Fireworks In Arlington: Why the Green Bay Packers won
By Kenn Korb
Clutch Crosby
Who ever would have seen this as a possibility way back during this man’s struggles in 2012?
Back then, Crosby missed 12 different field goals on his way to by far the worst kick percentage of his career (63.6%). The biggest part of that? His failure on long kicks (he went 2/9 on 50+ yard attempts that season).
Since that year, Crosby has proven time and again that the Packers were smart to stick with him through his struggles. To date, I haven’t ever seen a better performance out of him (and there are plenty to choose from); in fact, this may be the most clutch performance by a kicker, ever.
Grouped together these were historically impressive, but each was outstanding on its own merits as well.
His first kick was from 56 yards out to give the Packers a short-lived 31-28 lead. That kick was the third-longest ever converted in postseason history and tied for third-longest of his career.
The second kick was not quite as long — “just” 51 yards this time — but the situation was even more dramatic.
Three seconds remained after the enormous completion between Rodgers and Cook moved the ball 36 yards to even give Crosby the shot; a miss here would leave the Packers at risk of yet another overtime heartbreak.
He wouldn’t miss, but he did have to kick it twice; the annoying (and ultimately pointless, both in this particular instance and statistically overall regarding this sort of situation) decision by Jason Garrett to ice Crosby made sure fans and players alike would have to sit with their hearts in their throats to wait out another long kick.
Somehow even more dramatically this time, with the hopes of an entire organization on his leg yet again, he booted the ball through the uprights again (barely, but still through).
That kick not only gave the Packers the win, but added to some increasingly remarkable milestones and records reached by Crosby.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Crosby is the first kicker ever to make two 50+ yard field goals in the final two minutes of a playoff game.
If that seems surprising, so will this: it was the first time in his career Crosby had ever accomplished the feat of making two 50+ yarders at all (prior to this he’d been 0-2 on 50+ yard attempts in his career), much less in the same game or in such a clutch situation.
With these kicks added to his repertoire, Crosby reached 26-28 on postseason field goal attempts in his career — including an NFL record 23 straight postseason conversions (second place is David Akers with 19).
If things work out as hoped this coming weekend, he’ll likely continue adding to these impressive totals.