[Mick]

I just don't follow pro football or the 49'rs like I used.  What stands out to me in your post is the special teams situation.  It appears the kicking game really, really sucked.  Hiring a new special teams coach doesn't help much if the kickers are what they appear to be. What are the chances of getting better talent at punter and FG kicking. If you get in FG range you need someone who can make the kicks and you absolutely have to have punters who put the other guys deep on their end of the field.  It seems to me fixing those two things would help the team a lot, but fixing them probably isn't easy or cheap.

I think the challenge with the kicking is that Moody had a high ankle sprain in the first half of the Cardinals game in week 5 last year. He was a perfect 12/12 on extra points and 13 of 14 on field goals at that point. He missed three weeks, then was ineffective when he returned, going 12 of 22 on field goals and missing an extra point. He had an 82% touchback rate until he got hurt, then dropped to 65%.

I think he needs training camp competition, but I fully expect him to get the job.

Wishnowsky's a different story. He had a back injury that started in training camp, flared up throughout the year but he didn't go on IR until week 11. They brought in Pat O'Donnell to punt. O'Donnell's just a year older than Wishnowsky (32), and he had three yards net better punting that Wishnowsky (39.3 vs. 36.3), though Wishnowsky put 50% of his punts inside the 20, and O'Donnell had just 33.3% inside the 20. Both are terrible, by the way, and finished 29th of 30 NFL teams.

Pretty good draft for punters, BTW. There's five punters projected to be NFL punters, at a minimum; including Burnip (Alabama), Elzinga (Oklahoma), Mastromanno (Fla. St.), Crawshaw (Florida), and Kroeger (South Carolina)

[Mick]

I just don't follow pro football or the 49'rs like I used.  What stands out to me in your post is the special teams situation.  It appears the kicking game really, really sucked.  Hiring a new special teams coach doesn't help much if the kickers are what they appear to be. What are the chances of getting better talent at punter and FG kicking. If you get in FG range you need someone who can make the kicks and you absolutely have to have punters who put the other guys deep on their end of the field.  It seems to me fixing those two things would help the team a lot, but fixing them probably isn't easy or cheap.

I think the challenge with the kicking is that Moody had a high ankle sprain in the first half of the Cardinals game in week 5 last year. He was a perfect 12/12 on extra points and 13 of 14 on field goals at that point. He missed three weeks, then was ineffective when he returned, going 12 of 22 on field goals and missing an extra point. He had an 82% touchback rate until he got hurt, then dropped to 65%.

I think he needs training camp competition, but I fully expect him to get the job.

Wishnowsky's a different story. He had a back injury that started in training camp, flared up throughout the year but he didn't go on IR until week 11. They brought in Pat O'Donnell to punt. O'Donnell's just a year older than Wishnowsky (32), and he had three yards net better punting that Wishnowsky (39.3 vs. 36.3), though Wishnowsky put 50% of his punts inside the 20, and O'Donnell had just 33.3% inside the 20. Both are terrible, by the way, and finished 29th of 30 NFL teams.

Pretty good draft for punters, BTW. There's five punters projected to be NFL punters, at a minimum; including Burnip (Alabama), Elzinga (Oklahoma), Mastromanno (Fla. St.), Crawshaw (Florida), and Kroeger (South Carolina)