The Colts have faith in Adam Vinatieri, who is committed to working on getting “the demons out.”
But what happens if he doesn’t?
When the Colts decided to work out kickers is unknown, but they had six of them in town for tryouts Tuesday. Indianapolis has began working on a backup plan it hopes not to use.
The Colts worked out Elliott Fry, Cole Hedlund, Greg Joseph, Younghoe Koo, Chase McLaughlin and Cody Parkey, Howard Balzer reports. They also reported tryouts with offensive tackles Gerhard deBeer, Christian DiLauro and Brandon Hitner as well as center James Murray.
Viantieri said Tuesday the possibility of retirement never crossed his mind after his seventh missed kick the past three games, including five misses this season. Speculation surfaced about his future when he offered a cryptic response in a brief postgame comment to a reporter.
“No [on retiring],” Vinatieri said, via Mike Wells of ESPN. “That was one those situations that I was walking out of the locker room. Quite frankly, for two decades, we’ve always had open locker rooms on a Monday, and granted our schedule has changed as of last year. When I walked out saying I’ll talk to you guys on Monday, I just needed a little bit more time. Like I said, none of us should assume stuff.”
Owner Jim Irsay admitted “concern” about his kicker, but coach Frank Reich again gave Vinatieri a vote of confidence this week.
Without Andrew Luck, the Colts can’t afford many more misses from Vinatieri. He knows that. Reich knows that. Everyone knows that.
The Colts now have an idea how the free agent market looks at the position in case they need to “break glass in case of emergency.”
The pressure is on the NFL’s all-time leading scorer, but Vinatieri has handled pressure with aplomb his entire career.