Today I wanted to examine an often underappreciated facet of the NFL game, kickoff returns. This has become even more true considering the rule changes the NFL made to the play for this upcoming season, and with it will likely come far more return opportunities.
Upon that news, the Pittsburgh Steelers quickly went out and signed Cordarrelle Patterson, who has provided a substantial impact on kickoff returns in his career. The goal of this article is to see what Patterson provided in 2023 compared to players with matching or greater attempts, along with those returner’s career stats to gauge his impact.
Last season, Patterson had seven kickoff returns, and here are the 34 qualifying players’ attempts in 2023 as well as their careers:
Here we get a sense of Patterson’s kickoff return contributions trailing off last year, with those seven attempts tying with three other players at 31st in the league. That was the least attempts in his 11-year career to date, along with nine in 2022 another low total compared to a low of 18 previously. In total, we can see that Patterson comfortably led qualifiers with 270 career attempts, with second place coming in much lower at 122.
This emphasizes the rare longevity that Patterson has provided as a kick returner over his career, one of only six qualifiers to have more than five seasons of kick return work. Eight seasons was the second-highest career length, compared to Patterson’s 11, and prepped to add to that impressive feat in 2024.
Next, let’s look at 2023 and career yards per attempt (YPA):
Patterson lands in the same quadrant of the chart, with a better career mark than last season. In 2023, Patterson was below average at 21.9 YPA (24th), compared to a second-best 29.6 over his career.
The best mark was Dameon Pierce at 32.1, an impressive number in his rookie year no doubt, but a decade less than Patterson’s career mark. Impressive, but there we see an obvious downtrend again last year, and of course, the hope is to rekindle some magic comparatively.
Including former Steelers also adds interesting context. Godwin Igwebuike was the primary Steelers kick returner last season, with 25.6 YPA (12th) on 11 attempts (T-18th). He has three seasons of kick returns to date, totaling 50 kickoff returns (13th), and a 25.7 YPA (tenth). Not too shabby, albeit over a much shorter span than Patterson.
If you’ve followed the team for a bit, Ray-Ray McCloud III will be a familiar name as well. He was with Pittsburgh in 2020 and 2021 and has six NFL seasons under his belt. McCloud has 108 career kickoff returns, the fourth-most and final player over 100 among qualifiers, along with a 22.6 career YPA (T-24th).
Lots of valuable NFL, Steelers, and Patterson context thus far.
I was also interested to see what the yardage totals in 2023 and careers looked like:
Get used to this recurring theme of Patterson landing atop the career marks. His whopping 7,990 career kickoff return yards was the most by a vast margin, with second place landing at 3,112. Patterson’s 153 yards in 2023 were stale in comparison, second-least among qualifiers, which brings up the concern if father time has become a factor.
Igwebuike and McCloud were also below average in 2023, the formers 282 yards ranking 17th, and the latter’s 225 tying for 22nd. McCloud is above average in his career, with 2,438 (fourth), including his best seasons coming in the Steel City (776, 646).
An encouraging takeaway is the two former Pittsburgh returners have some solid marks so far, which hopefully implies strong kick return units and coaching that will apply to Patterson as he sports the black and gold.
Another extremely impactful element to kick returning is busting off long, field-flipping returns. Here are the 2023 and career-longest kick returns for the qualifiers:
Once again, Patterson tops another category with a 109-yard kickoff return, so basically from the back of the end zone. Patterson has a whopping six seasons with a long of over 100 yards, the last one occurring recently in 2022, along with another 95-yarder to boot.
In 2023 though, that number was just 29, which ranked 30th (fifth-least). With that huge return ability on his resume, here’s to hoping history repeats itself in 2024.
Former Steelers had better marks in 2023, with Igwebuike at 36 and McCloud a 34-yard long, but haven’t been able to bust off the home run in comparison over their careers (Igwebuike – 50, McCloud – 49).
I also wanted to include PFF grades while I was at it:
Igwebuike lands above the mean in both data points once again, as he did in YPA. His 63.3 kickoff return grade ranked 11th, while his career grade of 67.8 landed fifth-best. He is still a free agent currently, and was one of Pittsburgh’s stronger special teams contributors (that wasn’t limited to kick returns) in 2023, so a reunion wouldn’t hurt my feelings one bit.
In comparison, McCloud was below average last season at 57.2 (19th), compared to a bit stronger 61.8 career grade (17th).
You guessed it, Patterson landed on the top left of the visual once again. His career 71.6 grade was third-best among qualifiers, which seems low, humbly. Discouragingly, Patterson’s 2023 mark was on the other end of the spectrum, a 50.2 that was fourth-lowest at 31st.
What’s the ultimate goal? Getting on the scoreboard with a touchdown, of course. Here are those results:
Patterson has provided a whopping nine touchdowns over his career, far more than second place (three TDs). 2023 was a goose egg in that department, but we also see that was lacking across the league last season. Only three touchdowns were provided among qualifiers last season, from three different players: Marvin Mims Jr., Jalen Reagor, and Pierce.
The former Steelers were unable to provide a touchdown in 2023, or in their career. So, in these terms, there was no better resume and person to add this offseason than Patterson. Last season wasn’t so hot, but paired with some of Pittsburgh’s encouraging results coupled with Patterson will hopefully make for some electricity on the revamped kickoff return in 2024.
Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts in the comments.
