Opinion: Cockroft never changed his straight-forward approach

In 1967, Don Cockroft saw the future of field goal kicking. You might say he didn't embrace tomorrow.

For decades, American men had taken a straight-forward approach to kicking a football. Literally. These men stepped straight into the ball and smacked it with their toe.

Pete Gogolak, raised in Budapest, Hungary, brought the sideways approach to kicking the ball. He hit the ball with his instep and arch. And he sent it flying a long way.

Cockroft was a rookie placekicker for the Cleveland Browns in 1967. He stood 6-foot-2 and weighed 195 pounds. He had played middle linebacker and quarterback at Fountain-Fort Carson High School and strong safety at Adams State.

He was a genuine football player. Cockroft, who lives in Canton, Ohio, has returned to Colorado Springs for Saturday night's Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference 100th anniversary dinner. He was named to the RMAC's all-time team.

Today, Cockroft is remembered as one of the last of the old-fashioned kickers, but in 1967 his style remained the established norm while Gogolak represented the bizarre new wave.

"They were flaky kickers," Cockroft said. "They were weird. I'm sorry, but I always considered myself an athlete and these guys were, like, funny.

"I kept asking myself, ‘What are these weird, wimpy dudes doing kicking the ball?' They didn't even know what football was. They were coming to the ball from the side. They were strange. They were just these little guys."

Garo Yepremian was another of the pioneers. He gained fame as a kicker for the Miami Dolphins, but in 1967 was trying - and failing - to find his way with the Detroit Lions.

Late in a Lions loss - some things never change - Yepremian trotted out to kick a meaningless extra point. He made the kick and started shouting and dancing with joy.

"What are you doing?" asked Hall of Fame lineman Alex Karras, Yepremian's bewildered teammate. (You might remember Karras' magnificent, Oscar-worthy performance as Mongo in "Blazing Saddles.")

"I keek a touchdown," said Yepremian, a native of Cyprus who might have stood 5-6.

Following the season, Lions coach Joe Schmidt cut Yepremian. Schmidt was an old-fashioned football tough guy. Soccer-style kicking, he gruffly announced, was just a fad.

Yet Cockroft could sense Schmidt was wrong. He didn't want to admit it, but he knew soccer-style kickers would revolutionize football.

Soccer-style kickers, Cockroft said, were blessed with a more panoramic view of the field.

"The door was open for them," Cockroft said. "For us, it was partially shut."

The new style offered more power and accuracy. Cockcroft could see his brand of kickers would become extinct.

Still, he enjoyed a long ride. He kicked 216 field goals, punted for a 40-yard average and even completed three passes in a career that stretched to 1980.

Americans eventually embraced the soccer-style revolution and banished the foreign influence. The first wave of newfangled kickers came from across the globe. They were, in the words of Stefan Fatsis, "tiny, foreign and eccentric."

The freshest wave comes from the United States. According to a 2008 Sports Illustrated survey, 33 of 37 placekickers on NFL rosters were natives of the U.S. and 36 of 37 attended high school in the U.S. The average weight of the kickers was 204 pounds.
It's been nearly 25 years since the retirement of the Redskins' Mark Moseley, last of the straight-on kickers.

Cockroft laughs when he remembers his first look at a soccer-style kicker.

"It was something out of my nightmares," he said, his laughter rising. "Something from the worst of my dreams."