With Justin Tucker currently out of work, Chris Boswell is arguably the greatest kicker employed at the moment, historically speaking. He is probably the current greatest kicker, earning first-team All-Pro honors last season. But what would it take for Boswell to achieve football immortality as the most accurate kicker ever?
I’ve done the math, using my fingers and toes and those of my neighbors. I have determined that Chris Boswell would have to make his next 31 field goals to pass Justin Tucker. He currently has an 88.025 percentage, and Tucker is at 89.102.
Boswell has made 272 out of 309 field goal attempts since entering the NFL, Tucker 417 out of 468. In order for Boswell to eclipse Tucker’s percentage, he would need to reach 303 out of 340. That would give him a career percentage of 89.117, a new NFL record.
Of course, not so long ago, Justin Tucker owned a career field goal percentage north of 90 percent. He failed to hit the 90s in three consecutive seasons, however, leading to his average tumbling. Last season, he had the worst year of his career, going 22-for-30 for a 73.3-percent clip.
It is surely at least in part due to Tucker’s late-career decline that the Ravens chose to release him yesterday while he remains under investigation by the NFL for sexual misconduct. The combination of the two factors could potentially lead to the end of his career. How many teams would be willing to sign a kicker, no matter how good, amid a pending investigation? Meanwhile, Chris Boswell has been part of a revolution in NFL volume-distance kicking, making 13 field goals of 50-plus yards. Prior to the 2024 season, that would have been an NFL record, but others achieved the same feat last year.
A former college undrafted free agent, Justin Tucker quickly developed a sterling reputation. He made the first-team All-Pro list in his second season, going 38-for-41 and 6-for-7 from range. Prior to 2021, Boswell had never made more than four field goals from 50-plus in a season, and he only made more than two once. But in the past four years, he is 34-for-40 from 50-plus.
While this conversation focuses on Justin Tucker and Chris Boswell, the latter only ranks fourth in all-time field goal percentage. In between the two are Harrison Butker and Eddy Piñeiro, both currently active. The latter is .069 percentage points ahead, while Butler is .0592 ahead. Because both are currently active, and younger than Boswell, they are moving targets whose average will fluctuate more considerably, thus making it somewhat meaningless to calculate.
If this does mark the end of Justin Tucker’s career, though, he will own the NFL’s all-time field goal percentage record securely. But Chris Boswell could jump ahead of him with one perfect season. Even one miss would be a sharp blow, though. If he were to miss kick 341, his average would fall to 88.856. That’s why we tend to figure these things out after players retire. But if Tucker is done, then we know the target goal.
