Early in his 10th NFL season, Ravens kicker Matt Stover was struggling, and a rookie head coach named Brian Billick was looking to make an example out of him.
By the end of September, the Ravens were auditioning possible replacements for Stover. On October 6, 1999, they claimed a young, left-footed gun named Joe Nedney off waivers, in an effort to turn up the heat on Stover.
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Billick, Nedney and everyone else is still waiting for Stover to falter.
In case you just woke up from a stupor brought on by that 9-7 snoozer of a win on Sunday in San Francisco, Stover nailed three field goals to account for all of the Ravens? points ? now there?s a trip down memory lane. The highlight was the 49-yarder he drilled down the middle in the third quarter that put his team ahead, 9-0.
The symbolism of his performance was beautiful. It came at the expense of Nedney, who is now with the 49ers ? his eighth team in 11 seasons. Nedney had another chance to overtake Stover, this time with 2:37 left and San Francisco trying to take a 10-9 lead. But Nedney?s 52-yard field-goal attempt hooked wide right.
Eight years have passed since Nedney showed up in Owings Mills to put pressure on the veteran. Nothing has changed. Nedney was cut after spending five weeks on Baltimore?s inactive list in 1999, and still can?t catch the man who has gone on to become one of the top kickers in league history.
Where would Billick be without the unflappable, 39-year-old from Dallas? Probably coaching somewhere else at best. After so many years of presiding over offenses that have sufferedstage fright in the red zone, Billick has become quite accustomed to clinging to the lifeline wearing No. 3.
At this point, there should be a Stover slush fund attached to Billick?s portfolio. It?s the least the coach could do for leaning so much on a 5-foot-11, 178-pound man fast approaching middle age.
Stover, the team?s only holdover from its days in Cleveland prior to moving to Baltimore in 1996, made just over 75 percent of his field-goal attempts during the Ravens? first three seasons.
But since he started the 1999 season by making just 10-of-15 attempts, Stover has kicked at an elite level after giving Nedney the boot.
He finished 1999 by making 18 straight field goals, then carried a moribund offense through the dark times that ultimately led to a Super Bowl crown in 2000. The Ravens went through an infamous, midseason, five-game stretch without an offensive touchdown, but went 2-3 during that slide because of Stover.
Stover is now the one we take for granted. He has never missed a game due to injury as a Raven, has not missed one since spending his rookie year on injured reserve with the Giants in 1990.
Dating to 1999, Stover has never made less than 84 percent of his field-goal attempts in a season. Along the way, he has set the NFL record for most consecutive field goals made (38), has scored at least 100 points in every season but one, has always been there to score when so many quarterbacks have failed to make it happen.
Stover entered this season as the second-most accurate kicker in NFL history. Sixteen days ago, he averted a fourth-quarter collapse by beating Arizona on a last-second, 46-yard field goal. Then, one week after missing twice ? what, he?s human ? in a 27-13 loss at Cleveland, Stover came up big yet again.
How fitting it all was. On a day when injuries reduced the offensive line to a cast of rookies and near-rookies, on a daywhen the offense and defense resembled so many Billick teams of the past, there he was, the same old Stover. He ranks second in the NFL with 46 points.
It seems like a lifetime ago when Billick flirted with the idea of running Stover out of town. It doesn?t seem like a stretch to say the kicker might end up outlasting the coach.
Gary Lambrecht writes about the NFL, Major League Baseball and college sports.
