A new NFL rule last year pushed the revolution upon us.
Starting in 2025, teams were allowed to prepare their own kicking balls — special footballs used for kicks and punts — all throughout the game week. In the previous 25 years, teams could only do it on game day.
The result felt like the changing of the sport itself.
Kickers made more than half their tries of 60 yards or more last season. The Jaguars’ Cam Little set an NFL record by making a 68-yarder and later claimed second place by making a 67-yarder. Kickers went 12-for-22 from 60 yards or more — and 3-for-6 from 65 yards or more.
This year hasn’t pushed the edges of field goal range farther back, nor has it made kickers more accurate. Kickers have made 84.3% of their kicks this year, down from 85.6% the entirety of last year — and the weather hasn’t even turned nasty yet.
What’s remarkable, though, is from where kickers are missing. This year, players have made 79.5% of their tries from 40-49 yards. A year ago it was 84.3%.
The deep balls have been roughly the same — Kickers made a slightly higher percentage from 50-59 yards this year compared to last season, and slightly fewer from 60 yards and up.
That’s not the jump some projected after last season.
“The year before to last year, it was a massive leap,” Bears kicker Cairo Santos said Tuesday. “And now I think it’s the same.”
Everyone, though, seems to be trying, and making, kicks from the mid-50s.Almost two-thirds of the kickers in the league — 21 of the 33 who have made a kick this season — have a long of 56 yards or more this year. That includes Santos, who booted a career-high 58-yarder to salt away the Bears’ win against the Patriots on Thursday night.
Santos, who so upset about a previous miss that he couldn’t fully enjoy his late-game achievement Thursday night, said he grew to appreciate it over the weekend.
“I am happier,” he said. “It’s never as bad as you think and it’s never as good as you think either. I’m still mad, given how well I thought I kicked all week. There’s a lot to build on. Making that kick, the 58-longer, the confidence jumps even more.”
Kickers are more accurate from long range than ever before, thanks to factors such as year-round training all the way down to the youth level and the ability to kick inside domes and off artificial turf.
The “K-ball” rule change that began last year stands out the most, though. During the week, teams try to make the ball resemble a soccer ball as much as possible, trying to dull the points of the ball and make the leather softer. They can use the most basic of tools — water, towels, sponges and brushes — to remove a waxy coating. Teams can use ball for three games, maximum, and must have three balls at the ready for each game.
From 1960 to 2024, kickers made 49.9% of their kicks from 50 yards or more. Since the start of last year, kickers have made 68.6% of them.
While 2026 hasn’t continued the massive trajectory of 2025, Santos expects kicks to keep getting longer.
“I do think that you’re still going to start seeing bigger numbers — and a small increase,:” Santos said. “It’s gonna be 71, 72, 73 [yards].”
