David Akers has been named to the Pro-Bowl five times and a first team All-Pro four time. Let's compare:
Overall:
Akers - 294/359 81.9%
Crosby - 107/137 78.1%
0-19 yards
Akers - 5/5 100%
Crosby - 4/4 100%
20-29 yards
Akers - 95/96 99%
Crosby - 36/37 97.3%
30-39 yards
Akers - 96/109 88.1%
Crosby - 31/38 81.6%
40-49 yards
Akers - 83/117 70.9%
Crosby - 26/37 70.3%
50+
Akers - 15/32 46.9%
Crosby - 10/21 47.6%
Two things jump out at me, looking at those stats:
- The difference at 30-39 yards. That seems to be Crosby's only weakness. However, his sample size is somewhat small, thus magnifying the significance of each miss. If he "fixes" that he compares favorably to a perennial Pro-Bowl/All Pro kicker.
- 21 of Crosby's 137 attempts have been from 50 or more. That's 15% of his attempts. 32 of Akers' 359 attempts have been from 50 yards or more. That's 9%. For Crosby, 1 of every 7 is from 50+. For Akers, 1 of 11. Since that is clearly where success drops significantly, kicking that frequently from that distance hurts Crosby's overall success rate a lot.
Really, we should expect this. For most of Crosby's career the Packers have been very successful scoring TDs when they get inside the red zone. As a result, Crosby has fewer chances for the most makeable FGs. Couple that with MM's willingness to try 50-55 yarders whenever possible, and you will have a fieldgoal kicker that has almost no chance to match the success rate of kickers on teams that struggle to score TDs in the red zone.