The San Francisco 49ers are still searching for a new special teams coordinator after finishing second to last in special teams DVOA, including fourth-worst on field goals/extra points and punts.
The Niners drafted a kicker in the third round of the 2023 NFL Draft and are still waiting to reap those benefits. But for as much as we talk about Jake Moody and his struggles this past season, punter Mitch Wishnowsky didn’t play in a game after Week 10. Wishnowsky was affected by injury, but was it all season? His net average per punt was 34.7 yards.
Unfortunately, this isn’t anything new with Wishnowsky. He has never had a net average above 44 yards, while his overall average was only 43.2 in 2024. For reference, I live in a hotbed for high school football in Phoenix, Arizona. In 2024, six punters had higher averages than Wishnowsky….at the high school level.
If the goal is to improve your special teams, wouldn’t it make sense to press the reset button and make wholesale changes across the board? What results have we seen from either the kicker or the punter that would suggest their performances to date have been anomalies?
Wishnowsky is under contract for two more seasons, but the 49ers could cut ties with him this offseason and save around $4 million over the next two seasons.
This past year was the first time Wishnowsky had missed time due to injury. He finished dead last in the NFL on the net average. The player right in front of him? Wishnowsky’s replacement, Pat O’Donnell. Wishnowsky only had one punt land inside the opponent’s 10-yard line and was bottom five in the percentage of punts that landed inside the 20.
Moving on from Moody
In recent years, the 49ers have moved on from draft picks—specifically in the third round—when they felt it was time. Moody isn’t different from a Trey Sermon, other than he’s gotten more opportunities.
During their post-season press conference, neither Kyle Shanahan nor John Lynch addressed Moody head-on. Shanahan spoke about special teams in general, saying, “We spent a third-round pick on a kicker. Making special teams changes is why special teams is important to me. Because we do work at it, but it wasn’t good enough this year.”
The argument would be that Moody is on a rookie deal for two more seasons. Releasing Moody wouldn’t do any harm to the 49ers salary cap — where they have $46.5 million in cap space — so it’s not as if the team couldn’t sign or draft a kicker.
Perhaps it makes sense to bring in competition for Moody, but we see the reports. He doesn’t miss in practice. We have evidence of Moody struggling at the areas of the field where other kickers seemingly never miss.
Moody had the sixth-worst percentage from 50+ yards this season and was dead last from 40-49 yards. If you look at where the top kickers were drafted, the majority were not. They were all signed as undrafted free agents. We’re not talking about replacing Brock Purdy. Franchise quarterbacks are difficult to sign. The last couple of years have proven that you can snag a kicker at any point in the draft and get similar, and usually better, production from a kicker selected in the early rounds.
Above all, moving on from Moody and Wishnowsky, to a lesser degree sends a message to your team that last season was unacceptable and that you’re not willing to live with those results again by bringing in a different punter and kicker, along with a new coordinator.
I’m sure these questions are at the top of the list as the 49ers go through interviews: “What would you do at kicker? Who do you believe should replace the punter?”
Shanahan should make an executive decision and realize that what the 49ers are trotting out there on special teams is losing the team field position and, ultimately, points. The decision doesn’t seem like a difficult one.
