New England Patriots: 5 rookies who will make immediate impacts in 2020
New England Patriots will count on K Justin Rohrwasser.
Taken with the No. 159 pick in the 2020 NFL Draft, Marshall kicker Justin Rohrwasser was a pick only Bill Belichick would make.
Who else would take a kick with a mid-round pick but the New England Patriots head coach who values his special teams players and specialists?
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Well, despite the team passing up on some other positional needs like quarterback and wide receiver, the selection of a kicker wasn’t surprising given the team has decided to move on from long-time kicker Stephen Gostkowski. With any drafting of a kicker, the issue was more where they selected him.
Standing at 6-foot-3, 230 pounds, Justin Rohrwasser will have more of a spotlight placed on him than any other kicker the team could’ve selected.
First, he is following two kickers who were a main part of the team’s 20-year dynasty in Adam Vinatieri and Gostkowski. With that long history of clutch kickers, Patriots fans will expect similar success from Rohrwasser. Every missed kick will be scrutinized, especially if that involves extra-point kicks.
Another reason he will have the spotlight placed on him is a question as to who he is off the field. After he was selected by the New England Patriots, Justin Rohrwasser had some character questions to answer after photos circulated social media highlighting a controversial tattoo on his arm of the logo of an anti-government group called the “Three Percenters.”
Rohrwasser dismissed that he was aware of what the logo symbolized when he got the tattoo and vowed to remove it.
Between playing for a coach like Bill Belichick and battling public scrutiny, the 23-year-old kicker will have to kick a lot of clutch field goals to win fans over and I think he will have an impact in that fashion. Given the limitations of the offense following the 2020 NFL Draft, Justin Rohrwasser will have plenty of scoring opportunities when it comes to field goals.
In that respect, he may turn out to be one of the more important rookies for the New England Patriots in the 2020 season. Coming off a final college season at Marshall in which he converted on 85.7 percent of his field goal attempts and 97.2 percent on extra-points, he has the capability, but the main question is will he have the mental toughness to be successful in the NFL.