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Releasing punter Derrick Frost Monday said it for them: The Green Bay Packers made a mistake when they cut incumbent punter Jon Ryan Sept. 1 in favor of Frost.
And now, with four games left in the regular season, the 5-7 Packers will audition replacements, starting today, for who'll kick for them Sunday against Houston.
After enduring weeks of Frost's poor punting, the team finally moved on Monday, one day after he averaged 43.8 gross yards, 32.3 net yards and 3.63 seconds of hang time on four punts during Sunday's loss to Carolina. His first attempt, a 2.96-second line-drive 40-yarder that netted just 28 yards, resulted in a chorus of boos from the Lambeau Field crowd.
Asked what the ``final straw'' with Frost, McCarthy answered, ``Clearly a performance issue. We just tried everything that we could and it's unfortunate that it didn't work out. Just the (in)ability to transfer it from the practice field to the playing field. ... It was something we felt factored in some of the outcomes of our games, and we needed to make a change.''
McCarthy said backup quarterback Matt Flynn will take over as the holder for kicker Mason Crosby.
The Packers cut Ryan after training camp ended to add Frost, who had been released by Washington on the final cutdown. In 12 games, Frost averaged 42.1 gross yards and 36.1 net yards on 48 punts. That ranked Frost 26th in both gross and net average, while Ryan, now with the Seattle Seahawks, ranks ninth in gross (46.7) and 17th in net (38.2).
Asked whether he regretted cutting Ryan, McCarthy replied, ``I don't want to go back. Jon was a true pro, a very talented punter. We had a positive experience with him here.''
Asked if he erred in releasing Ryan, Thompson answered, ``I'll let you guys (decide) that. I don't speak negatively about our players so I'm not going to now. Derrick was a wonderful punter in practices and pregame drills. It just didn't translate to the game. We anticipated having more consistency at that spot and it just hasn't worked out that way, and that's on me.''
Pressed on why he cut Ryan, whom at the time of the move Thompson said ``can hit punts like nobody I have ever seen,'' Thompson said, ``It's what I said at the time: We were looking for more consistency out of that position. We thought we'd be able to get that. We have not been able to get that.''
And it's unlikely they'll get it in the final four weeks. The team is set to bring in at least three punters -- Durant Brooks, Paul Ernster and Jeremy Kapinos -- for tryouts today, and could look at more as the week goes on if none of the three impresses. The Packers also invited Ben Graham in for a workout, but Graham signed with the Arizona Cardinals on Monday, replacing Dirk Johnson.
Brooks, a sixth-round pick from Georgia Tech who beat out Frost for the Redskins' punting job, averaged 39.6 gross yards (35th) and 32.1 net yards (35th) on 26 punts before his release after six games as part of an injury settlement because of a hip injury. The Redskins cut Brooks in favor of Ryan Plackemeier, whom the Seahawks cut when they signed Ryan.
Ernster, a former kickoff specialist, punted for Pittsburgh before being cut in favor of veteran Mitch Berger and averaged 31.6 gross yards (37th) and 31.3 net yards (37th) on 12 punts. However, only two of his punts were returned (for 4 yards) and four punts landed inside the 20-yard line.
Kapinos signed with the New York Jets as an undrafted rookie free agent from Penn State in 2007 but has never punted in a regular-season game. Johnson, who averaged 41.8 gross yards (28th) and 35.2 net yards (29th) on 40 punts for Arizona, joins a host of veteran out-of-work punters, including 38-year-olds Scott Player (formerly of Arizona) and Josh Miller (Pittsburgh, New England).
Thompson said punter is ``one of the few positions that one can line up and perform without practicing or learning the plays. We're working our way through it. We have to have one by Saturday in order for him to be eligible to play in the game.''
As for Frost, who also had a poor game at New Orleans (33.5 gross yards, 30.8 net yards and 3.54 seconds hang time on four punts), Stock said he'd never seen a punter look so good in practice and punt so poorly in games in his 17 years of NFL special-teams coaching. Although thought to have been the driving force behind cutting Ryan and signing Frost, Stock would only say that ``the Green Bay Packers made that move.''
``I don't want to look back. It's just one of those things where we made the decision and we're living (with) it,'' Stock said. ``The decision was the decision. As it turns out, Frost doesn't fulfill our expectations. It's not like the kid doesn't have talent. Fulfilling the expectations is another thing. And he didn't do it.''
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