Super Bowl could come down to a swing of the leg
Super Bowl could come down to a swing of the leg

By Berry Tramel

Published: February 3, 2008

GLENDALE, Ariz. — Lawrence Tynes made the Letterman Show 11 days ago. You know why he was there. The 47-yard overtime field goal that beat the Packers in the NFC title game.

But here's the kicker. Tynes surely would have been invited by David Letterman even with a miss that frozen night on Lambeau Field, and the New York Giants had not made the Super Bowl.

Two years ago in the playoffs, Mike Vanderjagt shanked a 46-yard field-goal try that would have sent his Indianapolis Colts into overtime against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Vanderjagt became a Colt pariah but landed a guest spot on Letterman.

That's what happens so often in football and occasionally in Super Bowls, maybe even tonight, when the Giants and Patriots decide NFL supremacy in this Phoenix suburb.

After barbarians and behemoths plunder and pillage for 59 minutes and someodd seconds, cracking skulls and breaking bones, a little guy better suited for soccer trots onto the field and steps into a spotlight, like a soloist on the Broadway stage, and decides the game.

Goat or hero. No in between.

It's pressure unlike anything else in sports. Not the batter's box with two out in the ninth. Not the foul line in the final seconds. Not the 18th green with a putt for par.

The baseball player and basketball player are asked to do a myriad other things in a ballgame. The golfer has no teammates.

Not so the kicker, who has only one job, make the kick, and the hopes of all those linebackers and tight ends ride on the foot of he who wouldn't last one play in the middle of a scrum.

"There's no doubt, kickers feel that pressure,” said Patriots special-teams coach Brad Seely, who tutored two-time Super Bowl hero Adam Vinatieri. "A lot of people counting on 'em. Players, family, thousands of fans. But that's what they do. That's what they deal with.”

Kickers deal with it well, else they would never make it this far. Would never be placed on this stage.

Tynes being the perfect example. At Green Bay, he missed two shorter kicks down the fourth-quarter stretch yet remained unflappable. In fact, when the Giants faced fourth down in overtime, Tynes didn't even wait for the field-goal unit to be called. He marched onto the field without orders.

"I don't get nervous,” Tynes said. "This is what I do for a living.”

Not nervous? Maybe. But don't mistake that for no pressure. The pressure is severe.

Uwe von Schamann, who kicked at OU then kicked on two Miami Dolphin Super Bowl teams, said playoff-game pressure bears little difference from the regular season. "But when you get to the Super Bowl, you definitely can feel the pressure,” von Schamann said. "The Super Bowl is when everything counts.”

Von Schamann never missed a Super Bowl kick, going 4-for-4 on field goals, though Miami lost both games.

"The ultimate kick would be to win the Super Bowl,” von Schamann said. "I wanted to be in those situations. That's it. What else? After that, you gotta feel pretty good about your game and the rest of your career.”

If you make it.

Kickers' great martyr is Scott Norwood, the Buffalo Bill who missed a 47-yard field-goal attempt on the final play of Super Bowl 25, allowing the Giants to survive 20-19. Norwood was a fine kicker whose career has been reduced to one swing of the leg, whose name has been reduced to a synonym for failure.

"He probably still thinks about that, to this day,” von Schamann said. "They're always going to associate that with him missing. That would be hard to live with.”

Norwood has a defender in Tynes, who in January 1991 was a 12-year-old just barely across the pond from his native Scotland. But Tynes knows all about Norwood.

"You guys crucified him,” Tynes told Super Bowl media a few days ago. "He missed a 47-yarder on grass. He never made one that far on grass. I don't know if you knew that, but I know it.

"It's unfortunate. No one wants to be on that side of the story. But if you are, you deal with it.”

That's what kickers need. Strong legs and thick skin.

"It gets down to the tail end, there's a lot of pressure,” said Don Chandler, the kicker on three Green Bay title teams in the 1960s, who now lives in Broken Arrow. "That's probably what separates the good from the not-so-good. Not really anything like it, coming out there two points behind. It can be real tense.

"I've been there. It's a tough deal. Miss the first one, the second one's tougher. Miss that one, the next one's really tough.”

Here's how Tynes dealt with it. Strong leg, thick skin and selective hearing.

Fox cameras caught Giants coach Tom Coughlin reaming out Tynes as he trotted off the field from his second miss in Green Bay. "I never hear what he's saying,” Tynes told Letterman. "I just don't know what he's saying.”

A common football belief is to treat kickers gingerly. Don't accost after a miss. Don't upset their psyche. Leave them alone. Leave them on that island. Seely, a 19-year NFL special-teams coach, said he doesn't yell at kickers and was surprised to see Coughlin blow a gasket.

But von Schamann said it happens all the time. He said Don Shula, with more wins than any coach in NFL history, once bounced him after an exhibition game miss.

"He jumped all over me, I jumped all over me,” von Schamann said.

In Green Bay, Tynes moved on. And now the Super Bowl arrives, with multiplied pressure and the sun's zenith on every kick. If the Giants hang tough and take New England into the fourth quarter, this game, this championship, could come down to the foot of Tynes or Patriot Stephen Gostkowski.

Tynes says he hopes it comes down to him. Hopes this Super Bowl is determined by a last-second Giant field goal.

"Everyone wants to be the Adam Vinatieri,” Tynes said. "He's the Brett Favre, the Tom Brady of what we do.”

Tynes now has spent a fortnight in the spotlight. The Letterman Show. Surrounded at Super Bowl media day. A New York folk hero. Tynes says he's enjoyed it.

"I don't know when another opportunity like that is going to happen,” Tynes said. "I'll take it to my grave with me.”

So will Scott Norwood.

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