Vikings UFA profile: K Greg Joseph

With the 2023 season in the books, Inside the Vikings is taking a look at all 22 of Minnesota's pending unrestricted free agents over the course of a few weeks. We're examining their past and speculating about their future, particularly the likelihood that they could be re-signed by the Vikings this offseason. We started from the least important (Hakeem Adeniji) and are working our way up to the big fish (Kirk Cousins).

Age: 29
2023 stats: 24/30 FG (80%), 36/38 XP (94.7%), 77% touchback rate
2023 contract AAV: $2 million

Greg Joseph has been the Vikings' kicker for the last three seasons despite being firmly below-average during that time. During that span, he has hit just over 82 percent of his field goal attempts (61/83) and 90 percent of his extra point attempts (112/124), which are below the league-average success rates. Among qualified kickers, his PFF grades have ranked 24th out of 33, 28th out of 34, and 26th out of 35. He's just good enough to keep his starting job, but consistently among the bottom ten kickers in the league.

The problem for the Vikings is that finding an upgrade isn't easy — although they haven't tried particularly hard. Since replacing Dan Bailey in Minnesota, Joseph has held off competition from undrafted players like Riley Patterson, Gabe Brkic, and Jack Podlesny. Patterson has gone on to have more success than Joseph while bouncing between the Lions and Jaguars.

Joseph meets the bar as a starting-caliber NFL kicker with a big leg, but it doesn't seem like the Vikings should be satisfied with that. He has consistently hurt them with misses more than you'd like from your veteran kicker. In 2023, the majority of his misses went wide right, suggesting some sort of mechanical issue.

Joseph will compete for a kicking job somewhere in 2024, but the Vikings should seriously consider looking elsewhere at that position. Upgrades not being easy to find shouldn't be an excuse for not trying. Whether via free agency, trade, or the draft, it's time for the Vikings to find a kicker who can provide more consistency than Joseph.

Previous Vikings UFA profiles: