Idiot kicker’s fall shows value of V-2 for Colts

By Anthony Bialy  |   Sunday, June 01, 2008  |  Comments( 7 )

Indianapolis Colts
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Mike Vanderjagt got football work; unfortunately, he’ll have to spend game days booting a rugby ball 110 meters in order to score rouges against the Roughriders, or something of the sort. While it may beat inspecting bottles on the line at the Elsinore Brewery or hoping the Mounties return his cold calls regarding employment opportunities, the fact is that seeing him return to the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League is the equivalent of watching an actor sink to arguing with Vanilla Ice and Mini-Me on a VH1 reality program just to earn rent money.

Indianapolis’ former proficient yet somehow inadequate placekicker getting a job in Football North serves as a good reminder for Colts fans how much better they are now at the position: No matter what the career statistics allegedly proclaim, Adam Vinatieri’s marginally lower make rate belies the fact that he’s a much better football player than his predecessor.

To be fair, the South Dakota-born, South Dakota State-educated kicker did have a slightly off 2007: His success rate of 79.3 percent was exactly 10 points lower than in his first Colts season the year prior, as well as being below his career hit mark of 82.3 percent.

Most notably, his two misses on as many attempts at San Diego in Week 10 prevented any chance of a miraculous comeback, including a 29-yard letdown with 89 seconds left and his team down by two. Still, a single bad performance from what was an uncommonly collectively rotten night for the team isn’t sufficient cause to surrender faith; panicking and hitting on a 19 almost never improves things.

It’s not as if Vinatieri is over the placekicking hill. He’s 35, but it’s not as if he’s a running back’s 35; special teams specialists are of course different in maturing terms. For example, Morten Andersen played until he was spending most of his game checks at Old Country Buffet, and Gary Anderson’s first-hand accounts of the Battle of Verdun are cherished by historians.

When comparing the current roster spot holder with the man he replaced, it’s easiest to point out what Vinatieri doesn’t do. While it’s unfair to theorize about “could haves,” particularly in professional sports, it’s still difficult to envision, say, Vinatieri missing a game-tying kick with 17 seconds left in a postseason game as the current CFLer did in his last action as a Colt when he helped Jerome Bettis get his Hollywood ending.

Moments like that are why a player like Vanderjagt remains justly overlooked despite his career 86.5 percent rate of achievement, and it also helps people understand why his perfect 2003 is harder for fans to recall than his occasional but prominent lapses and obnoxious declarations, the latter of which were particularly egregious for someone who wasn’t exactly immersed in the game’s physical aspect. The only thing worse than trash talk is unearned trash talk.

On the other hand, Vinatieri’s dominance is not statistical but rather situational. The debate over whether the Patriots cheated their way to a dynasty wouldn’t be taking place had he not converted two tiebreaking attempts in as many Super Bowls and scored six points in a three-point win over the Eagles in the third.

He also went 14 of 15 during the Colts’ postseason run culminating in their ultimate triumph; even with one rough short miss in the midst of winning his fourth championship, he still was successful on three efforts during a game that may as well have been played in swampland.

Vince Lombardi used to remark that the one thing that kept football from being a perfect team game was the way that the quarterback is excessively crucial to success; while he was correct in that regard, it’s also true that kickers have too much impact on the sport.

A player who spends most of the game relegated to the sidelines often gets to decide the game’s fate without surviving a collision, touching the ball with his hands, or getting mud on his uniform. The importance of a single field goal try often trivializes the efforts of skill and force players; that said, it is what it is, and franchises should recognize the worth of such players and invest significant salary-cap resources in kickers who have not just glossy averages but also reputations for being as cold-blooded as a ninja bounty hunter.

Vinatieri matches that standard. Detractors can claim that he’s fading, but, if a team needed a kick made and had the choice of anyone in the league, which coach still wouldn’t pick him right now?

While the eventually clutch Giant Lawrence Tynes might receive votes, the man who will be the second kicker enshrined in the Hall of Fame would be the overwhelming choice. That would be true even if the available group included the Argos’ current kicker in his prime, a man who proved “accurate” and “money” as an adjective aren’t always synonyms.
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