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Fans waiting to be wooed with a kick

By JOHN ROMANO
Published August 22, 2005

TAMPA - It was a night made for memories. Possibly the first moments in a burgeoning relationship. As I recall, you wore pewter and he wore red.

This was the night when time literally came to a halt. The clock read :00, but an extra second was found. And that was when he walked into your life.

Ah Matt, you could have had us at 53 yards.

That would have been the fairy tale, right? Matt Bryant kicks a 53-yard field goal after the referee adds one final second to the clock, and Tampa Bay falls in love with the squat, balding stranger from Bridge City, Texas.

Instead, Bryant pushed it a little to the right, and the role for a leading man in the kicking game remains unfilled.

It could still be Bryant. It could be Todd France. Or the Bucs might venture outside the city limits looking for castoffs in the coming weeks.

However it turns out, the suspicion is the job could have been won Saturday night. It could have been nailed down had Bryant sent the Jacksonville game into overtime.

To that moment, France and Bryant had alternated their field-goal attempts. Bryant converted his first three, and France was perfect on his first two. If they were taking turns, it should have been France's kick.

Instead, the Bucs turned to Bryant in the pressure situation. And it had nothing to do with the distance, because Bryant was also preparing for what would have been a short kick before an interception on the previous drive.

The hunch has been that the Bucs have secretly wanted Bryant to win the job. He's the one who has played parts of three seasons in the NFL. He's the one who has converted 80 percent of his 50 field-goal attempts in the league.

It is a valuable position to hand someone with no experience, and France has yet to prove himself in the NFL.

Seeing Bryant in a game-tying situation Saturday night only reinforced the perception that the job is his to lose. Even if he doesn't believe it.

"If I was thinking that way," Bryant said, "I might as well pack my bags and go home because I didn't make the kick."

A kick of that distance is not going to preclude Bryant from the job. In the past two seasons, NFL kickers have converted only 53.2 percent of field goals of 50 yards or more.

It was the pressure of the situation that was of greater concern. After two years of steadily declining faith in Martin Gramatica, coach Jon Gruden needs to find a kicker he can trust. Someone who will not just make 80 percent of his field goals, but will make the clutch kicks.

To that end, Gruden has been finding ways to unnerve Bryant and France in mock drills. He has sent them on the field with little time to prepare. He has engaged them in competition. He gave them a chance to earn an extra hour before curfew for the team if they each made a series of field goals.

Bryant was perfect on his three kicks with curfew on the line, but France missed his final attempt. Knowing what Gruden was seeking, Bryant stepped up and offered to kick a long field goal for a double-or-nothing bet. He hit a 53-yarder that earned him praise, but no extra time before curfew.

"He stepped up and made a big kick for us in practice," special teams coach Richard Bisaccia said.

"It came down to a situation (Saturday night) where he had a chance to do it again. We figured we'd give him a shot."

So, with the regular season a couple of weeks away, the Bucs appear to be no closer to naming a kicker than in the spring. And, at some point, we may wonder why they weren't more aggressive in the offseason.

They could have pursued Doug Brien, who hit 24-of-29 field goals for the Jets in 2004 and is among the 10 most accurate placekickers in NFL history. They could have chased Paul Edinger, who connected on 77.9 percent of his field goals for the Bears from 2000-03 before slumping last season. Instead Brien signed with the Bears and Edinger went to Minnesota.

And the Bucs went with France, who has been released each of the past three preseasons. And Bryant, who was cut by four teams in four months last year.

"We're looking all over the league," Gruden said. "But if you're going to make a change and bring anybody in, they're going to have to fit in underneath our salary cap. And if you look at that, it's not one that's going to allow us to go after a really expensive player at any position.

"The chances are one of these two is going to be our kicker."

Maybe it will work out. Maybe the Bucs found the best available kicker in the offseason, and that will soon be apparent.

After all, neither France, nor Bryant has done anything to make you break out in a cold sweat. They've been steady. They've been trustworthy. Their kickoffs have been decent, and their placekicks have been perfect under 50.

Following consecutive seasons at the bottom of the NFL rankings in field goals, you're willing to believe anything is possible.

You're willing, after all this time, to fall in love again.

You're just waiting for the right guy to come along.

[Last modified August 22, 2005, 01:08:08]