After missing the first game-winning field goal attempt of his career, 49ers kicker Jake Moody is ready to turn the page.
"I'm already focused on the next kick, wherever it might be," Moody said after 49ers practice Thursday. "A short one, a PAT, a 50-something-yard field goal. I'm just focused on the next kick at this point. That's all I can focus on."
With the 49ers' upcoming game against the Minnesota Vikings scheduled to be played inside a dome, Moody was asked if the artificial turf at U.S. Bank Stadium provides the best surface for a kicker.
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"Yeah, I would assume so," Moody told reporters. "Won't know until you get there, but as of right now, it seems like a pretty nice place to kick."
During an interview Friday morning on KNBR's "Murph and Mac Show," general manager John Lynch shared his perspective on Moody's missed game-winner and why he is as confident as ever in the 49ers' decision to invest significant draft capital into a kicker.
"That was a decision for the now, and for the future," Lynch said. "And Jake's going to be a really good player for us for a long time. We've got full confidence that he's going to respond. Now he has to go do that, and that's a tough position; it's a tough place to kick in Cleveland. But Jake would be the first to tell you he's got to finish that game, and that's his expectation that he does. We've got a lot of confidence in Jake because of what he does out here each and every day, what he has put on film, and because of his makeup.
"So we've got a lot of confidence in him, I think he can grow from this experience. Kickers miss from time to time, I know there is a spotlight on him because he is a rookie [and] where we drafted him, but we've got a lot of belief he is going to be a tremendous kicker and an asset for us moving forward."
San Francisco 49ers
Lynch was then asked if he went out of his way to chat with Moody this week while also sharing some powerful insight from one of Moody's former Michigan teammates.
"I'm always around these guys, and if they ever need me, I'm right here," Lynch said. "But you try not to make it bigger than it is. He's used to that. He kicked for Jim Harbaugh. I'm sure there was a lot of stress in that in and of itself. One of the coolest things, Ronnie Bell, came up to me on the field yesterday as we ran our field goal portion of practice and he just said 'This kid's a stud. I was around him for four years at Michigan. He's going to be just fine, he's going to be great.' So to hear it from someone whose been around him, that's our feeling anyhow, I think our whole team's got a lot of belief in him and now he's got to just go show it by being him."
Over the last five seasons, NFL kickers have made 80 percent of their field goal attempts from 41 yards.
However, all three field goal attempts in Cleveland from that distance across that span have been missed, including Moody's from last Sunday.