Knock on wood. Jake Elliott has been kicking well this season.
After a down year in 2020 — Elliott would admit as much — the Eagles’ 26-year-old kicker is in the middle of what appears to be a bounce-back season.
And as the Eagles have won two of their last three, he’s been big. Elliott has made all his kicks in the last three weeks — he’s 7-for-7.
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“Kudos to him refocusing on what got him here and that's just his fundamentals, working with Arryn (Siposs) and Rick (Lovato) in the offseason, getting that down,” Eagles special teams coordinator Michael Clay said.
“Obviously, it's a new holder, so there’s going to be something new. But they've been fantastic and kudos to all three of those guys, just working hand and hand and they have been operating like a well-oiled machine.”
Last season, Elliott made just 73.7% of his field goal attempts, by far the worst percentage of his NFL career. That percentage ranked him 26th of 31 qualified kickers in the league.
This season, Elliott is 14 of 16. At 87.5%, this is the highest field goal percentage of his career. Right now, that’s the fifth-highest percentage in a season in Eagles history with a minimum of 15 attempts.
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Clay pointed out that Elliott, Siposs and Lovato — the Eagles’ three specialists — get along great and keep each other loose. For a player in such a high pressure position like Elliott, that's key.
“And they go out free-willing and, you know, all three of them have been performing at a high level,” Clay said. “But especially Jake coming back from, you could say it was a down year, one of his lower field goal percentages.
“But he's coming back and he's operating at a high level that's helping us win.”
Of Elliott’s two misses this season, just one was a true miss. His 47-yarder against the 49ers was blocked. The only true miss was a 46-yarder that Elliott pushed wide right against the Bucs.
Last season, Elliott also struggled with short kicks. He was 1-for-3 on kicks from 20-29 yards and was 24 of 26 on extra points. This year, he’s 5-for-5 on those short kicks and is 25 of 25 on extra points.
Just last week, Elliott came up big again for the Eagles, making a field goal to push their lead to two scores points heading into halftime.
If the Eagles are going to make a playoff push down the stretch, they’re going to need Elliott to keep it up.
"He's done a fantastic job the entire season in terms of when we call on him,” Clay said, “he steps up to the plate and he's been delivering for us.”
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