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Respect the Specs: Fan favorite Rodrigo Blankenship wins Indianapolis Colts kicking competition
By Keith Farner
Published:
One of the most popular Georgia players in recent memory received some dream news recently when it became known that he won the kicking competition with the Indianapolis Colts.
Rodrigo Blankenship has reportedly won a job after the team announced it had released Chase McLaughlin, who was its kicker at the end of last season, in favor of the undrafted rookie free agent Blankenship.
Blankenship has a strong reputation from a decorated career at Georgia. He converted all 200 of his extra-point attempts and was 80-of-97 (82.5 percent) on field-goal attempts.
Between hitting big kicks for Georgia, including a 55-yarder in the Rose Bowl against Oklahoma, and conducting interviews with his helmet on, Blankenship became a fan favorite in Athens and across Dawg Nation. He had a career-high 4 field goals each against Kentucky in 2016, Missouri in 2017, Missouri in 2019 and Texas A&M in 2019.
The All-American last year also took home the 2019 Lou Groza Award winner as the nation’s top placekicker.
So, undrafted rookie Rodrigo Blankenship wins the Colts’ first kicking competition since 1998. #respectthespecs
He’ll also be the first full-time kicker on this roster not named Adam Vinatieri since 2005 — Peyton Manning’s seventh year in the league.
— Zak Keefer (@zkeefer) September 5, 2020
The #Colts are waiving kicker Chase McLaughlin, source said. He’d been competing in camp with rookie Rodrigo Blankenship.
— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) September 5, 2020
A former newspaper veteran, Keith Farner is a news manager for Saturday Down South.
