Hey everyone, hope you all had a wonderful Christmas on Saturday! We had a white one in Nashville, but Santa didn’t bring everything I put on my list — I asked for a win in Kansas City, and it wasn’t even close! We had a two-hour delay Saturday morning to spend with our families, open gifts and celebrate Christmas Day. At 10:30 a.m., we were in meetings, watching film and reviewing our game plan. That’s just part of our season: work through the holidays and keep focused on the game at hand. Of course, this season’s been a disappointment… even after a six-game slide and sub-par season, we still had a glimmer of hope to make the playoffs by winning our final two games and getting help from the Jags and Colts by losing out. Incredibly, had that happened, not only would we have made the playoffs, but we would have won the AFC South and had a first-round home game! Problem is, we didn’t give ourselves a chance to get there — instead, we dropped another game, this one by 20 points. It wasn’t looking so good after the first drive, when the Chiefs marched 70 yards downfield to score right off the bat! It just got worse from there, and so it’s going to be an early offseason this year! I didn’t do much after the opening kickoff — in fact, I haven’t gotten to do much in the last four weeks. I only have two field goals in that time span, which is crazy when you consider I’d been averaging about two field goals a game earlier in the season. I had two extra points and an extra kickoff after we recovered a great onside kick… Unfortunately, that kick didn’t count because one of our guys was offsides. We almost got the rekick when the returner muffed his catch on the 20-yard line… but you know what they say about “almost”.
In short, Kansas City was miserable. It was cold, for starters, and we just didn’t play well. Might as well have been blizzard conditions! All I really did was sit on the bench by the heaters next to Randy Moss, trying to stay warm so I would be ready to go if my number was called. Unfortunately, it never was, except for a couple irrelevant extra points. Brett Kern stayed busy punting, and he did pretty well, especially considering the weather Mother Nature gave us… If you watched the game, you could see it was cold with a slight breeze — enough to cause the Chiefs’ Ryan Succop’s 48-yard field goal try to fall short. I had to really drive the ball in warmups to get it there from that distance. He got under his and put it up into the air, allowing the breeze to make it fall short.
So now we go to Indianapolis this Sunday and play for nothing more than pride! Maybe we can act as a spoiler against the Colts, who knows? If so, I’m sure the media will write about it this week. For us, it’s a meaningless game, but I’m going to treat it like any other and be prepared for all field goal opportunities. The dome will be a nice change of pace; as a kicker, I always like kicking indoors.
I’m also hoping I get the votes to make the Pro Bowl in Hawaii this year… I’m tired of being an alternate (which I have been the past two years) since going over to the islands in 2008. Keep your fingers crossed for me, and thanks again for all your fan votes this year!
