Here is an article from kansascity.com. Why didn't the Chiefs draft Mason Crosby with a monster leg instead of Medlock?
The Chiefs’ strategy for solving their kicking troubles was a simple one. Too simple, as it turned out.
Their solution was to sign the best available free-agent kicker, Seattle’s Josh Brown. They had no backup plan.
So when Brown instead signed with the Rams in the opening days of free agency, the Chiefs were left at kicker with journeymen Nick Novak and Billy Cundiff, an undrafted rookie in North Carolina’s Connor Barth and plenty of continuing unease over the situation.
“We’ll have to decide at the end of the day if one of these three guys is the guy or do we have to go out and get one of those old guys who doesn’t want to come to training camp?” coach Herm Edwards said. “Hopefully we don’t have to do that, but if we have to, we’ll do it.”
The “old guys” Edwards referred to include John Carney, who kicked for the Chiefs toward the end of last season, and former Colts kicker Mike Vanderjagt, who worked out for them early in the spring. Both are free agents.
Whatever the Chiefs do, they can only hope that their decision-making when it comes to kickers is better than it was last season, when they made one wrong choice after another. They erred in drafting Justin Medlock instead of Mason Crosby, in keeping Medlock instead of Lawrence Tynes, and in signing Dave Rayner instead of several other candidates, Novak included.
Novak and Cundiff are already kicking during informal workouts. Barth will join them when offseason practice begins in two weeks.
The Chiefs are encouraged with the early results, but there’s plenty of time for that to change.
“I called them both when we first signed them and told them that from the day they get here, there’s going to be competition,” special-teams coach Mike Priefer said. “I think they’ve each had one poor day. Other than that, they’ve both kicked very well. We’ve been kicking outside most of the time. It’s been cold, wet, windy. It’s Kansas City. If you can kick here, you can kick anywhere.”
Cundiff kicked for five seasons with Dallas and New Orleans, Novak for parts of two with Washington and Arizona. Each has been released numerous times, but that’s not unusual for a young kicker trying to establish himself.
“I’m not discouraged at all,” Novak said. “I feel like I’m getting better every year, especially on kickoffs.
“I’d say it’s been very close between us so far. Both of us should play in the league next year. The Chiefs either way will have a good kicker.”
The Chiefs came close to signing Novak early last year when they dumped Medlock. They opted instead for Rayner, who got off to a strong start but proved to be erratic as a field-goal kicker.
“We just felt (Rayner) had better potential,” Edwards said. “He had a strong leg, could kick off into the end zone. He came out of the chute firing. He was the special-teams player of the week. We thought we were going down the right road.”
Barth’s credentials at North Carolina, where he made 76 percent of his field-goal tries, were impressive enough for the Chiefs to sign him after the draft. It’s difficult to take seriously the roster chances of any rookie kicker in Kansas City because of last year’s experience with Medlock.
“I thought he should have been drafted,” Priefer said. “He was good enough to get drafted. He’s got some mental toughness to him. He had an excellent career at North Carolina. They didn’t score a lot of points down there, so most of his kicks were huge kicks for his team.”
