MY COUCH, Ind. – It’s not just that Matt Gay kicked field goals of 53, 53, 53 and 54 yards, the winner coming on a no doubter of a 53-yarder in overtime of their shocking 22-19 overtime victory over the Baltimore Ravens, but all those kicks were absolute bombs that bisected the uprights, not a foot to the right, not a foot to the left..just down the middle.
To quote Tony Dungy, who watched Adam Vinatieri kick five field goals in the Colts’ unlikely 15-6 playoff victory at Baltimore in January 2007:
“Money.”
And Gay did the deed right there in Baltimore kicker Justin Tucker’s house, MT&T Stadium, where Tucker has established himself as the greatest placekicker of all time. But there was the Colts’ kicker, a big-dollar free agent acquisition (by kicking standards), out-dueling Tucker, who had missed a 61-yard attempt just moments earlier. In the process, he became the first kicker in history to make four 50-yard-plus kicks in a single game.
Can we go ahead and call that the greatest single-game kicking performance in NFL history?
Hell yes, we can.
Still think Chris Ballard overpaid for a kicker?
Hell, no.
