Rodrigo Blankenship gets job as Colts kicker

WESTFIELD — The Colts’ kicking competition is over.

Rodrigo Blankenship is the last man standing.

Indianapolis waived challenger Jake Verity on Thursday to make room for the team’s new punter, Matt Haack, ending the kicking competition with one practice left in training camp and one preseason game remaining.

Blankenship has simply been better in training camp, both in the raw numbers — Verity missed five more kicks than Blankenship in practices and missed an extra point in the preseason opener — and from distance.

When the Colts asked both kickers to launch four field goals from distance on Tuesday, Blankenship made 3 of 4 attempts, and Verity made just 1 of 4.

“Rod has been really consistent throughout the preseason,” special teams coordinator Bubba Ventrone said. “There hasn’t been a lot of variation on his kicks. He’s been consistent, his operation times have been pretty solid overall.”

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Blankenship, who has made 41 of 53 field goals (84.3%) in his career, has opened the last two seasons as the Colts starter, but he seemed vulnerable in this training camp given his issues from distance — he’s just 3 of 8 on field goals longer than 46 yards — and the fact that the Colts didn’t give him back the job last season after he recovered from a hip injury warming up against Baltimore.

Verity, who spent last season learning under the tutelage of Ravens kicker Justin Tucker, has an incredibly strong leg, but he struggled to be consistent with his direction. Verity missed several long kicks wide right or left.

“I think Jake has talent,” Ventrone said. “He’s explosive, and has hit a little bit lower of a percentage in practice.”

Blankenship, on the other hand, was much more accurate from long range in training camp, making all but two of his attempts from 50 yards or more.

“He’s just been more consistent overall with really the percentages that he’s been hitting, and he’s been able to hit from longer distances,” Ventrone said. “The other day we had four kicks over 50 in that end-of-game situation period that we did, and he hit 3 of 4.”

Now, the Colts need Blankenship to carry that over to the regular season.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Colts keep kicker Rodrigo Blankenship over Jake Verity