Kickers suffer record futility on TD conversions

NFL kickers set a futility record by missing a combined 11 touchdown conversion kicks, breaking a mark of 10 misses in a single week that had stood for 46 years.
A major reason for the lack of success was last year’s rule change that pushed back to length of conversion kicks from a distance of 17 yards to almost double that distance.
Cincinnati’s Mike Nugent and Robbie Gould of the New York Giants each botched two point-after-touchdown (PATs) kicks to help push the total over the top.
There had been seven weeks when NFL kickers missed the old record of 10 conversions, but the most recent was the second week of the 1985 campaign.
Two-point conversion attempts remain near the goal line, prompting NFL teams to go for the extra point with a run or pass play about twice as much as they did before the kick was pushed back.
Overall, the dip in the success rates of conversion kicks since the change was made has been only about five percent.