No position is more unpredictable in fantasy football than kickers. Year after year after year, no position has a lower correlation between where they're drafted before the season and where they finish after the season. No position has a lower correlation between how they score in one week and how they score in the next. No position has a lower correlation between projected points and actual points.
In addition, placekicker is the position that has the smallest spread between the best players and the middle-of-the-pack players for fantasy. Finally, most fantasy GMs will only carry one kicker at a time, which means a dozen or more starting kickers are sitting around on waivers at any given time. Given all of this, it rarely makes sense to devote resources to the position. Instead, GMs are best served by rotating through whichever available kicker has the best weekly matchup.
Every week, I'll rank the situations each kicker finds himself in (ignoring the kicker's own talent) to help you find perfectly startable production off the waiver wire.
Week 3 Kicker Results
Harrison Butker (1 FG on 2 attempts, 3 XPs, 6 points)
The Chiefs handled the Dolphins with ease in Week 3, but Butker didn't benefit. His team passed up a 28-yard field goal for a failed conversion on 4th and 1, and Butker missed a 50-yarder in the final minute. His 6 points tied for 20th among kickers last week.
Tyler Bass (1 FG on 1 attempt, 3 XPs, 6 points)
This is the second straight week Bass looked like he had a monster matchup but came up short. Buffalo had ten drives and five of them ended in turnovers; when the Bills held on to the ball, Bass did just fine, with three extra points and a field goal in the remaining five drives.
Trey Smack (0 FGs on 1 attempt, 2 XPs, 2 points)
Smack was a Top 5 kicker through the first two weeks, but the good times came to an end against Atlanta. Smack's lone field goal attempt was blocked, and his only scoring consisted of an extra point at the beginning and end of a game the Falcons otherwise dominated. With two points, he ranked 29th in Week 3.
Daniel Carlson (0 FGs on 0 attempts, 3 XPs, 3 points)
Carlson turned in another disappointing performance for us. The Saints, who had thrived in the fourth quarter under quarterback Tyler Shough, wilted against the Raiders, giving up a 27-16 lead with 20 minutes remaining. New Orleans scored four touchdowns on the day, but Carlson missed an extra point, leaving him with just 3 points; that ranked 28th among kickers.
Jake Elliott (0 FGs on 0 attempts, 1 XP, 1 point)
Elliott capped off what turned out to be Rent-a-Kicker's second-worst week since I started tracking granular data in 2020. Overall, our five picks averaged just 3.6 points for the week; the lowest average was 3.4 in Week 3 of 2024. Against a Bears defense that seemed vulnerable, the Eagles managed just a single touchdown; Elliott's one point tied him for the week's lowest score.
Kicker Results To Date
To date, Rent-a-Kicker has made fifteen weekly recommendations. Those fifteen kickers have averaged 7.33 points. Our top three picks average an identical 7.33 points—compared to a long-run average of 7.71. The current average would rank just 14th at the position; starting next week, we'll begin comparing to the Top 12 kickers by preseason ADP.
I told you two weeks ago that our Week 1 performance was unusually good and you shouldn't expect a repeat. I can likewise tell you today that our Week 3 performance was unusually bad and is unlikely to recur. High week-to-week fluctuations are the nature of the position; trust, instead, in the long-run averages.