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</td><td align="left" valign="top">Mike Nugent - Kicking With Confidence
Jets second-round pick Mike Nugent is expected by the team and fans to shore up the kicking game, and he's fine with that.
Luke Sacks
NFLPLAYERS.COM
08/16/2005
</td></tr><tr><td class="smallText" colspan="2" align="left" valign="top"> Last season, a pair of missed field goal cost the New York Jets the chance to play in the Super Bowl when veteran Doug Brien missed two crucial fourth-quarter attempts in the AFC Championship Game in Pittsburgh.
Brien's 47-yard try with just over two minutes left drilled the upright and his 43-yard attempt on the final play of regulation sailed way left. The Steelers won in overtime on a successful field goal try leaving the Jets to ponder what could have been.
Hoping to avoid any repeats this season the Jets spent their second-round draft pick (47th overall) on Ohio State kicker Mike Nugent who connected on 72 of his 88 college attempts.
Nugent, who connected on his only field goal try in the Jets 10-3 preseason win over Detroit on Friday night, knows that he will be under a microscope in New York especially after the way last season ended. He may not have been a part of what happened last January at Heinz Field but it will still add pressure to every important kick he tries for the Jets.
"You have to be able to put the past behind you," he said. "Even though it's not my past, it's something that is still on in a lot of people's minds and that's the reason you bring in certain players. I never really think about it at all, I just think about what I have to do; every next step."
Playing at Ohio State, with 100,000 screaming fans and alumni counting on you, served as good preparation for what Nugent will face in the NFL. Last year he won the Lou Groza Award, given annually to college football's best kicker, was a first-team all-America selection and became the first kicker ever to win Ohio State's Most Valuable Player Award.
But he also recalled a missed field goal during his senior year hitting him particularly hard.
"I missed one against Northwestern in the first part of overtime," he said. "It was our possession and it was a 40-yarder to the right. It was just one of those situations where you really thought you let your team down."
The missed kick led to a Buckeyes loss and put a major damper on their outlook for 2004. But rather than bury his head in the sand, Nugent took to analyzing why the attempt failed and how to correct it, something he does after any missed kick.
<table align="right" cellpadding="5" width="200"> <tbody> <tr> <td>"You just figure, 'this is what I did wrong,' and you don't do it on the next one. You have to think that there is going to be another opportunity." </td></tr></tbody></table>"The first thing you do is try and figure out what you did wrong," he said. "If you don't know what you did wrong and I wasn't really sure what I did wrong, you get the film and figure it out. You have to try to figure out what you did wrong and try to throw it out the door."
The Jets home field at Giants Stadium, where the wind swirls, dips and changes direction minute-by-minute, is one of the toughest places for kickers in the entire league. And Jet fans are not the most forgiving when mistakes do happen. But Nugent knows that a kicker in the NFL is only as good as his last kick. After all, the week before missing the two tries in Pittsburgh Brien was on top of the world having booted a game-winner to vault the Jets past the Chargers in the AFC Divisional match-up. Seven days later he was the goat and had played his last game in New York.
"It is a tough feeling, especially if you're having a solid season," Nugent said. "When I missed it was our fourth game. Doug hit the game winner the week before against San Diego and had an unbelievable season. You don't second guess yourself at all. You just figure, 'this is what I did wrong,' and you don't do it on the next one. You have to think that there is going to be another opportunity."
Despite being the third-highest kicker drafted since 1982 and the added focus that surely will be on the Jets kicking game this year, Nugent is not feeling any pressure beyond reaching his own goals and surpassing his own expectations.
"I don't really feel that kind of pressure," he said. "I was really excited about the opportunity I was getting. I was going into the draft thinking, if I sign as an undrafted free agent or get picked in the fourth round, third round, second round, it doest matter to me. I can do my job when they ask for it and I just wanted the opportunity to do that job."
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Jets second-round pick Mike Nugent is expected by the team and fans to shore up the kicking game, and he's fine with that.
Luke Sacks
NFLPLAYERS.COM
08/16/2005
</td></tr><tr><td class="smallText" colspan="2" align="left" valign="top"> Last season, a pair of missed field goal cost the New York Jets the chance to play in the Super Bowl when veteran Doug Brien missed two crucial fourth-quarter attempts in the AFC Championship Game in Pittsburgh.
Brien's 47-yard try with just over two minutes left drilled the upright and his 43-yard attempt on the final play of regulation sailed way left. The Steelers won in overtime on a successful field goal try leaving the Jets to ponder what could have been.
Hoping to avoid any repeats this season the Jets spent their second-round draft pick (47th overall) on Ohio State kicker Mike Nugent who connected on 72 of his 88 college attempts.
Nugent, who connected on his only field goal try in the Jets 10-3 preseason win over Detroit on Friday night, knows that he will be under a microscope in New York especially after the way last season ended. He may not have been a part of what happened last January at Heinz Field but it will still add pressure to every important kick he tries for the Jets.
"You have to be able to put the past behind you," he said. "Even though it's not my past, it's something that is still on in a lot of people's minds and that's the reason you bring in certain players. I never really think about it at all, I just think about what I have to do; every next step."
Playing at Ohio State, with 100,000 screaming fans and alumni counting on you, served as good preparation for what Nugent will face in the NFL. Last year he won the Lou Groza Award, given annually to college football's best kicker, was a first-team all-America selection and became the first kicker ever to win Ohio State's Most Valuable Player Award.
But he also recalled a missed field goal during his senior year hitting him particularly hard.
"I missed one against Northwestern in the first part of overtime," he said. "It was our possession and it was a 40-yarder to the right. It was just one of those situations where you really thought you let your team down."
The missed kick led to a Buckeyes loss and put a major damper on their outlook for 2004. But rather than bury his head in the sand, Nugent took to analyzing why the attempt failed and how to correct it, something he does after any missed kick.
<table align="right" cellpadding="5" width="200"> <tbody> <tr> <td>"You just figure, 'this is what I did wrong,' and you don't do it on the next one. You have to think that there is going to be another opportunity." </td></tr></tbody></table>"The first thing you do is try and figure out what you did wrong," he said. "If you don't know what you did wrong and I wasn't really sure what I did wrong, you get the film and figure it out. You have to try to figure out what you did wrong and try to throw it out the door."
The Jets home field at Giants Stadium, where the wind swirls, dips and changes direction minute-by-minute, is one of the toughest places for kickers in the entire league. And Jet fans are not the most forgiving when mistakes do happen. But Nugent knows that a kicker in the NFL is only as good as his last kick. After all, the week before missing the two tries in Pittsburgh Brien was on top of the world having booted a game-winner to vault the Jets past the Chargers in the AFC Divisional match-up. Seven days later he was the goat and had played his last game in New York.
"It is a tough feeling, especially if you're having a solid season," Nugent said. "When I missed it was our fourth game. Doug hit the game winner the week before against San Diego and had an unbelievable season. You don't second guess yourself at all. You just figure, 'this is what I did wrong,' and you don't do it on the next one. You have to think that there is going to be another opportunity."
Despite being the third-highest kicker drafted since 1982 and the added focus that surely will be on the Jets kicking game this year, Nugent is not feeling any pressure beyond reaching his own goals and surpassing his own expectations.
"I don't really feel that kind of pressure," he said. "I was really excited about the opportunity I was getting. I was going into the draft thinking, if I sign as an undrafted free agent or get picked in the fourth round, third round, second round, it doest matter to me. I can do my job when they ask for it and I just wanted the opportunity to do that job."
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Were going to the Super Bowl
