The Giants are staring at a kicking issue they can’t ignore much longer, and Thursday night made it louder. Dominic Zvada missed a 33-yard field goal in New York’s 24-21 loss to the Washington Commanders, a miss that loomed large in a game decided by three points.
Zvada’s early-season cushion has evaporated fast. After opening his NFL career by going 9-for-9, the undrafted rookie has now hit just eight of his last 14 field goal tries. For a team trying to hang onto first place in the NFC East, that kind of slide is hard to brush aside.
Even so, John Harbaugh isn’t ready to pull the plug on the rookie. After the loss, he stood by Zvada and said, "As soon as a guy doesn’t make a play, you can’t start firing people left and right.
Especially your kicker, who’s a rookie. I’m confident that he’s going to become a good kicker."
That doesn’t mean the Giants should sit on their hands, though. A look at Ben Sauls makes plenty of sense.
Sauls is already familiar with the organization, and that matters. Last year, after the Giants rotated through Graham Gano, Jude McAtamney, and Younghoe Koo, the left-footed Pitt product gave them stability down the stretch. He played in the final three games of 2025 and was perfect on all 15 of his kicks, going 8-for-8 on field goals and 7-for-7 on extra points.
Not every kick was a stress test. Seven of those eight field goals came from inside 40 yards. Still, he didn’t miss one, and that counted for something.
The offseason battle between Sauls and Zvada went to the rookie. Zvada connected on 81 of 90 camp attempts, good for 90 percent, while Sauls hit 67 of 87, or 77 percent. Both were perfect in preseason action, but Zvada’s stronger leg and steadier camp won out.
Sauls was waived with an injury settlement in late August, though Harbs still made it clear he valued him, saying, "I would say Ben also won a job."
Since then, Sauls has remained available. He worked out for the Kansas City Chiefs on October 28, but they ended up choosing Justin Tucker instead.
That leaves the former Giants kicker still on the market, and the timing for a reunion is obvious. Nobody is saying Zvada should be dumped after one rough stretch.
He earned the job, and he deserves a chance to clean this up. But bringing Sauls in for a workout would be a low-cost way to add pressure and give the Giants another option if the misses keep piling up.
At the very least, it would force Zvada to prove the job is still his. And if the Giants are going to keep winning tight games, that’s probably the standard they need right now.
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