Titans are first NFL team since 1987 to miss more field goals than they made

[T-Rac]

Getty Images

The Titans are on the verge of wrapping up the ugliest season of kicking that the NFL has seen since 1987.

So far this season the Titans are 8-for-18 on field goals. If they don’t improve over the final two weeks of the season, they’ll be the first team since the 1987 Vikings to miss more field goals than they made.

That 1987 Vikings team saw its regular kicker, Chuck Nelson, go 13-for-24, which is bad but better than this year’s Titans. However, the 1987 season involved a players’ strike that featured three games with replacement players, and the Vikings’ scab kicker, Dale Dawson, went just 1-for-5 on field goals.

The Titans don’t have the excuse of a players’ strike, although they have had injuries at the kicker position that have resulted in three different kickers playing for them this season: Ryan Succop is an ugly 1-for-6, while Cairo Santos went 4-for-9 and Cody Parkey went 3-for-3.

That adds up to less than 50 percent of field goals made. If the Titans just miss the playoffs — and right now they’d miss the last wild card spot on a tiebreaker — they’ll look back at their inability to find a reliable kicker as a big reason.