For Aussie punter Mat McBriar, an all-too-familiar issue that plagued the 10-year veteran during his last season with the Philadelphia Eagles has clouded what could have been a strong return to the NFL this week.
The veteran got his first start of the season after the Pittsburgh Steelers cut their punter, Zoltan Mesko, and signed McBriar to immediately replace him.
In the Steelers’ Week 9 match-up with the New England Patriots the Aussie started strongly, and his first kick in the first quarter, a booming 49 yarder, forced the Patriots to call a fair catch on their own 22-yard line.
Unfortunately his second kick late in the third quarter had disastrous results.
Kicking from the Steelers’ own 36, McBriar punted the ball right into the hands of the Patriots waiting return man, Julian Edelman.
Unfortunately the kick was low and only in the air a little over four seconds. A gift for a talented return man.
The shifty receiver caught the ball on the move, made a single cut to avoid the coverage team and managed to return the ball 43 yards to the Steelers’ own 34-yard line.
At the time the Steelers were still in the game and only down by three points, 24-27, but the Patriots would quickly score on the short possession and the rout was on.
New England would go on to win 31-55.
McBriar would punt again in the fourth quarter for 50 yards. It was a quality kick (the ball was in the air close to five seconds and the coverage easily bottled Edelman up), but the damage was done.
The Aussie would finish the night with three punts for a 32.3-yard net average. Not a strong start to his time in Pittsburgh.
Of course, the blame for the big return and the shift in momentum that resulted cannot lay solely on the punter. Edelman made a nice move to find space and break a tackle, and some responsibility must go to the coverage team too.
But one cannot help but be reminded of McBriar’s time with the Eagles last season. As it was with this return, his kicks often didn’t have enough hang time, making them easy for the opposition’s punt returner to catch and run with.
Absolutely, the Eagles special teams was a mess last season, but the organisation held McBriar responsible for at least part of it, letting him go in favour of an open offseason competition between Donnie Jones and Aussie Brad Wing.
Last year’s performance would undoubtedly be on his and the Steelers’ mind as they head into the second half of this season.
Despite the one – admittedly bad – hiccup, McBriar had a 46-yard gross average on his kicks this last Sunday, and he appears to have almost fully recovered after receiving treatment on a cyst in his plant leg back in early 2012.
Everybody knows how good McBriar was and how good he can be. The two-time Pro Bowler dominated during his time with the Dallas Cowboys from 2003-2011 and he left as the franchise’s all-time greatest punter (he leads the team in both net and gross yardage and punts inside the 20).
He’s also arguably one of the best all-time Aussie NFL punters, second only to the great Darren Bennett. And he’s still only 34 years of age. There’s plenty of kicks still in him.
But to stay in the NFL he needs to fix this issue.
The Steelers let Mesko go because of his inconsistent performance in the first half of the season, if McBriar wants to stick around in Pittsburgh, he’ll need to minimise the line drives and put as much time on his kicks as possible.
Lest the issues of last season haunt him and the team for the remainder of 2013.
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