New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has seen some of the NFL’s greatest kickers in his NFL coaching career. Now, his team is set to face the kicker who he considers to be the best in NFL history – Baltimore Ravens kicker Justin Tucker.
Speaking to reporters on Friday, Belichick said Tucker is the best kicker in the history of the league.
It’s immense praise coming from a future Hall of Famer who coached and won Super Bowls with Adam Vinatieri and Stephen Gostkowski. Given Tucker’s track record, though, it might be accurate.
Tucker’s 90.68 percent success rate on field-goal attempts is the highest in NFL history. In fact, he’s the only player with a success rate over 90 percent. Meanwhile, it’s also three percent higher than Gostkowski (87.38 percent) and eight percent higher than Vinatieri (84.11 percent).
While Tucker is still 340 field goals converted away from Vinatieri’s active record (593), the 29-year-old kicker could easily break it if he plays for another 10-plus years.