Who Should I Start? Matt Prater or Greg Joseph

Friday, January 3, 12:10 PM

Arizona Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon said that veteran kicker Matt Prater (knee) "will not go" in the Week 18 regular-season finale on Sunday against the division-rival San Francisco 49ers. Prater suffered a meniscus injury in his knee earlier this year and missed the last three months as a result. The 40-year-old kicker only ended up playing in four games in 2024 before injuring his knee in his fourth year with Arizona and 18th year in the NFL. In the four games he was active, Prater made all six of his field-goal attempts (one from 50-plus yards) and was successful on all 10 of his extra-point tries as well. Prater will be a free agent heading into his age-41 season in 2025. Chad Ryland will close out the year this weekend as Arizona's kicker. He's bounced back from a tough rookie season with the Pats to go 26-for-30 on field goals and 21-for-22 on extra points in his 12 games with the Cardinals.

Friday, May 16, 11:47 PM

The San Francisco 49ers signed free-agent veteran kicker Greg Joseph to an undisclosed one-year deal on Friday, according to his agent. Joseph will head to the NFC West after he spent 2024 kicking for three teams -- the New York Giants, Washington Commanders and New York Jets. In eight games with those three clubs, the 30-year-old veteran went 16-for-20 on his field-goal attempts (1-for-2 from 50-plus yards) and 11-for-11 on his extra-point tries. Joseph will be in a competition in training camp for the starting kicking job this summer with Jake Moody, who will be the favorite to win the competition. Joseph entered the NFL as an undrafted free agent out of Florida Atlantic before debuting with the Cleveland Browns in 2018. He has an 82.3% success rate on 141 career field-goal attempts over his six seasons in the league.