Can PK Aldrick Rosas redeem himself after rocky rookie season?

Aldrick Rosas had a difficult rookie season with the New York Giants in 2017. Will Rosas get a second season with the Giants to try and redeem himself. Let’s look at the former NAIA placekicker as we continue our player-by-player profiles of the team’s 90-man roster.

The basics

Height: 6-foot-3
Weight: 221
Position: Placekicker
Experience: 1

2017 season in review

Rosas beat back a training camp challenge from veteran Mike Nugent to earn the job. Statistically, Rosas had an awful rookie season. He was 18-of-25 (72 percent) in field-goal attempts, with only four qualifying kickers having a lower percentage. He made only 20-of-23 extra points.

2018 outlook

In today’s NFL, struggling placekickers do not get much rope. Still, Rosas is back and with only Marshall Koehn (one career extra point) as current competition he has to be considered the favorite to keep the job.

The Giants have not given up on the 23-year-old.

“I see a kid that was a rookie last year and like most rookies in this league, they’re inconsistent. It’s rare where you see a rookie that just comes in and just rips it up just walking through the door,” special teams coach Thomas McGaughey said in the spring. “He’s young and like Dave Gettleman always says, we’re not going to give up on talent. He’s a talented guy and there’s some things that he can do that a lot of people can’t do and I think there’s some talent there and we’re going to work with that talent.”

The Athletic reported that Rosas has been working this offseason with long-time NFL kicker John Carney.

“You usually see quite a bit of improvement from that first year to second year,” Carney said. “There’s more to the game than just kicking the ball when you go from college to the pros. There’s a longer season. You don’t have backup kickers so you’re taking all of the reps during the week, all of the reps during the game. The exposure obviously is enormous, so you have to understand that you’re in a fishbowl and make or miss, the media is going to talk about it. It’s going to be national news, so you have to understand the gravity of that and come to terms with that.”

Can Rosas and the Giants harness his talent and earn a second season? To be fair, the Giants — special teams included — were a mess last season. Two Rosas kicks were blocked.

The expectation here has always been that the Giants would likely bring in a veteran for competition during training camp. We’ll see if that happens, but right now I’m still expecting Rosas to be the team’s placekicker during the upcoming season.