Much has been made of the Bears’ kicker competition, most recently with a Sports Illustrated article painting a picture of an obsessive coaching staff desperate to find a kicker.
Considering the Bears’ recent history with kickers — including Cody Parkey’s infamous double-doink missed field goal — it makes sense that the position would be a focus in the offseason. Which it was.
Bears coach Matt Nagy embraced the national spotlight that came with the kicker competition, no doubt another tactic in creating pressure outside of game situations. But some of those nine kickers in attendance at rookie minicamp expressed frustration and confusion by the whole thing, as explained in the SI article.
While there has been criticism surrounding the Bears’ kicker competition, one person that valued the experience is Elliott Fry, someone who was there from the start.
While Fry wasn’t able to beat out Eddy Pineiro in the kicker competition, Fry left the experience feeling confident that he has a future in the league.
“I really do feel like I can play in the NFL,” he said, via The Athletic. “Going through this whole process and going through everything, I feel like I can do it … I feel like I can get in there, I can play at this level and be good.”
One of the areas of criticism was focused specifically on how the Bears were evaluating their kickers. Putting them into situations where they’re kicking 43-yard field goals, utilizing the Augusta silence and evaluating every kick.
But Fry believes that he’s grown mentally as a result from those tactics.
“The Augusta silence was definitely interesting at first,” Fry said. “I don’t know if many kickers had gone through that. At the time, it was like you don’t want to do this, because it’s just a tough thing to do but in hindsight — and me and Eddy talked about this a lot, too — I think I’ve gotten so much better mentally because of that.
“It’s one of those where now I feel like I can literally kick any field goal in any situation and not even be remotely bothered by it. It’s like, if I can go in and make kicks with that going on, I can do anything. It was great looking back on it in terms of growing. It’s just like working out really hard; it sucks while you’re doing it but then after, ‘Hey, this has made me better.’”
After getting cut by the Bears on Aug. 18, Fry was signed by the Baltimore Ravens. While Fry won’t be competing for a starting job with Justin Tucker in place, it provides another opportunity for Fry to show that he belongs in the NFL.
