New York Giants head coach John Harbaugh has steadfastly stood by rookie placekicker Dominic Zvada through Zvada’s ups and downs this season, which have included too many costly misses.
Harbaugh continued to do so after Zvada’s latest miss, an extra-point distance 33-yarder in what became a three-point loss to the Washington Commanders on Thursday night.
“You can’t, as soon as a guy doesn’t make a play, start firing people left and right. Especially your kicker who’s a rookie,” Harbaugh said. “So,
I’m confident he’s going to become a good kicker. I mean, at some point in time, if it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t happen. But I’m not going to panic halfway through the season when a guy’s made a bunch of kicks, if that’s what you’re inferring we should be doing. We’re just not going to knee jerk it like that. He’s going to make kicks. He’s going to make a lot of kicks. I believe in him. I think he’s really good and really talented. We’re going to give him an opportunity to do it, and it’s up to him to do it.“
Turns out, all six of Zvada’s misses this season — three pushed wide right and three yanked wide left — have come from the right hash.
“There’s a technique issue there with his plant foot that we’re kind of looking at,” Harbaugh said on Friday. “And he needs to clean that up from a consistency standpoint. He knows that. Popped up again in that one kick there. There is an issue on the right hash, no question.”
Zvada was tremendous all spring and summer, beating out Ben Sauls for the placekicking job. He started the season 9-for-9, but has made just 8 of 14 kicks since.
It is fair to say that Zvada’s struggles were critical parts of why the Giants tied and lost games to the Commanders, rather than winning both games. He missed three kicks in the tie to Washington in Week 5, and his miss Thursday came in a 3-point loss.
It is also fair to wonder if Zvada’s struggles have impacted some of Harbaugh’s decisions. The Giants punted three times inside Washington territory Thursday night — from the 37-, 41- and 46-yard lines. Two of those kicks would have come from inside 60 yards, where the Giants have already asked Zvada to kick nine times this season.
Maybe the play-calling that led to the punts would have been different if the Giants truly had faith in Zvada. Or, maybe they would have allowed him to try those kicks.
“Well, let’s look at the distances. Why don’t you go back and give me the distances. I don’t have it in front of me. What were those field goals have been? They were like high 50s, weren’t they? 55 plus,” Harbaugh said. “It’s kind of a risk-reward. I’m not saying that he can’t make those kicks, but it’s a windy night and it’s a field position game in some ways. It’s a big risk there, too. Sometimes it’s better to play a field position game.
“So those were toss up kind of calls probably at least, probably leaning toward punting, but I’m not saying we shouldn’t have gone for them or couldn’t have kicked them either way. The one question is, “should you have gone for it?” The next question is, “should you have kicked the field goals?” That’s the follow-up question. I don’t know. The other question could have been if we’d have missed the field goal, maybe you should have punted it down in there and played the field position game. So they’re all kind of coin flip type of decisions.”
Here is how the analytics saw each of the three situations in which the Giants chose to punt rather than try the field or go for the first down:
Giants 0, Commanders 0
Fourth-and-7 at the Washington 37, Q1 11:28
Commanders 17, Giants 14
Fourth-and-3 at the Washington 46, Q4 14:15
Giants 21, Commanders 17
Fourth-and-5 at the Washington 41, Q4 1:54
The point here isn’t to debate which decisions Harbaugh made correctly, and which he didn’t. Though discussing that is certainly fair game. The point is that Zvada’s continued misses are complicating the decision-making and costing the Giants points that are probably costing them games.
In an NFC East race that seems likely to go down to the wire, and where every decision, every made or missed kick, everything that happens in the margins of an NFL game, could end up making the difference how much rope can the Giants give Zvada to figure it out?
