On September 13, 1987, Steve Cox made a 40 yard field goal. It was slightly unusual, in that Cox was primarily a punter. On occasion however, he would handle longer field goal attempts - 15 throughout his 8 year career. But that is not why we remember that particular kick.
Throughout history, humankind has demonstrated the ability to learn, adapt, and change. But change is not always easy - especially fundamental shifts. Some individuals will cling to the old ways, despite the inevitable change sweeping passed them. Some will complain until the bitter end.
Ed Agner recollects on the personal impact of one such fundamental change in the kicking game:
"It happened every time. I knew the routine and the dialogue by heart. I could even see it coming most of the time too. The kicker would line up, I'd get a queasy feeling in my stomach and think of ways to steal the remote and change the channel before the side-winding kicker sent a ball sailing wide right or left and Dad launched into his diatribe about the evils of soccer-style kickers. It didn't matter how many times the advantages of kicking soccer-style was explained, my Dad hated soccer-style kickers with a passion usually reserved for hippies, lawyers, politicians, the IRS and door-to-door salesmen. Dad wanted (and still wants, actually) a world where ALL kickers looked like mechanics or shady used-car salesmen, kicked straight-on and played a REAL position too. Or two out of three of those at least - with kicking straight-on being mandatory. In the NFL after George Blanda, Don Cockroft, Tom Dempsey and Jim Turner were put out to pasture, Mark Moseley was the closest thing to a King to my Dad - which was odd given Dad's Cowboy fandom but..."
Criticism of the new soccer style kickers was certainly not limited to fans. The soon-to-be-extinct straight ahead kickers had less than favorable things to say. The aforementioned Don Cockroft commented:
"They were flaky kickers. They were weird. I'm sorry, but I always considered myself an athlete and these guys were, like, funny.... I kept asking myself, ‘What are these weird, wimpy dudes doing kicking the ball?' They didn't even know what football was. They were coming to the ball from the side. They were strange. They were just these little guys."
The straight ahead kickers came to the brink of extinction in 1986, when Mark Moseley retired. He was the last full-time straight-on kicker in the league. The honors for the final straight kick however belonged to a part-timer. In the latter years of Moseley's career, the Washington Redskins began letting the strong-legged punter handle long field goal attempts. Steve Cox's 40 yarder is now a trivia question answer. Of course he could lose that distinction if there is ever a straight-ahead revival, something that ten years ago Moseley suggested is within the realm of possibility:
"There's no reason a straight-ahead kicker, if he kicked that way, and put the time in as these other guys, couldn't do it. My son kicked straight ahead in high school, and was very good. He could have kicked in college. He decided not to, but there's no reason he couldn't have gone on.... It's a sign of the times. I was the last one so there's nobody else out there for kids to see kick that way. Now, the coach goes over to the soccer team, and recruits his placekicker. Then they go and get coached in that style, and that's how it's done....
The problem is you can't find a square-toed shoe anymore. No one makes a square-toed shoe."
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Actually, you can find straight-on kicking shoes at http://prokicker.com/catalog/products-c-34_51.html And the real reason straight-on kicking has largely died out is because no one who tried it knew much about sports psychology; and therefore, no one could consistently swing his leg straight through the middle of the football (that's all there is to it) and consistently kick a ball straight. Consequently, the top straight-on NFL kickers of all-time had a career field-goal percentage near 66%; whereas top soccer-style NFL kickers are at around 86% for career percentage. That's quite a difference, but I'd venture to say that a straight-on kicker could easily top that if he was truly knowledgeable in sports psychology.
ReplyDeleteFootball is a game of trends, as life is. It is interesting to follow trends. Coaches just adapt. Many pick up what is trendy. Kicking is particularly interesting. Coaches, including entire staffs at HS, college and pros, are ignorant about kicking. The kicking school industry, a for profit grouping, rank their own students and peddle them to colleges through rankings. The quality criteria (try hang time)really don't match the reality of scoring and field positions (but it is easy for ranking). But coaches don't know and just go with the flow. The two elements of kicking are focus and technique. Players are benched for the season because a simple ten minute correction is not seen by coaches because they don't know kicking.
ReplyDelete"Straight-on" versus "side winder" "angle", or "soccer style" kickers is the perfect example of trend football and coaching ignorance. Also, most coaches weren't interested in kickers (if the coaches were even around)and so don't remember straight-on kicking. What is gone and not remembered can't be any good. Ask all the posters who have lots of opinions and no facts on comparison. Facts and not stats are needed. Football surfaces, climates, equipment, and players are different today. The urban legends are set in stone by people who only read and repeat posts.
It is time for straight-on kickers to compete under the same conditions head-on with angle kickers. How interesting that will be. How many coaches will buck the trend.? None, until the trend is changed and then they'll have a problem in deciding what to do.
There's definitely more to kicking straight-on than just swinging your leg straight through (as most of the greats could actually do that), though that is, without a doubt, an absolutely essential aspect of precise, accurate straight-on kicking. And I do concur that sports psychology is also important, as is psychology. Though, if you also have an understanding of philosophy, you'll be far ahead of the pack. In my mind, straight-on kicking is not dead, it's the future of kicking; because that form, when done correctly, produces an absolutely straight kick every time. And it's actually more difficult to get that kind of ultra-precise accuracy with soccer-style kicking. But soccer-style kicking does require significantly less knowledge (to be accurate and consistent) than does straight-on kicking, which is why soccer-kicking has risen to prominence: virtually anyone without a PhD could do it. But mark my words, straight-on kicking is the future of precision kicking.
ReplyDeleteIt will have to start at the D1 level in college. They set all the trends and once they are set in their ways it is almost impossible to change their mindset. It almost happened early this century when a straight ahead kicker from Mt. Carmel HS in Chicago got a full ride to Florida; but he did kickoffs only-he never attempted a field goal or PAT.
ReplyDeleteZenon Andrusyshyn from UCLA was one of the last, great examples of the art imo. Played for the Argos, Ti-Cats, Eskimos and Alouettes in the CFL, the Chiefs in the NFL and the Bandits in the USFL. His stats come out at just under 60% for FGs, long of 57yds.
ReplyDeleteI remember a guy playing pre-season for the Rams - played in the London game, though the Rams went with Mike Lansford when they really needed the kick! Sorry buddy, can't remember your name. Just round about the time they got rid of the 1" tee in college, so whether that had an effect, who knows.
Speaking as a kicker who's played around with the technique in the past, one of the main issues with it is that the holder needs to be absolutely spot on with his hold, as if it is even slightly off, the kicker finds it extremely difficult to adjust to the bad placement, compared to a sidewinder.
However, I don't see any reason why it couldn't make a comeback. If a guy is kicking every fg and pat asked of him, what coach is going to turn his nose up at that?
The new(ish) American Wedge style of kicking utilises a lot of the base principles associated with straight-on kicking (full leg-lock on contact etc) compared to the old(er) pure soccer-style of sidewinder.
Oh - and if anyone fancies giving it a go, Wizardkicking.com do a shoe in a lovely shade of funereal black. ;)
From my understanding, the reason soccer-style kicking has dominated the scene is because it is more prone to success with the way the rules are set in today's game. Allow me to explain:
ReplyDelete"Straight-On" kicking increases potential distance because it utilizes more of the quadriceps- which is the strongest muscle in the leg- and increases the amount of weight in the foot behind the ball (more simply, you can get your entire foot behind the ball which creates more potential energy through the ball). However, even with a square-toe shoe, the amount of surface area that makes contact with the football is significantly less than "soccer-style" which dramatically affects accuracy. Being able to control the direction of the football is a direct result of how much surface area of the foot contacts the football. The same reasoning is behind the over-sized head drivers in golf: would you rather use a driver that can hit the ball 300 yards and has much more control of the flight path of the ball or use a driver that can hit the ball 350 yards but provides little control over the flight path? Much the same, "soccer-style" kicking may sacrifice the potential distance of a kick but it provides a style that is more prone to accuracy.
Now, to answer my thesis: the reason "soccer-style" is better fit for the rules is because it has generally and historically proven to be more accurate. With a missed field goal now coming back to the spot of the miss (its been a few decades since this rule was changed), a coach needs to feel more sure of success. Back when the rules treated a missed FG like a punt, coaches were much more likely to allow longer field goal attempts because a miss had much less impact on field position. Therefore, a "straight-on" kicker could be considered just as much of a weapon.
Actually, Steve Cox made a 60 yard field goal!
Delete'' "Straight-On" kicking increases potential distance because it utilizes more of the quadriceps- which is the strongest muscle in the leg- and increases the amount of weight in the foot behind the ball (more simply, you can get your entire foot behind the ball which creates more potential energy through the ball).''
DeleteThis may at first seem true, however sidewinders also bring into play the core body muscles and this helps generate much greater torque into the 2nd ''drive'' step on top of the power generated by the quad.
Look at the foot-speed at point of impact and I think you will find it is much greater in the sidewinder/American Wedge style...in fact, this is one of the main points of thinking behind the original American Wedge, which was to incorporate the best features of both straight ahead and earlier soccer styles.
I considered that very point awhile, but I decided that it was moot, and here's why: while the torque created from the rotation of the core transitioned into the hips is a great indicator of leg speed and its a multi-lateral torque that compounds (increases) the amount of energy created, the hips can also create unilateral torque with the "straight-on" style. Basically, instead of snapping the hips to the side with soccer style, the hips in "straight-on" are rotated upward, much like a punt. As a result, the combination of the amount of energy created between leg speed and weight of the lever (foot) in each style are varied individually but combined they are roughly equal. And on this premise, I deduced the greater incorporation of the quad as the deciding variable between the two.
DeleteAll this being said, I think we basically agree on the main point of the discussion. Additionally, I don't have access to a human performace lab to test out my theory so I don't have any historical data to support it, but I believe my statements follow the logic well enough to hold some weight.
Yes, it would be extremely interesting to have a true scientific study done. I used to have access to such facilities but alas, no longer.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree that I am going mostly on personal experience. When I try both styles side-by-side, it simply feels like there is more power there in the sidewinder style. However, this could obviously be explained by the fact that that is my usual style and the muscles used for that are more developed.
It seems to me, that if a kicker was to make a breakthrough, it would be someone who had started out as a punter, so the kicking motion would not have to be altered that much.
Interestingly, you can find Colts' punter Pat Mcafee booming FGs of 65, 70 and 75 yard field goals during a training session on YouTube, where he is clearly capable of making 80 - 85yds. However, he is using a sidewinder style to do it...would he be as successful if he'd transferred the punting style into kicking straight on?
It should be noted that the reason he didn't, is probably due to the fact that he was also a soccer player at West Virginia.
It is also true that most of today's punters don't kick with the same technique as back in the 70's and 80's, as they actually stride out at an angle to the kicking leg side nowadays and not dead straight as they were taught then. Almost a very narrow-angled approach soccer style (there's that American Wedge again!).
Actually, there is an ESPN "Inside a Moment of Time" video out there that does use science to compare the issues mentioned above (which revealed that foot-speed at the point of impact favors soccer style kicking as does the surface area issue) in comparison of Tom Dempsey and Jason Elam's 63-yard field goals.
ReplyDeleteFrom a distance perspective, if you watch some of the Youtube videos from past games, you'll see that past straight-on kickers such as Mark Moseley and Tom Dempsey could kick long-distance field goals (i.e., they were just as able to kick the ball as high as the uprights from 40+ yards out and as far as today's kickers). Though, no doubt, if you're 5'9" 170 lbs, you're going to want to kick soccer style. Whereas, if you're 6'4" 240lbs, you could probably get away with the straight-on form.
But straight-on kicking started to die out when NFL rules moved the goal posts back 10 yards in 1974, and those 30+ yard field goal attempts were suddenly 40+ yard attempts; and simply put, straight-on kickers couldn't consistently hit those kicks of 40-49 yards that soccer-style kickers were (around the same time frame) starting to make - with much more regularity.
In fact, after the goal posts were moved back, only a couple of straight-on kickers ever made to the NFL; with the last straight-on kicker to break in being Tom Birney, with the Packers, in 1979 (source: Wikipedia). By 1982, there was only one straight-on kicker left in the NFL (Moseley). Though there were a number of them that caught on with the USFL ('83-'85) and played until that league went under. That was 30 years ago.
But the real issue here, in my mind, is the necessity for straight-on kickers to have a much higher level of psychological awareness to consistently pull off the feat: an accurate kick. It's like any other skill, unless you can raise conscious awareness high enough to perform a particular task, just about any skill is difficult to do with consistency. And it's not just about "knowing more," a straight-on kicker must actually "do more," much more (psychologically), during the kicking process. That's really why it's so much harder to pull off on a consistent basis.
In fact, it appears to have been an insurmountable challenge for those long-gone straight-on kickers. Even Mark Moseley's MVP year ('82) was somewhat tainted with missed extra points, 1-5 FG kicking in the NFC playoffs that year, as well missed field goals in that season's Pro Bowl game. (His hot streak was very short-lived. Fortunately, that season was strike-shortened, and there were only 9 regular season games.)
And now the only role models of placekicking are all the much-easier-to-do-requiring-substantially-much-less-awareness soccer-style kickers. I don't blame 'em, but I would agree (from above) that straight-on kicking is (theoretically) a more precise skill.