He Missed It

“He missed it.”

The words almost simultaneously spilled from three sets of lips, just as Mike Vanderjagt’s field goal attempt sliced wide, thus eliminating the juggernaut Indianapolis Colts from Super Bowl contention.
Tony Dungy mumbled them glassy-eyed, in quiet disbelief. Bill Cowher exclaimed them comically, in not-so-quiet euphoria. And Peyton Manning forced them through a frustrated smile, as if to say, “Do I have to do everything myself?”

And all they’ll remember is “wide right.”

Scott Norwood knows that and soon so will Vanderjagt, at which point he’ll join an elite club of kickers with great careers and terrible misses that includes not only Norwood, but fabled names like Gary Anderson and lest we forget, Ray Finkel.

It’s a shame, really, because the Colts kicker, in addition to being the most accurate ever has never given Indianapolis fans any reason whatsoever not to trust him.

But none of that matters, because his miss marked the last memory of a year that belonged to Peyton Manning and company, one in which the Colts won 13 straight games only to have coach Dungy dub it a “failure.” In fact it was a failure, and that fact’s got a lot more staying power.

There it sat, the Lombardi Trophy just weeks away, the team rested and the Patriots booking tee times. Nothing, not even a kicker from Oakville, Ontario could stop the electrifying Colts. Well they got stopped, but a Canadian on special teams wasn’t the reason why, or at least not the only one.

I’d like to propose that maybe the Colts just weren’t that good. They turned the ball over and missed tackles with reckless abandon and all without playing hard in a month. And don’t blame it on the downtime. Too rested is like too rich, it’s an ideal and nobody ever thinks they’re either.

As well as the Colts played all season, they’re in a marshmallow division and have enough talent to bail them out most times. But as good as Manning is, maybe he’s just not that good. Maybe he can’t win in the playoffs, or maybe as he suggested, his offensive line should take the blame for their “protection problems.”

Or maybe they just lost. It doesn’t matter how good you are, it happens sometimes.
For all the games Indy won, the Patriots and Steelers also won their share. They didn’t necessarily look as pretty, but pretty doesn’t put rings on fingers, at least not in sports.

“He” missed it, but everybody made mistakes. The interception that wasn’t, which apparently slipped out of Troy Polamalu’s hands and later took the form of a Colts touchdown would’ve made anything Vanderjagt did from that point on completely academic.

The ending would’ve been the same, the goat different. It’s just another example of how fickle fate can be. Outside of being perfect, you’re destined to be remembered by the last impression you made. And as Norwood, Finkel, Anderson and now Vanderjagt know, football is a capricious business that like a unfaithful lover is there one minute, gone the next.

Future kickers of the world pay attention. Whenever your foot makes contact, everything can change in an instant. Blink, and you’ll miss it.