Rodrigo Blankenship signs practice squad deal with Arizona Cardinals
It’s been a busy day for former Georgia stars in the NFL. After Jake Fromm signed with the Washington Commanders this morning, Rodrigo Blankenship has inked a deal to join the Arizona Cardinals on their practice squad.
Blankenship was cut by the Colts earlier this season after a rough outing in Week One. He missed a would-be 42-yard game-winning field goal for Indianapolis in overtime against the Houston Texans and hit two consecutive kickoffs out of bounds late in the game. The game would end in a 20-20 tie.
Prior to that, Blankenship has been pretty good for the Colts, who signed him after he went undrafted in 2020 out of Georgia. Blankenship converted 45 of 54 field goals in two-plus seasons along with 52 of 55 extra point attempts. He did however struggle with distance, only making one of four attempts from 50 yards or longer after that was an area he had success with in college. Some of that may have been due in part to a hip injury that Blankenship sustained last season.
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In college, Blankenship was one of the best kickers you could find. Over the course of his career in red and black, he made 80 of his 97 field goal attempts, finishing as the leading scorer in program history with 440 points as well as the all-time leader in field goal percentage at 82.47 percent. It also shouldn’t go unnoticed that Blankenship was a perfect 200-of-200 on PATs, helping Georgia hold the longest such streak in the country for quite some time. Blankenship was named to the SEC All-Freshman team in 2016 as selected by the league’s head coaches. He hit a career-long 55-yard field just before halftime of Georgia’s Rose Bowl win over Oklahoma in the College Football Playoffs, a play that helped turn the tide for the Bulldogs in route to victory. He was named to the All-SEC Second-Team by both the media and coaches in 2018, and in 2019, he was recognized as the top kicker in the country with the Lou Groza Award, also earning All-SEC and All-American honors in the process.
Cardinals kicker Matt Prater is nursing a hip injury ahead of Arizona’s Thursday Night Football matchup against the New Orleans Saints. The Cardinals have said that if Prater can’t go, Blankenship will be activated for the game. Blankenship has previously worked out for the Cardinals and didn’t get the call back as the team opted to sign Matt Ammendola instead. Ammendola missed a game-tying field goal against the Eagles and an extra point this past weekend in Seattle resulting in his release. Blankenship also worked out for the Jacksonville Jaguars before getting the call by the Cardinals following his departure from the Colts.
