The art of kicking
Clutch kicker Logan O'Connor is a valuable weapon in Eastern's arsenal this season
Darren Zancan
Issue date: 9/17/09 Section: Sports
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Facing a fourth down, he called on kicker Logan O'Connor to come in and attempt a 31-yard field goal. In front of 35,000 screaming Hoosier fans hoping for a block or miss, O'Connor trotted onto the field and lined up the kick.
The football was snapped, the placeholder spinning it into place. And as the roar from the crowd suddenly stills to a hush, O'Connor lets it go, the ball arching through the air, taking every eye in the stands with it.
This is the life of Eastern's kicker and punter Logan O'Connor. It's his job, often during the games most intense moments, to come in and save the game. In that way, kickers are like closers in baseball. When the game is on the line, coaches have to have enough confidence to put the game in one person's hands, or in this case, on his foot.
"You're miserable if you do not have a good kicker," Coach Hood said. "It's that simple. Having a good kicker is a serious weapon. Bottom line, we need someone to get us points."
O'Connor never played a single down of organized football until the eighth grade. His brother, Ian, was the kicker for Halls High School in Knoxville, Tenn. If one brother could kick, then the other brother could kick, or at least that was the thought of their high school coach.
Once Ian graduated, it was time for O'Conner, the soccer star, to become a football kicker. After four years as a varsity starter for his high school team, O'Conner was ranked seventh, out of thousands of players, on Prokicker.com as a specialist. He had the choice to play at University of Tennessee as a preferred walk-on, at Marshall and at several other schools. But instead, he picked Eastern.
"What brought me here was the kicking coach (J.B. Gibbony)," O'Connor said. "To actually have a kicking coach that would work with me on every facet of my game, that really helped make up my mind."
O'Connor is not just a field-goal kicker. He handles kick-offs and punts as well. All three require different approaches and different styles of kicking. Field goal kicking relies heavily on the placeholder lining up the ball for the kicker, while a punt requires a level snap and a completely different sweeping motion with the foot.
In the sports world kickers get a reputation of "not being a real football player." Somehow that myth still continues to this day.
"Kickers get ridiculed," Hood said. "The thing is, we put our guys through a tackling circuit, including Logan. It's a myth that they cannot tackle. They learn how to get themselves into position to make the tackle if need be."
These lessons have not been lost on Logan: In his freshman season, he made six tackles on kickoffs.
Still Logan acknowledges the life of a kicker offers the best of both worlds. He gets to suit-up and hit the field each week, but also gets to sidestep some of the punishment that the rest of the players are subjected to, week in and week out.
"I feel like I am one of the guy's everybody is jealous of," O'Connor said. "Sure I get the kicker jokes, but I am living the life. I do not get beat up every day."
Even though there's a chance he'll play only a few downs during a game, he still has routines and superstitions he follows religiously before every game.
On game day, he only drinks water because Gatorade gives him a sugar rush making him crash right before games. On the morning before a game, he usually has some sort of a meeting, film review or break down of practices involved. Lunch is served and then it's time to break out the iPod.
Early on game day morning, his musical selection is James Taylor and Jack Johnson. Before kickoff, out comes Metallica and Shinedown, the music he says that gets his heart racing and the adrenaline flowing.
He puts on his pads a certain way every game, every practice, no matter what.
He wears the same socks used in practice on game days, clean of course, and has continued to do so since freshman year of high school.
Once the shoes are on and laced up, it's game time.
"Sometimes it's a blur," O'Connor said. "Everything is in the moment. You have to rely on everything you do at practice and let everything else come natural."
What many common football fans do not realize are the steps involved in just one field goal attempt.
The holder makes the call; kicker checks the target, then nods his head; holder yells out, then signals; the snapper snaps; the hand marker moves as the kicker starts his motion; the holder handles the snap, places the ball on the spot, then kicker plants and follows through, and it all happens in less than one and a half seconds.
"There is a lot of pressure on me," O'Connor said. "The good thing is if I mess up I know how to fix it. My old coach once told me, 'You're only as good as your next kick.'"
Coach Hood and special teams coach Dane Damron said they see something special in O'Connor.
"Logan is a great kid," Damron said. "He is very sincere and is extremely hard working. He is a tremendous asset to our football program and to this university. He has been through the wars and has the experience we need to help us be a better team."
O'Connor, an art major, will finish out his last two seasons here at Eastern and plans on becoming an art teacher, that is if he's not kicking for a team in the pros.
"I'd love to kick in the NFL," O'Connor said. "But I have a long way to go. The thing is I do not want to look back and say I did not give it a try."
With the crowd on the edge of their seats, the ball at the Indiana game dropped through the uprights, narrowing the scoring gap to a touchdown. Eastern was back in the game.
It was just another day in the life of a kicker.
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