A few outside-the-box suggestions for your consideration...

[Rams43]

Kickers tend to get injured more than punters from my recollections. I’d rather not put all our kicking eggs in one basket.

And if Ficken loses a game for us then MAYBE he was a rare mistake made by this staff. But kickers can be a flukey lot. Good kickers freak up. Kickers that have freaked up in the past, find their groove. I remember GZ going through a really bad stretch a couple years ago. I guess we should have cut Greg then because there were a lot of fans saying we should. Hell Hekker had some rough periods early on and shanked one in pre-season.

So we flip the page and bring in the next of a quirky lot. Does he make us a better team? Does he make everything he kicks? Does he sign for what might be just a few games? Do we know anything about how the Rams went about pursueing kickers?

Honestly. Can anyone really say they have watched tape on KICKERS to see how they handled situations, surfaces, weather, etc? Anybody? Pretty sure Bones has.

So, 503...

Should I put you in the “keep Ficken” camp? Lol.

 

[Ramhusker]

You are not so out of the box. I've been thinking the same thing except I wouldn't cut Ficken. Y'all do know he won a try out competition this time before we resigned him right? But I wouldn't think twice about going for it a lot on 4th down but inside the 40 on 4th and medium or less. I'd even go for it on 4th and 1 or 2 when to the 50 or closer. Going for two is not a bad play either the way our O is playing. The flow of the game will obviously dictate the frequency of these things. Mixing in some fakes will spice things up a bit also. We now have many options due to injuries. Isn't that ironic!

 

[James Otto]

Ficken missed a 47 yard FG (not a gimme), shanked one kickoff out of bounds at the beginning then kicked all the rest deep, was 5-5 on XP, and saved a TD with a hell of a tackle on a kickoff return. All of this in his first game after being called in OFF THE STREETS? And we should just cut him like that?

Give me a break .... oh the drama ...

 

[Ram65]

I was into giving Ficken a little time last year so I'll give him another game. He looked shaky except for the tackle.

What's Heckers FG range?

He did look better @ Extra Point Attempts. Love to see a FG kickoff between him and Ficken. Keep Ficken for kickoffs.

 

[RamFan503]

So, 503...

Should I put you in the “keep Ficken” camp? Lol.

Honestly - no. Put me in the McVay and Bones know better than me and hopefully all the nay sayers camp.

 

[RAMblin Man]

Kicking and Punting are very different leg actions. Doing both tends to put the kicker at risk and can compromise both activities through wear and tear on less used muscles.

 

[shaunpinney]

Ficken: I wouldn't release him, I don't think GZ is out for a very long time (or is he?) I'm going to trust Bones on this one - in my mind he's the best ST coach I've seen in the NFL, and our ST unit is the best in the league and has been for a long time now.

KR: I'm happy with just downing them, catch them cleanly and lets just start from the 25 - it doesn't sound like JoJo is out for a considerable length of time, so lets just roll with it until then. I do not want to see an injury to Kupp.

Going for it on 4th and short: That really depends on the way the game is going, if we're up by quite a few scores then, yeh, I'm happy to go all Madden and go for it, but I'd rather see Hekker pin the opposition within their 10 and let our D wreak havoc there than lets say at their 46yd line. If there's one thing that Fisher taught me, yes Fisher, is that you can win games by punting, and when it comes to that, we've got the best in the business!

 

[bubbaramfan]

I was at the game and Ficken actually missed the FG twice in a row. The first time the Chargers had called time out just before the snap, but Kupp got it down and Ficken missed "wide left". After the TO he over compensated and missed again "wide right".

Ficken hasn't shown he's very dependable.