A trade market for kickers sounds odd until you look at the league-wide mess at the position, and that’s exactly where Joey Slye enters the conversation.
According to Jason La Canfora, “a smart GM” is going to land the Titans kicker in a deal, with Slye carrying a $2 million cap hit on an expiring contract. The timing lines up with what La Canfora described as the kicking chaos around the league, and he floated the Packers, 49ers and Rams as teams that could make sense.
The recent production also gives the idea some weight. Over the last two years in Tennessee, Slye has connected on 38 of 46 field goal tries and 36 of 37 extra points. This season, he has played in seven games and gone 10-for-11 on field goals and a perfect 10-for-10 on extra points.
La Canfora singled out Green Bay because rookie Trey Smack has struggled. San Francisco, meanwhile, just extended Eddy Pineiro, but he has missed a kick in each of the last four games. And the Rams are already on their third kicker of the year in Brandon McManus after cutting Harrison Mevis and losing Blake Grupe to a torn ACL.
He also mentioned the Eagles as a team that could try to move some contracts while adding help in an effort to win the division this year, though that could shift if they lose in Week 7 and drop to 2-5.
Slye’s path to this point has been anything but straight. He went undrafted out of Virginia Tech after the 2019 NFL Draft and first signed with the Giants. He was waived in May, brought back in July, and then waived again.
From there, he bounced around the league. He joined the Panthers as a camp leg and wound up winning the starting job when K Graham Gano went on injured reserve.
He re-signed, then signed a one-year extension in January 2021 that would have set him up for free agency in 2022. But the Panthers cut him coming out of the preseason, and he later landed with the Texans and 49ers as an injury replacement.
Washington then brought him in as its primary kicker after releasing K Dustin Hopkins.
After that, Slye returned on one-year deals for two seasons, tested the market as an unrestricted free agent, signed a one-year contract with the Jaguars and was cut a month later. He then signed with the Patriots for the 2024 season before the Titans added him on one-year deals for each of the last two seasons.
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