Pro Bowl Kicking Game Adjustments a Mixed Bag; Not Quite Time for Big Changes

The NFL's 2015 edition of the Pro Bowl was an experiment of sorts.

Besides some entertaining moments, the usual lack of intensity and cautious play from some of the sport's very best, the league tested out using narrower goal posts and having kickers boot extra points from 35 yards out to make the game more challenging.

Normally, according to the league's rulebook, extra points are kicked from the 20-yard line and the uprights are set to 18 feet, six inches. During the Pro Bowl, the goal posts were brought in to a distance of 14 feet.

Team Irvin kicker Adam Vinatieri was greatly affected by these adjustments. In total he missed three kicks—two extra points and a 38-yard attempt in the third quarter. As a point of reference, Vinatieri hasn't missed an extra point since the 2009 season, per John Breech of CBSSports.com.

ESPN's official NFL Twitter account chimed in on what we all saw:

These changes that the NFL has been thinking about incorporating isn't anything new. Josh Weinfuss of ESPN.com mentioned that the league tried to use a 33-yard extra point during the first two weeks of the 2014 preseason.

When you add it up, the league's kickers made 99.39 percent of their extra-point attempts in 2014. Those numbers are as close to automatic as it gets.

The sample size is way too small to come up with a definitive conclusion, but shrinking the distance of the goal posts and pushing the distance back 15 yards should make that percentage dip.

Even Vinatieri believes this to be true. Talking with Weinfuss prior to the Pro Bowl, he offered up this quote: "I just want them to understand and realize that if they do this next year, two years, four years down the road, field-goal percentages will go down. And if that’s what they’re looking for, then great."

Using info obtained from Bleacher Report's Jason Cole, B/R's Ty Schalter was blunt explaining how the veteran kicker feels about this whole issue:

The issues with field goals are complicated. Back in the summer of 2014, Mike Klis of The Denver Post made a great point:

Mark Humphrey/Associated Press

"The problem with adding difficulty to the extra point, though, is it increases the possibility it will determine the game's outcome. After 80 some offensive and defensive players bang away for 60 minutes, do they really want a football game to come down to a 33-yard extra point?"

That's a concern the league will have to continue to mull over. The last thing it needs is games being decided by an extra-point attempt.

Perhaps the answer is somewhere in the middle.

Shrinking the goal posts ultimately could work. Whether it's 14 feet or even 16, that tweak would greatly alter the outcome of field-goal attempts and force head coaches to make difficult decisions.

If the league moves in that direction but decides to keep extra points at the 20-yard line, that would eliminate the chances of a longer kick ruining close games.

You could also fall back on the stance that sometimes it's best not to mess with what's worked for so long. The NFL is the most popular sports conglomerate in the United States for a reason. Tinkering with things like field goals might turn fans off.

In Klis' article from the summer, Broncos punter Britton Colquitt chimed in on the great debate: "The kickers don't like it. I guess the biggest thing is why change something that's one of the original rules of football? I'm not kicking it, but if I was a kicker I wouldn't like it. I think you can make too much change."

We've already witnessed the backlash surrounding the "catch rule" this season. Maybe the league should focus on adjusting all of the questionable rules in the game today instead of messing with the traditional ones.

Unless noted otherwise, all game scores and information come courtesy of ESPN.com.