal unit. The power and ability are there in both cases, and it's beautiful when it all comes together like this.

More kicker takeaways from Week 1

Jason Myers’ perfect box score doesn’t tell the whole story: I'm still worried about Jason Myers. The 35-year-old is coming off an incredible 2025 season highlighted by his five-field goal performance in the Super Bowl, but he also submitted the absolute worst preseason numbers of any kicker. While his first game of 2026 featured two made field goals and a successful extra point, he wasn't exactly striping the ball down the fairway. His 30-yarder sailed through comfortably, but his 26-yard make erred left, and his PAT came too close to the left upright for comfort. He could easily find his groove, but the Seahawks aren't out of the woods yet.

Lucas Carneiro looks like a future NFL kicker: Let's travel into NCAA territory for a second. Lucas Carneiro drilled a 57-yard field goal for Ole Miss with the maximum level of casualness on Saturday, and it's only the latest indication that he's a clear-cut future NFL kicker. He's still fighting an uphill battle to take the No. 1 spot on my draft board from Oklahoma's Tate Sandell, but he's 100 percent going to be kicking on Sundays next year. You don't typically see easy power look this easy at the "amateur" level.

Brandon Aubrey’s shaky opener deserves attention: Even Brandon Aubrey can have troubling games. Not only did the Dallas Cowboys specialist miss a PAT after a stupid Javonte Williams taunting penalty turned a 33-yard try into a one-point attempt from 48, but he also showed out-of-character inaccuracy on his earlier extra points. He pushed his first successful conversion far enough right that it snuck a few feet inside the upright, and his second was an ugly hook that curved too close to the left upright for comfort. That's three bad kicks in three attempts from the NFL's premier option, who needs to lock in for Week 2.

Jason Sanders recovered when his job depended on it: Jason Sanders, if you had one shot or one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted in one moment, would you capture it or just let it slip? Apparently, the New York Jets kicker's palms were sweaty, and there was already-chewed spaghetti all over his jersey after a straight-up shank from 54 yards. But to his credit, he was calm and ready to drop bombs afterward, making from both 51 and 52 yards later in the proceedings. Blake Grupe is waiting in the wings, but Sanders settled his nerves enough that the Jets should continue thinking of this as an ongoing battle rather than allowing Grupe to win the job in absentia. He hasn't been fully chewed up, spit out and booed off stage yet.

Cairo Santos showed both sides of his value: Let's take a moment to acknowledge the duality of Cairo Santos. On one hand, Chicago Bears fans can be reasonably frustrated that he left two kickoffs short of the landing zone (a shockingly common occurrence across the NFL in Week 1 thanks to him, Jake Bates, Chad Ryland and Nick Folk). For Santos, in particular, that's not an issue new to the 2026 schedule. But on the other hand, he went 8-of-8 on extra-point attempts during the Bears' offensive explosion and showed off his veteran savvy with a 40-yard make in the face of a threatening Carolina Panthers rush. He shortened his sequence, got through the ball quickly and hooked it through the uprights for a kick whose middling accuracy grade belies its impressiveness.

Chad Ryland may already be testing the Cardinals’ patience: Speaking of Chad Ryland, he had quite the rough outing. Against a Los Angeles Chargers unit that pressured him on just about every kick, he doinked a 54-yarder and nearly missed a 27-yarder on the left side before bouncing back to finish the night 4-of-5. Somehow, the broadcast crew decided the near-miss from 27 yards was a "perfect" kick in the moment. It wasn't. Ryland does have the built-in excuse of facing pressure off the edge, but that isn't the case on the failed dynamic kickoff, and he might not have a long leash after an uninspiring preseason came on the heels of subpar 2025.

NFL doink counter after Week 1

1(tie). Eddy Pineiro (1): The 49ers kicker put together an impressive debut in Australia before a garbage-time 52-yarder drifted right and bounced off the upright. Before you blame the Coriolis effect, remember that the force causes moving items to drift marginally left in the Southern Hemisphere. If anything, we have the Coriolis effect to thank for this being a doink and not a straight-up miss outside right.

1(tie). Chad Ryland (1): This isn't how you want to begin your 2026 campaign. After an uninspiring preseason, Chad Ryland needed just one quarter and nine seconds to remind Arizona Cardinals fans that they should have trouble trusting him. His 54-yarder drifted right and right and right before clanging off the upright and falling harmlessly to the turf.

Editor's note: The executive chair of the Doink Counter Committee has decreed that a "doink" shall henceforth only be awarded in the event of a kick that features direct contact with the upright or crossbar and fails to cross the threshold successfully. Off-the-upright makes, heretofore referred to as "banks," are not eligible for inclusion. This ruling was made following Harrison Butker's bank off the left upright with 14:39 left in the Kansas City Chiefs' victory over the Denver Broncos.

NFL Kick of the Week: Ka’imi Fairbairn delivers from 58 yards

Can we collectively agree to start referring to Ka'imi Fairbairn as an all-timer at the position?

The 32-year-old is coming off a season in which he paced the NFL in KVA, and he's showing no signs of slowing down. He may not have the cannon employed by Cam Little, the record-setting accuracy numbers of Will Reichard and Cameron Dicker or the (earned) reputation of Brandon Aubrey, but the man just keeps making big kicks. The clutch 58-yarder against the Buffalo Bills was only the latest example.

Houston Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans hesitated for approximately one nanosecond before sending Fairbairn out for the lead-earning attempt with 6:44 left in the fourth quarter. And why should he have second-guessed himself? Cool as a cucumber, Fairbairn trotted out and knocked it right through the center of the uprights, acting like he had complete confidence in himself all the while.

Fairbairn should have plenty of chances to add to his resume throughout the 2026 season, and he's now sitting at No. 38 in the career KVA standings after using Week 1 to jump past Jason Myers and Phil Dawson. Should he replicate last year's numbers, he'll rise into the all-time top 30 with plenty of life left in his right leg.

Honorable mention: Eddy Pineiro's 56-yard stinger

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