The Bears have such a complete roster, a two-deep so stacked, that it’s headline news when they trade for a KICKER. Not a high profile kicker. Not even a kicker that’s ever made a field goal or an extra point in an NFL game. A practice squad player from Oakland who kicked last at the University of Florida.

What a luxury. To have such a well-rounded roster that all fans feel the need for you to do is round out the specialists. Get that squared away, and you have a Super Bowl contender on your hands.

Well, it may be not be that easy. Matt Nagy is really petty when it comes to kickers. He clearly has very little tolerance. Maybe he loves Ace Ventura (LACES OUT, DAN), maybe a kicker used to beat him up in middle school, or maybe he’s just in love with advanced analytics and wants to be on the cutting edge as they come into football. In only one year, Nagy has waged war with the position. A war waged in such secrecy that we may have not even noticed how long its been going on.

Kicker was a priority for Ryan Pace in the 2018 offseason. Price was no object. Find the best guy, pay him whatever he wants. Cody Parkey was that guy. A solid career up to this point, but he had never been in a situation like playing for Matt Nagy. I wish i loved anything as much as Matt Nagy loves ignoring his kicker. He seems to crave it like a drug. He’s a junkie for the adrenaline of leaving his offense out there on 4th and short. He loves to incorporate Akiem Hicks and Khalil Mack on 2-point tries. He revels in getting to unveil the name of his “ingenious” formations to ravenous media members, who eat it up.

That’s all well and good, but I don’t think he ever stopped to think what message that sends to your millionaire kicker. It could only be interpreted 2 ways: either Nagy was telling Parkey “I don’t trust you,” or “I don’t value you.” No matter how you slice it, it’s not good for a position most notable for its fragile psychology. Right or wrong, Kickers need to feel like everyone has their back. Cody Parkey must not have felt that way. And theres evidence to back it up.

That’s why, in hindsight, the Lions game in Chicago should not have been a surprise. Parkey missed 5 (I REPEAT, FIVE) kicks. There’s a couple kickers to come out of Boylan High who could convert more often than that. But kicking is a game of trust. Parkey didn’t feel like he was ever afforded that, and if he was it was all gone now. Nagy ramped up the trickery even further. Tarik Cohen, Taylor Gabriel, Trey Burton. Everyone got a shot to execute a trick play to avoid a kick.

Is it ever really a surprise that in the biggest moment of the season, and maybe his life, Cody Parkey hit the upright? Afterwards, he went on the Today show and Nagy lambasted him publicly. “It was a ‘me’ decision, not a ‘we’ decision.” as Nagy put it. He clearly hated the kicker getting any kind of national attention at all. He didn’t really care if it was positive or negative.

Now to this point, this may read as a lambast of Coach Nagy. It really isn’t. He clearly has a philosophy on how to win games, and it seldom involves a kicker. If Matt were in a position to change the game, i’d bet everything he’d take placekicking out entirely. If he just in totalitarian control of his team, I bet he’d never kick or punt. He seems to relish in the advanced metrics that, to this point, show that punting, settling for field goals, and kicking extra points nets teams less scoring in the long run.

The numbers are there, no team has had the guts to try it. It would certainly make games more interesting. It would be second-guessed to the high heavens when it doesn’t work out. But radical change for the better can only happen if someone has a radical idea, and the stomach to implement it. Coaches are second-guessed every time something doesn’t go their way. Why not go out on your own terms?

Maybe Matt Nagy is the guy. Maybe Ryan Pace, one of the youngest GM’s in the NFL will give him the green light now that they’ll be relying on seemingly an unproven commodity to kick in high pressure situations. It’s hard for me to argue that relying on kickers is becoming more and more untenable by the year. Maybe football is due for a radical change. I’d still tune in every Sunday.

– Jake Logli, Sportsfan 1330