Chicago Bears: Meet the 5 kickers headed to rookie mini camp

Emmit Carpenter

Minnesota

The next guy that the Bears will be bringing into rookie camp is Emmit Carpenter. Carpenter stands 6-feet, 200 pounds. He is out of Minnesota and was their starting kicker for the last three seasons — dating back to when Carpenter was a sophomore.

His freshman year was his best year as a field goal kicker hitting 91.7 percent of those and he only missed one extra point going 43-for-44, resulting in a strong 97.7 percent. Things didn’t really go as well in his final two college seasons, however. He was a perfect 100 percent on extra points in those final two seasons, but his field goal percentage fell way off. He went 14-for-20 for 70 percent in his junior year, and then 17-for-23 for 79.1 percent in his senior year.

The Big Ten breeds great competition and he has kicked against some very good football teams, but he is going to need to be much better than that if he is going to stick around with the Bears. After last year, there might be a short leash on any kicker the Bears go into the season with. Carpenter may or may not be that guy but he will be given the opportunity.