The Houston Texans waived Matt Ammendola after his two miss-game, but there's more to it

The Houston Texans saw two critical kicks fail to hit their marks in Sunday's 24-21 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars. The Texans sent Matt Ammendola out twice, both from 50 yards, to try and get points on the board, but both times from 50 he missed. The second time was truly a heartbreaker, as it would've made the game tied, giving the Texans hope to get the win in overtime.

But the kick didn't go through and the Texans lost the game. Still, despite the kick missing, it was on target, it was just a 58-yard kick and those are notoriously hard to make. So while Ammendola wasn't great on Sunday, he wasn't just whiffing kicks. Not many kickers in the league can get it 58 yards, so it's fair to say that Ammendola did his best.

Ammendola has been filling in admirably for Ka'imi Fairbairn, who is the Texans starting kicker.

But that may not have been good enough, as the Texans still cut him on Monday. The news was shocking as Houston Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans even said that Ammendola would remain on the team following his far-from-perfect-outing on Sunday. So why the move? Well, it has less to do with his play and more to do with a new arrival.

As we mentioned before, the Texans landed former Eagles DE Derek Barnett off of waivers, so someone had to go to make room for Barnett. That's where Ammendola comes in. The Texans opted to waive him, knowing that he'd pass through the waiver system and that he'd be re-signed to the Texans practice squad as soon as he's free and clear too.

The Texans will likely now call up Ammendola for the next few weeks as one of their practice squad call-ups, something they could up to three times. This likely means that either Ammendola will be resigned to the main roster in due time, or the Texans feel that starting kicker Fairbairn is only three weeks out from returning.

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