I know, I know: it’s the wrong time of year.
Nevertheless, the thread on square-toed shoes got me thinking about Lou Groza (who wore one square-toed shoe: on his kicking (right) foot), and that got me to thinking about soccer-style place kickers, which brought to mind this trivia question:
Who was the first soccer-style placekicker in professional (American) football?
No, you’re not allowed to look it up.
(By the way, I thought that I knew the answer, so I looked up that player. It turns out that I was wrong: he was second.)
No clue
Edit: Looked it up and have never even heard of him.
That goalie who kicked for the Jets? I forgot his name.
Garo Yapremian. Maybe Jan Stenerud. But if guys above have never heard of him, I am probably wrong.
I remember when the specialized kickers first started showing up (rembmeber, guys like Jerry Kramer used to do the kicking), my dad would bitch and moan “That guy is not a football player!” And nothing would piss him off more than a “sidewinder” as he used to call them, would kick a 50 yard field goal to beat his Packers.
^I thought about both of those, and also thought about Tom Dempsey. But he only had half a foot, so he couldn’t be it.
Jan Stenerud was my original guess; he was second.
Yepremian was third at best. Another good kicker, but a lousy passer.
^Garo Yepremian. Like Bill Buckner and Leon Lett, he had a great career.
Some probably useless hints:
He started with the Bills, who were then in the AFL, and then signed with the NY Giants
He also had a younger brother kick in the NFL (Washington and Boston)
He is still the all-time leading scorer for the Giants