| | By John Clayton
ESPN.com
NAPA VALLEY, Calif. -- Sebastian Janikowski was admittedly nervous, something you wouldn't
expect from the biggest, baddest kicker in the land. He missed a 35-yard
field goal in the TWA Dome against the St. Louis Rams on Saturday. None of his four
kickoffs made the end zone.
|  | | The Raiders are hoping Sebastian Janikowski can put his legal woes behind him and focus on booting 59-yard field goals. |
Janikowski quickly learned the NFL isn't a party. And he didn't
feel good about it. "I was more nervous than I was in any college game,"
Janikowski said. "I didn't get it done my first game."
On Monday, it was back to work for Janikowski, the Raiders'
first-round pick. Practice ended in the early evening with a test. A week
ago, Janikowski was asked to make a long field goal to give players
an extra hour added to their curfew for the night.
This time, coach Jon Gruden asked Janikowski to kick a 59-yarder to end
practice. This was done for the confidence of his kicker instead of the
social life of his teammates. Janikowski
put the ball directly through the uprights. Players cheered. Janikowski felt
good about himself for the first time in days.
From his numerous arrests and incidents on the Florida State campus,
Janikowski is considered a character in sports circles. In Raiders circles,
he's a rookie. He's behaving. To make sure he understands the professional
nature of an NFL job, Gruden moved Janikowski's locker between veteran
quarterbacks Rich Gannon and Bobby Hoying.
"We're trying to surround him with as many top-flight leaders and
professional people as we can possibly can," Gruden said. "By moving his
locker, we put in the type of atmosphere befitting a professional football
player. Sebastian is a character, but he's a great kid. Maybe he's naïve in
some ways."
To meet Janikowski is to accept that he's a little shy and quiet.
Around friends he may be wild and crazy, but he speaks softy with a Polish
accent that sometimes is hard to understand unless you are listening
closely. Because he's the 17th player taken in the draft, he is watched more
closely than any other kicker in the league.
|
“ |
I'm
not trying to prove anything to anyone. I'm trying
to help the team. It was a big honor being drafted
in the first round by Oakland. As long as I do my
job, Oakland is going to win. ” |
|
|
— Sebastian Janikowski, Raiders kicker |
Reporters chart his daily field-goal accuracy. The last thing he
looks like is a kicker. At 6-foot-1 and 255 pounds, Janikowski is built like a
fullback or linebacker. "He's just a different shaped kicker," Gruden
said. "He's one of those old-school shaped kickers."
But what a powerful left leg. The thing you notice most about his
kicking is how quickly the ball elevates. Janikowski said he gets under the
ball with his shoe to lift the ball high enough so that it will never
be blocked. At Florida State, he said he used to practice five or seven feet
in front of a wall or a golf cart to get quick elevation on his
boots.
"You try to kick it that way because people are trying to jump up
and block the ball," he said.
Said Gruden: "He doesn't take a running start at it. He has a very
short, compact stroke. Most long field goals kickers kick flatter and try to
drive it through. His get-offs are as good as anyone in football. He may be
the best of all time."
Janikowski said it takes 1.26 seconds for him to get off most kicks,
but he's done it as quickly as 1.12 or 1.16 seconds. He also has a temper.
One of his morning kicks Monday sailed to the left for a miss. He spotted
another football on the ground and kicked it in anger.
Raiders kickers missed 13 of 38 field goals last season. With eight losses by a
total of 34 points and none by more than seven, the Raiders figure they
were a few field goals away from the playoffs.
To them, it was worth the first-round investment.
"I'm not trying to prove anything to anyone," Janikowski said. "I'm
trying to help the team. It was a big honor being drafted in the first round
by Oakland. As long as I do my job, Oakland is going to win."
At least he has a simple philosophy of what he does.
"I like to kick the stuff out of a football," he said.
John Clayton is the senior NFL writer for ESPN.com.
| |
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