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Sports => Snyder's Electronic Cyber Space World => Topic started by: catsfan20012002 on August 05, 2006, 10:39:59 AM
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http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/sports/15203545.htm
A kicker once hailed as the best in the NFL is back and with the New England Patriots.
No, not Adam Vinatieri.
It’s former Kansas State star Martin Gramatica, whose outstanding career faded so completely that he didn’t even play last season. He’s competing to replace Vinatieri, the clutch kicker who left for the Colts after 10 seasons and three Super Bowl championships with the Patriots.
“Anywhere you go, everybody watches the kicker because it’s an important part of the game,” Gramatica said, “but here especially for what Adam did. Everybody’s really concerned about who’s going to replace him.”
Will it be the 5-foot-8 Gramatica? A few days before Tampa Bay won the 2003 Super Bowl, coach Jon Gruden said, “we have the best kicker in the league.” But injuries and consistency problems and was released during the 2004 season.
Or will it be 6-foot-1 Stephen Gostkowski, a rookie drafted out of Memphis in the fourth round?
“He’s good,” Gostkowski said of Gramatica, but “I can’t worry about what he does.”
Gramatica said the two kickers are friendly and he’s not focusing on how Gostkowski is performing.
“I don’t feel any extra pressure than if I were the only (kicker) in camp,” he said.
A little more than a week into training camp, coach Bill Belichick says it’s too early to compare the two. He wants to see them kick a lot more before making a decision.
“You’re talking about (an) operation that is a three-man operation” with the snapper, holder and kicker, Belichick said. “I think it’s too early to start charting kicks.”