AFC NORTH

From Bob Labriola's Column:

ITEM: Competition likely at PK, along offensive line [in Baltimore]
With 11 seconds left in an AFC Championship Game that the Baltimore Ravens were losing by three points, kicker Billy Cundiff badly missed a 32-yard field goal, and the New England Patriots advanced to Super Bowl XLVI.

Maybe that one miss won’t cost Cundiff his job, but that miss at the end of a season in which he missed 10 attempts has left Coach John Harbaugh interested in having competition for the job this summer.

“Yeah, we’ll probably bring the best group of players to camp that we can,” Harbaugh told the Baltimore Sun. “If we can get a kicker who is capable of competing with Billy, we’ll do it. Do you have to draft a guy? Is there a free agent? Is there a guy that will be on the street? That’s kind of hard to determine. We want competition for pretty much every position. I say that so I’m not ruling anything out, but Billy is our kicker. And I would anticipate Billy will be our kicker for the opening game of the season. I think he’ll have a great preseason. I think he’ll have a great season next year, but everybody gets competition and he’s no exception.”

During the recently completed owners meetings, Harbaugh identified another area of his team that needs work.

From ME: I've been meaning to comment on this since it happened (maybe I did but it's worth repeating). Harbaugh seems to take no responsibility for not simply calling a time out to give his kicker time to prepare. In this instance it would have been justified; nothing like Brad Garrett (or was it Billy The Kid) did to his kicker in Dallas. In fact, if I were the coach, it would be understood that my kicker could call a time out himself in such a situation if he did not feel comfortable getting the kick away. In that way the coach does not have to take on the responsibility of "knowing" what his kicker requires.

DOH!