In a surprise move, the Seahawks added kicking god Sebastian Janikowski to the roster today. No, that isn’t laying it on too thick.
Sebastian Janikowski cured the Seattle Seahawks kicking woes today by signing on the dotted line. By some estimates, that’s a three game improvement over 2017. I don’t agree with those estimates, but there is no shortage of 12s who say Blair Walsh cost the Seahawks three games last year. Sebastian Janikowski would not have missed all those kicks, I agree.
At least he would have made most of them if he’d actually played last year. Janikowski missed all of 2017 with back pain worse than Quasimodo’s. (The 1939 version of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” reigns supreme; accept no substitute). Until his back pulled a Tiger Woods on him, he was one of the NFL’s elite kickers well into his second decade on the field.
In 2016, Janikowski made 82 percent of his kicks. His only flaw is one that might strike a small chord of terror in the hearts of 12s. He only made three of the eight kicks he tried from the 50 or further. Now you can look at it as, “Oh my God we’re doomed!” I prefer to think of it as, “Seabass only missed once inside the 50 all year!” Russell Wilson, just get the ball to the 33.
He did miss six field goals in his last season, it’s true. He missed those six kicks in five games. The question is, how much did those missed kicks hurt his team?
Just how good (or bad) was Janikowski in 2016?
First, we’ll focus on the worst of Sebastian Janikowski. His first miss was in week two versus Atlanta. He missed his only attempt, a 58 yard kick at the end of the first half. He made all four extra points in the Raiders 35-28 loss. His miss had minimal impact on the game.
His second miss was in game five, a tough road game against the San Diego Chargers. It was a 50 yarder in the first quarter of what turned out to be a very tight game. Raider Nation probably forgave him, as he nailed a 46 yard kick as time expired in the first half. Oh, and Janikowski made three other field goals and both extra points in a 34-31 Oakland win.
The very next game he missed a 52 yard kick early in the second quarter against the Chiefs. Of course he then drilled a 46 yarder to pull Oakland within three at the end of the half. The Raiders 26-10 loss to Kansas City gets pinned on a weak offensive performance.
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Now we come to Janikowski’s only bad game, the only game in which he missed two kicks. It’s also the only game where those misses came in potential game-winning situations. Luckily for Seabass, the Raiders won anyway. (What a great nickname for a guy in Seattle). With four seconds left in a 24-all game in Tampa, he missed a 50 yard kick. Given a reprieve in overtime, he missed a 52 yarder. This time the offense pulled it out, and Oakland won 30-24 despite Janikowski’s struggles.
He didn’t exactly struggle the following week against Denver. The Polish Cannon made three of four field goals, his only miss a 48 yard attempt in – you guessed it – the second quarter. He also made all three of his extra points. The Raiders won 30-20, so I suppose you could say his 12 points were the difference in the game.
Did I mention he was a kicking god?
You could also say that was the last time he would miss a field goal. After the Denver game, Janikowski went on a tear and made all 16 of his field goal attempts. He scored nine points each in close wins over Houston and Carolina. He scored 13 in a 19-16 win over San Diego. Somehow, he missed his only two extra points of the year in the penultimate game of 2016, a 33-25 win over Indianapolis.
So in 2016 he provided the margin of victory in no less than seven games. His misses cost the Raiders exactly zero losses, although he was bailed out in the Tampa Bay game. That’s a performance the Seahawks would have loved to get from their kicker last year.
Did I mention Seabass has made 80 percent of his field goals for his career? Did I also mention that he was actually better than his career average over his last three seasons? Oh, and his career percentage for extra points is 98.9. He’s never missed more than two extra points in a season, and has twelve seasons with zero missed extra points.
I think that qualifies as a kicking god. Although I recall one of the Hulk’s best lines ever: “Puny god”. Janikowski is 40 years old, and he missed an entire season. He may not kick like he has for sixteen seasons in the NFL, but there are a lot more reasons to think he will, than he won’t. The only surprising thing about the Seahawks signing him to me was the money. When musing on free agent kickers earlier this year, I ruled Janikowski out, as I expected him to be too expensive for Seattle. There’s no word on his contract yet, but it’s certain to be significantly less than the $3.7 million average he was getting in Oakland.
Either that, or the Seahawks decided that experiments in kicking just aren’t that fun after all.