Matt Gay. Kicking on the turf of the man who could go down as the best ever to kick a football (Justin Tucker , M&T Bank Stadium), Gay had the greatest day an NFL kicker’s ever had. Four field goals of 53 yards or longer, including the winning 53-yarder in OT for the first-place Indianapolis Colts of the AFC South.
The best day a kicker ever had. This is Matt Gay’s fifth NFL season, and he’s had a nice early career. But entering Sunday, he’d been close to average (17 of 23, 74 percent) in field-goal tries from 50 and beyond. That all changed in Baltimore Sunday. He made 54-, 53-, 53-, and 53-yard field goals, all after halftime, to lead the Colts past Baltimore 22-19. Gay’s the first kicker to hit four field goals of 50 yards or more in a game, ever.
What impressed me: Under big pressure late in overtime, Gay’s last field goal was so perfect that if there’d been a stake rising straight up from the middle of the crossbar, his kick would have shtoinked it. Beautiful, straight down the middle, with plenty to spare.
“I didn’t see it,” he said from the Colts’ locker room. “I kind of just blacked out when I kicked it. I’ll go back and watch it, but if it was right down the middle, that’s pretty cool.”
Good kickers, I’ve found, don’t ever think they’ve done something momentous when they make a big kick, or even four of them. If you’re looking for great drama or great quotes, don’t go to kickers.
Gay was exactly like that post-game. A flatliner. Just did my job. Emotions don’t help kickers. “Those four kicks, honestly, didn’t feel any different,” he said. “I’m not really thinking too much about anything else. I like to have my mind free.”
Re: the record, he said: “You get your name in the record book, it’s pretty cool. It’ll probably hit me later. More than anything—the records, the numbers—I really like just being able to give my team a win after they’ve fought so hard to win an important game.” Sounds like a good guy to have on your team.
Big contract, but maybe worth that money when one considers how teams waste it on other players.