Monday, December 31, 2001
No field day for Rackers
Turf was troublesome
In terms of traction, if not temperature, it was a day at the beach for Neil Rackers. The playing surface of Paul Brown Stadium was more sand than soil, and the footing was about as firm as a fairway bunker. For a kicker, these are the times that try men's soles.
“You can't go into the ball hard like you usually do,” the Cincinnati Bengals kicker said Sunday. “You're not able to drive into the ball and get as much power. As soon as you plant, your foot starts to slip.”
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PHOTO GALLERY
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Neil Rackers hits his winning field goal.
(AP photo)
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Under slightly different circumstances, Rackers' analysis might have sounded like an alibi. Before he booted the 31-yard overtime field goal that beat Pittsburgh, 26-23, Rackers missed two short field goals and, a potential game-winning extra point.
It was the kind of day kickers dread and non-kickers can never fully comprehend, a day when conditions make every distance daunting and turn each attempt into an anxiety attack. Final redemption made Rackers' experience bearable, but it could not make it fun. His strongest emotion at the end of the long, cold afternoon was not rapture, but relief.
“It didn't feel as good as it should have,” he said. “I think at that point, I was numb to any kind of feeling whatsoever.”
Kickers live condensed lives. Their defining moments are comprised of a few seconds of excruciating gloom and exhilarating glee, and they are as subject to snap judgments as chorus candidates at a Broadway audition. The guys who last learn to accept disappointment and rejection as part of the territory.
A lot of us figured Rackers was about one more false step from being fired Sunday afternoon. Perhaps, in the end, his game-winning kick will only mean a temporary reprieve. Yet if the Bengals have stuck with him this long, despite two years of inconsistency, perhaps they have discounted some of his difficulties because of lousy field conditions.
During pregame warmups, Bengals coaches determined the footing was so treacherous that no field goals would be attempted beyond 42 yards. When the Bengals draft next spring, their top priorities should be a cornerback, a tackle and an agronomist.
“That wasn't a field,” Bengals running back Corey Dillon said. “That was dirt, straight dirt.”
“I think I fell down twice on my four kickoffs,” Steelers kicker Kris Brown said. “It's really hard as a kicker to go out there with an aggressive attitude when you are worried about slipping and falling. I am not one to make excuses, either. But that's the way it was today.”
Brown also slipped in missing a third-quarter extra point in the south end of the stadium, on roughly the same terrain where Rackers missed his PAT in the last minute of regulation.
Some teammates sought to console Rackers as he paced the sidelines. Others avoided him. Bengals coach Dick LeBeau approached Rackers before the ensuing kickoff and implored him to concentrate on his next kick instead of his last one.
“Get your mind right,” LeBeau said, “because you're going to make the kick that wins this game.”
Rackers alternately cursed and prayed, craving another opportunity in overtime, hoping his offense could get him in range but not score a touchdown that would make a kick unnecessary.
“Otherwise, I have to sit on a (missed) extra point until possibly next season,” Rackers said.
“When we got to their 40-yard line,” LeBeau said, “I went over to him and said, "Neil, when you practice your kicks in this net, I want you to see nothing but you being successful.'”
When the Bengals reached the Steelers' 13-yard line with a second-down play, LeBeau decided against trying for a touchdown, called a timeout and summoned his field-goal team. Then Pittsburgh called a timeout to give Rackers more time to consider his kick.
“I was actually thinking, "Wow, we have more time to find a better spot,' ” Rackers said.
Holder Nick Harris found a small patch of grass near the right hash mark of the 21-yard line and told Rackers a joke in an attempt to defuse the pressure. Rackers didn't hear the joke — unprintable here — until later in the locker room. He debated concocting a story that he was giggling as he made his game-winning kick, but he was not inclined to press his luck with levity.
“I apologize to the guys for leaving them cold a little longer,” he said.
E-mail tsullivan@enquirer.com. Past columns at Enquirer.com/columns/sullivan.
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SULLIVAN: No field day for Rackers