Think you could kick a field goal? Meet the writer who actually tried

DG: Welcome to Sports in America, everybody. I have a mission today, and that is to convince all of you that the NFL preseason matters. That’s the goal. I really want to convince you. And the conversation you’re gonna hear in a few minutes might do a lot of the work for me because it’s with a friend of mine who is a journalist and writer. That’s right, a journalist and writer, not a football player at all. But for the purposes of research and working on a book, he made an effort to become an NFL player during the preseason and actually played briefly for the Denver Broncos. So you think preseason doesn’t matter to him? So if you’ve ever had a dream of your own. And you wanted it to come true, you’re gonna want to listen to that conversation. But we’re gonna start with Nick Baumgardner. He is a senior writer at The Athletic who covers the NFL and he’s gonna help me convince you why the NFL preseason matters, as of course does the regular season for all of us NFL fans.

NICK BAUMGARDNER: Yes.

DG: Nick, thank you. Yes, you said yes. So you make the case for me. Why should people be paying attention to the preseason right now? Because there’s a lot to not care about since it’s mostly backup players playing and, you know, not that much on the line.

NB: Right. Yeah, but I mean, I think that the thing that people maybe on on the surface level fan may maybe lose track of is that like this is like the biggest opportunity time of the year for so many guys. It’s not just like guys at the top of a roster to or maintain them. We know what those guys can do, but it’s all these guys in the middle, guys at the bottom of a roster that are trying to inch their way up and oftentimes the difference between a guy in the middle and on the bottom And a guy that’s starting somewhere is really, really thin in the NFL.

DG: This is their Super Bowl. I mean, it’s probably not exaggerating. This is their Super Bowl, yeah.

NB: It really it kind of is. I mean a lot changes, a lot changes, a lot of expectations about guys change during the preseason. This is also often if you’re even like I say, if you’re a surface level fan of a team, your team’s first round pick, whatever that is, is a huge investment and that player is gonna be tested for the first time in preseason. And I’ll tell you what, no matter what his position is, if he goes out there and he’s lost early, like you guys you got problems. So there’s a lot to learn if you’re really paying attention in that first year or in any preseason really. It’s the games are kind of overvalued, but if you’re paying attention day to day, there’s quite a bit you can pick up on.

DG: Well, and I guess if you’re if you’re a Raiders fan, for example, I mean you just drafted Fernando Mendoza, you know, a quarterback who was supposed to be the future of that franchise, won the Heisman last year. I guess that’s does give you a chance to keep an eye on him because he’s probably not gonna be your starting quarterback in year one, but in the preseason, like, you know, get a feel for whether the future’s as bright as you hope it is.

NB: Absolutely. And I think the the biggest saying that we always hear, you know, for me in the NFL draft world is that the NFL is not a developmental league. and always keep that in mind when you’re scouting guys. Like teams will take chances on guys with you know, upside, but not a lot because they don’t have a lot of time. There’s only so many snaps quarterbacks have to play, and there’s only so many opportunities for a Fernando Mendoza, who I believe is in a great situation here. He, Ty Simpson too, possibly. They can give them all the snaps they want in these meaningless games. They don’t even have to look good, they can look terrible, and it might not matter. because it’s like, hey, we want to get your all the kinks out, do whatever. There’s no pressure on you right now if your Mendoza, Cousins is gonna start the first however many games of this season anyway. So this is your one chance to really let things happen. On the on the other side, a couple years ago, if you remember, when Michael Penix got drafted by the Falcons, they didn’t play him at all in his first preseason. And what have we seen since?

DG: Bad idea.

NB: Really kind of a middling talent. So I do think it’s important.

DG: He probably he probably needed that preseason.

NB: Yeah, it’s an early litmus test for a lot of guys ideas.

DG: Well, can I I want to go where no NFL preview show has ever gone before. And that is to focus on the truly lousy teams, the fan bases that have just been in misery for so many years and are just praying that this could be the season. I feel like the preseason oftentimes it’s like the one period of time that these fan bases get to have hope.

NB: A thousand percent, yeah.

DG: I mean, this sounds really mean because I mean there can be surprises, but I’m thinking of I’m thinking of Cleveland right now and not just because I’m a Steelers fan and want to relish in their misery, but like their quarterback problem is huge. They’ve got Shedeur Sanders who is young. It’s Deion’s son, like maybe a lot of promise, but unproven. And then you have Deshaun Watson, who’s just been a problem for the Browns since they signed him into this massive contract with injuries and behavioral nightmares. What do you do if you’re a Cleveland Browns fan to give yourself some level of optimism?

NB: I’ll tell you what, the only thing you can do, because I used to cover the Lions here in Detroit, right?

DG: And you were bad for a long time.

NB: We had a lot of those years here where it was like, good God, what do we even write about to get these people interested at all?

DG: (Laughs) That’s the pressure on the sports writer.

NB: But yes, preseason was always kind of where we where we made our hay in those leaning years, is because it’s exactly that. You have to focus on the young players on the roster that are performing well. Because while the quarterback situation is a mess, if you’re a long-term fan of the Browns, you understand that their pick situation is about to get it’s getting better. They’ve had more in recent years. They’re gonna probably have a good one again next year, and there should be better quarterbacks out next year. So they might have an opportunity to get a really good young quarterback again. You never know what that works out as. But if I’m a Browns fan, I’m looking at guys like Harold Fannin, Judkins, Schwesigner, the guys that they picked up in the last year or two that have just been terrific young players. Last year’s draft in particular was really good. The Browns are slowly but surely kind of getting it back together, but it’s like you gotta really look at this thing from the granular level and pay attention to preseason based on, you know, who’s improving day to day in camp, who’s getting what reps with who and and training in and the games. and the other thing too to look at is always the inter squad scrimmages. If they ever do those, those are always incredibly valuable.

DG: Yeah. Do they still call the stadium in Cleveland the Factory of Sadness or have they moved on from that?

NB: Yeah, it’s probably still the the Mistake by the Lake or whatever I don’t know.

DG: Factory of Sadness, Mistake by the Lake. Yeah.

NB: Factory of Sadness. (Laughs)

DG: Yeah. I feel bad. Well, I mean I mean, this is an emotional time for NFL fans. And and I just I think about like the two sentences that would come to mind from an emotional level as a Steelers fan. It’s like, can we count on old men to get us back into contention? And I’m talking about Mike McCarthy, our new coach, who is a very old coach who we brought in, and Aaron Rodgers, who is like, you know, just…

NB: Hanging in there.

DG: Like I want to believe, but I’m like, can we please move on? Can we turn the page? And it’s like, I think that’s the emotional thing I’m dealing with. Like, when do we turn the page? Isn’t it time to turn the page? But also like wing in a prayer, maybe Aaron Rodgers has one more year. What is the sort of emotional state for a Lions fan?

NB: For a Lions fan yeah, for Lions it would be more of a it’s a similar situation. Yeah, it’s an emotional time because it’s like you don’t know, you think that they’re gonna be better than the nine and eight season. They made a lot of adjustments this off season, they made a lot of changes, they made a lot of new hires and free agent signings, although one of them, Cade Mays, is already hurt over the ball. So a lot of their expectations were to really be much better. And now it’s kind of like we’re seeing injuries pile up already here. So you’re kind of in this mode of like they’re still very talented. They still have a ton of guys who could do a lot of things. They could still have a great year. But there’s this lingering thing now all of a sudden that, you know, is Dan Campbell only going to be the guy who was able to get them, you know, up off the ground and down the road little bit, but maybe not over the hump, you know, then that’s maybe the question that people face with themselves if this year doesn’t go the way it’s supposed to. So for Lions fans, especially ones that have paid attention during the Dan Campbell era, it’s like this is the a very interesting time because for the first time in that era, it’s like, if he loses big games, these are gonna be games that we can’t unsee. These are gonna be games that people remember for longer. You know what I’m saying? If you if you don’t make the playoffs, if you get to the playoffs and lose immediately again, those are things that are gonna maybe haunt you a little bit more. So it’s an interesting time for Dan and for the team in general. They have I think I saw a stat the other day, the Lions have paid a billion dollars, or more than a billion dollars to their draft picks since Brad Holmes has taken over.

DG: Wow. A billion with a B. That’s like…

NB: Yes, a billion with a B.

DG: That’s a lot of money on on young talent.

NB: With the recent Gibbs signing, right? So you’ve got Jack Campbell, Jahmyr Gibbs, Penei Sewell, Aidan Hutchinson, Kerby Joseph.

DG: Time to see this pay off.

NB: Yeah, Jameson Williams. So some guys gotta start going here. Amon-Ra St. Brown and they’ve got to take over and have a big year. So it’s a kind of a do it or don’t type season almost a little bit in Detroit.

DG: A crossroads. You’re hoping last year was like an anomaly, like you’re on the right trajectory but the nine and eight.

NB: Yeah, a lot of people right. A lot of people have said, I think the window’s closed there, you know. I think they missed it. You know, I don’t think Goff I think Goff’s gonna continue to go down. But I think that you look at the group that they have there, it’s not unlike some of those Saints teams that Campbell was part of with Sean Payton, where it was like that window might be tightening, but you guys got a lot of talent here still and you could surprise some people. So I think they’re in this interesting spot and who knows how it’ll go.

[MUSIC]

DG: Last question I have, it’s because we’re we’re about to listen to a fellow kind of a fellow sports journalist, who actually took the field and felt the pressure of kicking field goals. Not in the regular season, we should say, but it’s Stefan Fatsis. would you ever think of doing something so insane for the work purpose of our work?

NB: No. Not what, when, what year was this? Did this happen?

DG: Oh, it was ye it was years ago. It’s i it’s not a brand new book, but we’re bringing him on.

NB: If we were living in like the 70s, maybe, like this 50s, maybe?

DG: Why not now? Why then and not now?

NB: Because they’re so much bigger and stronger.

DG: Yeah, that’s fair.

NB: If you think back 1950s, guys were kind of more normal sized, you know, they were kind of not humongous, but as time went on, obviously guys got bigger and stronger. No, no way.

DG: Yeah. Now even if you’re a kicker, if you get bumped by alignment, I mean you are

NB: No way, the closest thing I would ever try is like I could maybe be like a equipment manager helper or something like that for a for a week. Everything in the NFL moves so fast.

DG: Yeah.

NB: People have no idea. I’m sure you’re about to find out, as that’s an interesting interview there for sure.

DG: Yeah, it should be a lot of fun. We’re gonna listen to to Stefan Fatsis in just a moment. But Nick Baumgardner, senior writer at The Athletic covers the NFL. Best of luck to your Lions this year and let’s have a fun season to cover. It’s been great talking to you.

NB: Absolutely anytime.

DG: How many times have you found yourself sitting in front of the TV, absolutely furious? You just finished the last seconds of an NFL game. You were rooting for your favorite team, let’s say for the sake of example, I don’t know, the Pittsburgh Steelers. It all came down to the final moments of the game.

[MUSIC]

DG: Your kicker has 40 yards ahead of him. He has made a shot like this before easily, but this time, the pressure is at an all-time high and he misses.

BROADCASTER: And the kick is no good! Wow! Go figure.

DG: Your team loses. Maybe it knocks you out of a championship run and ends your season altogether. You’re thinking to yourself, come on, it’s a kicker. Kickers have one job. I mean, even I could have made that kick.

STEFAN FATSIS: I mean, the most common sticky thing is to like look at a football game on TV and watch a kicker miss one and go, “I could have done that.” Well, like, “I can make a field goal, I can an extra point.”

DG: You wouldn’t be the first person to watch a pro fail on the field and then think, “Man, I could have done a better job.” But what about if you actually got the chance to try, to join the NFL, train with the pros, try to land a 40 yarder between the goalposts?

SF: I hadn’t kicked a football since like high school soccer practice when we would screw around and like the football team would come on the field. Yeah, a little rusty.

DG: Here’s the thing, I know a guy who literally did this, my friend, Stefan Fatsis. He is a journalist like me, a long time sports reporter and a familiar voice on NPR. In the summer of 2006, as a 43 year old, 5’8″, 160 pound writer at the Wall Street Journal, Stefan thought he had what it took to join the National Football League. Today on Sports in America, as we approach the deadline for NFL roster cuts, I present one of the most surprising stories of a person who was able to make it onto the field. Stefan Fatsis convinced the Denver Broncos to let him join the team for preseason training camp, and then he wrote a book about it called, “A Few Seconds of Panic,” where he shares what it’s actually like when you get the chance to get off the couch and attempt one of the highest pressure, most make or break positions in football.

Stefan, thank you for being here.

SF: My pleasure, David.

DG: It’s not often that I get to talk to someone who is both a fellow journalist and had a brief career in the NFL. So this is, this is great.

SF: I tick the boxes, man.

DG: I don’t know quite how to ask you this, but with an esteemed career in journalism, you decide to try out for a place kicker for the Denver Broncos. What the hell were you thinking?

SF: I was thinking that I was ready to do another book. It was purely sort of mercenary, like struggling to find ideas. You know what that’s like as a reporter. It’s hard to latch on to things that excite you, particularly for books where you’ve got to invest a year or two or more in writing them. And I was literally like, I had a great job covering the sports business and other weird stuff in sports for the Wall Street Journal. I had no complaints. I had a lovely wife and a toddler at home and I just needed to do something else. I’m literally sitting at my desk in the Washington Bureau of the Wall Street Journal one day thinking like, what could I do for another book? And I was like, Oh yeah, like George Plimpton playing in the NFL. Nobody’s played in the NFL in 40 years. Maybe I could do that.

[MUSIC]

DG: Okay. So what Stefan decided to do was not totally unprecedented. He just mentioned George Plimpton. He was a writer who joined the Detroit Lions preseason training camp in 1963. He was 36 years old himself and starting out as a rookie quarterback. He wrote a book called “Paper Lion” about his time training with the team.

GEORGE PLIMPTON: I would rear back and throw the ball. It would arch through the air, bounce down the field, and rock abruptly to a stop in the grass. I would fetch it. Then I would throw it again. Without someone to throw to, it was a melancholy practice.

DG: What Plimpton didn’t know is that four decades after his book came out, he would inspire another writer to attempt a similar feat.

And did you think about other positions? Did you think like, I’ll try out to be a linebacker, I’ll out to try out be a quarterback? Oh.

SF: Oh, good God. No, David. Come on, man. I’m like I was, you know, I was 5’8″ then maybe? I’m not 5’8″ now. I weighed a buck 60. You know, Plimpton’s conceit was that he would try out as a quarterback. He was not like a team sport athlete. For him, it was the sort of theater of participatory journalism. It was the idea to throw yourself into this without any training, and make a fool of yourself. But at the same time, he’s George Plimpton. He’s this effete New England intellectual who has this gigantic reputation in writing and journalism and high society. So he pulls it off through his sort of innate talents as a character. For me, in the modern NFL, this was gonna be different. Athletes are so inured to reporters showing up with their notebooks and their tape recorders and their cameras They are an afterthought. They are in annoyance. The only way—

DG: They were like insects that they have to like swat away or something that they

SF: That they have to tolerate because they are contractually obligated to tolerate them in most instances. And so for me, it was like, okay what could I do that could get me inside the league to tell a modern version of Plimpton’s “Paper Lion,” which was published in 1966. Plimpton went to Detroit Lions training camp as a quarterback in 1963. He didn’t even practice. He bought a football and went and threw it to nobody in Central Park. That was his training. And he shows up in Detroit and he writes this landmark book about sports, about football, the sort of very first book that takes you inside this league, this—

DG: And sports have, I mean, the football’s changed a little bit since in these mini decades.

SF: In those four decades? Yeah, I mean, that was my main thought. I’ve been covering the NFL for about 10 years for the Journal. And football was as it is now. It wasn’t that different when I did this 15 years ago, 19 years ago, sorry.

DG: So you were thinking like the only, I have to get on the inside because like, you know, just being a reporter and going to the locker room doesn’t really teach you the truth about this sport and what it’s truly like. And you’re thinking, let me go the Plimpton route and try this in a modern way.

SF: Totally, because I knew that the athletes wouldn’t trust me. The athletes don’t trust reporters. I mean, we were already, when I did this in 2006, heading into a time when athletes were beginning to realize they could tell their own stories. That they didn’t need intermediaries like us to tell good stories. So I-

DG: Kinda like the White House and other places…

SF: Kinda like everything.

DG: Like we don’t need right any the media we can reach everyone direct

SF: No, no, no. And this is sort of on the cusp of blogging and blogging was full force, but it was on the cost cusp a podcasting, a few years before websites like the players. What’s that one called? Blah!

DG: Players Tribune.

SF: Players Tribune, thank you. So it was already the idea was there. So for me, it was like I can still do this. Like we’re not there yet. If I can find way to get inside, and demonstrate that I’m credible and gain the trust of the athletes, then I’ve got a great story to tell. And that’s kind of what happened.

DG: Did any part of you say that you were insane when you started thinking about like, okay, maybe I’m gonna try to go to training camp and actually see if I can kick a ball through the uprights?

[MUSIC]

SF: Um, no, um, you know, hubris journalism, you’re used to asking questions, you’re use to asking people to do things for you and tell you things that they wouldn’t normally be willing to tell you. So I just started by first, I called the NFL and said, you know, this is my idea for a long pause at the end of the line with the PR guy that I dealt with all the time. And then he said, let me ask. And the answer came back a few weeks later. “If you can get a team to let you do this, we’re fine with it.” And then I started calling teams. I mean, I had good contacts. I’d been covering the league for a decade. And one after another, after another it was, “Not really interested.” “No would be too much of a distraction.” “No owner won’t go for it.” “No coach won’t for it,” and I kind of, I wasn’t quite on the verge of giving up because I didn’t want to give up. So in the interim, while I was calling all these teams, I decided I need to get into shape, I need to learn how to kick. So if somebody says yes, I am ready to go.

DG: Oh, you started getting ready even before you got the answer?

SF: Absolutely. Yeah, I like I just I found a personal trainer in DC, a guy that I had met because I had profiled a National Hockey League player who was locked out in 2004 2005 when the NHL locked out the players. And I met his trainer and I went back to him and I said here’s the idea I want to play in the NFL, get me ready. And then I googled “kicking coach D.C ” And the first person that called me back, the first I talked to actually was a guy named Paul Woodside.

DG: Paul Woodside. Okay, if you haven’t heard that name before, he is a kicking and punting coach in the U.S. He almost made it to the NFL himself, but was dropped by the Buffalo Bills in 1985 before the season started.

And you found him on Google. I had this feeling that like you knew him going back through years or something. And you just googled “kicker D.C.” That’s fabulous.

SF: Nope, I just googled “kicking D.C.” and left him a message and he called me back and the first thing he said was, “I love this. Let’s do it.”

DG: Oh awesome.

SF: “I’m in. I’m all in.” Didn’t charge me a dime and was my coach.

DG: Oh really?

SF: Yeah. Yeah. He was amazing. Like the most inspirational, most positive, most like happy go lucky guy. And this was a guy that nearly made the NFL. He had reason to be bitter. He was the last kicker cut by the Buffalo Bills, and the job went to the guy who ended up kicking wide right and missing the game winning kick in the Super Bowl. Paul was unbelievable. I mean, he believed in me in a way that I never believed in myself about anything. And so I’m working out with Paul. And then finally, I call the Denver Broncos owner, Pat Bowlen, who is somebody that was a really good source. He was the head of the TV negotiations committee for the NFL. I call him up one day, he thinks I’m calling because of TV talks, and I spring the idea on him. And I’m expecting the same answer at this point, because the Broncos at that time were coached by Mike Shanahan, who was a noted sort of control freak in the league. I didn’t think that there was any chance he would say yes, which is why they were like number 20 on my list of the 32 NFL teams. But instead Bowlen says, “I wouldn’t be averse to that sort of thing.” And he explains the training camp schedule. He talks about Jason Elam, the All-Pro kicker for the team. And he really sounds like he wants me to do this on our first call. And he says, “Let me just talk to Mike Shanahan and I will get back to you.” And it took about two or three months, but he does get back me. “Mike’s okay with it. You’re coming to mini camp.”

[MUSIC]

SF: And he said, and I’ll never forget this, “We’re gonna put you in pads and make you kick some field goals. You’re not gonna just be hanging around. You better be ready to kick.” It sounded like a threat.

DG: Oh, my God.

SF: Which was exactly what I wanted, right?

DG: Of course!

SF: You want the narrative to build. And I was like, I hung up the phone and I was, you know, at once completely terrified and also like over the moon, like I’m going to get to be in the NFL.

DG: Yeah. That combination of feelings. I totally get it. What did Paul teach you about kicking about having kind of the physical and mental things you needed to actually do this with other NFL players? Like what were those months like leading up to camp?

SF: They were grueling because I hadn’t kicked a football since like high school soccer practice when we would screw around and like the football team would come on.

DG: Little rusty.

SF: Yeah, little rusty it had been, you know, like lit and probably had never kicked a foot ball more than 10 or 20 times, right? We just screw around in the backyard or at the playground, whatever.

DG: You needed some technique, you needed to learn some stuff. (Laughs)

SF: I need to learn everything. I played soccer though. So I had a decent leg. And I’m a reasonably coordinated athlete. So again, back to the hubris thinking like, all right, I’m not going to like make the NFL. I’m not going to compete with the players in training camp. But I just wanted to look respectable. And if I could get the players to believe that I looked like a kicker, and that I was trying that I was sincere then that was a way to get inside their brains, to get them to trust me and talk to me and open up to me and let me write stuff down in my notebook. And what Paul gave me was two things. One was the technical ability. And it is like, it’s really complicated. I mean, the most common sticky thing is to like look at a football game on TV and watch a kicker miss one and go, “I could have done that.” Well, “I can make a field goal. I can make an extra point.”

DG: We’ve all been there, especially like a game winning, you know, field goal that you’re, I don’t know, Chris Boswell misses and it’s 17 yard field goal and I could have kicked it better. Yeah.

SF: Yeah, you could not have done it. You could not kick that field goal, let me just tell you.

DG: You’re saying it’s more complicated. What makes it that complicated? I mean, it does look like you’re just literally within spitting distance of the uprights. Like, and you know, I’ve kicked something up in the air before. Like, what makes it so hard?

SF: Of course, exactly. I mean, it’s kind of like that scene in “Moneyball,” David, where Billy Bean, Brad Pitt, tries to persuade Scott Hattaberg to switch to first base. And he says, “It’s not that hard, Scott, tell him Wash,” talking to Ron Washington, his coach, and Wash replies.

BROADCASTER: It’s incredibly hard.

SF: “This is incredibly hard.” I mean, it is about repetition, it is about muscle memory, it’s about precision, it has about technique, it was about picking out like a dot on the football like a pebble in the leather, and hitting that spot every time. It’s about never deviating from any aspect of the motion, or else the ball will go a little bit to the right, a little to the left, a little bit short. It is all about this incredibly refined process, like within quarters of inches or less.

DG: And are you thinking about it constantly when you’re kicking or does it become like muscle memory and you just generate this sort of routine that you activate?

SF: That’s the idea. It’s like a golf swing. You know, you watch professional golfers and it always looks perfect and beautiful. The difference in golf though is that almost every shot is different. You’ve got lie, you’ve got distance, you’ve got club, angle. With kicking a football, yes, you sort of adjust slightly depending on how far you are from the goalposts or where vis-a-vis the hash marks you are on the field. But by and large, you’re not sort of kicking any sort of less hard when you’re kicking a 30-yard field goal than when you’re taking a 50-yard feel goal.

DG: Really? I mean, so these kickers who are like kicking 60, 65 now…

SF:That’s when it gets different.

DG: You’re saying it’s still not that different. Okay.

SF: That is a little different when you get that far away, because you have to strike it at a different angle. You want a more of a line drive kick as opposed to a more parabolic higher kick. But generally, you are trying to replicate the exact same motion, regardless of the kick.

[MUSIC]

SF: And that has to do with both with every aspect of what you’re seeing. It’s about where you plant your foot, it’s about the distance on each step that you take back. It’s about the distance to the side that you take when you prepare. It’s about where you put your toe behind you when you are preparing for your steps. It’s about the distance of each of those steps. It’s about where you plant your left foot, in the case of a right footed kicker, next to the ball. It’s about how far back you draw your leg. It’s about the speed with which you lower your leg to the impact with the ball, it’s about the angle of your foot when you strike the ball. It’s about the angle of the foot as you follow through from kicking the ball and it’s about the direction your leg goes after you have kicked the ball.

DG: That is officially a mouthful. Okay, so that it’s all of that and how much mastery did you feel like you had going into training camp?

SF: Going into training camp. I was terrified. I was completely terrified

DG: Okay, good, you’re human.

SF: Yeah, even though by the time my months of working out with Paul Woodside, you know, and with my trainer, I put on like a dozen pounds. My legs were like huge relative to my normal, you know, 43 year old, 42 year old 43 year old reporter’s body. I was in the best shape of my life. I mean, I was doing two a days I was eating six small meals a day, protein shakes, the whole thing. I wanted to gain weight. And in the end, I probably needed aside to gain like 10 more pounds, but I wasn’t able to do it because again, you’re 43, not 23.

DG: And a reporter’s body, we all know what that’s like.

SF: And a reporters body, you know, like the most telling moment during training camp was when the Broncos had a kicking consultant who would come in periodically to work with us. And one day, you know, and I was making, you know, spoiler alert, you know, with no line in front of me, just kicking on air, as we say, you know, no blockers, no snap, just putting the ball up in this little T thing that you set the ball up to kick, I was making 40, 41, 42 yard field goals.

DG: I’m proud of you, Stefan.

SF: Thank you.

DG: That’s impressive.

SF: That’s pretty good.

DG: I don’t care if there are no blockers or anyone, yeah, totally.

SF: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I never felt, you know, and again, like it’s one thing to do it with your coach on a high school football field with him yelling encouragement at you because he doesn’t want you to fail and wants to pump you up. And then doing it in front of professional athletes who are both humoring you and encouraging you but also kind of laughing at you. And not to mention the 300 pound guys in the locker room that are definitely laughing at you.

DG: What was the reaction because I know a couple of missed kicks that you made at camp you described as humiliating.

SF: Oh, utterly the most humiliating moment of my life, the most pressure I have ever felt doing anything in my life.

DG: Even though they knew you were a journalist, even though you were doing this as a pursuit for a book and didn’t have dreams of being in the NFL, it was still like a ton of real pressure.

SF: Absolutely. I mean, partly because, you know, you I had built myself up for months and months, anticipating this moment, like I wanted to be able to kick in camp, I wanted to be to kick into preseason game and I was even after what happened in camp. I was still hoping I could kick in a preseason and I wanted to experience what the players experience. That was the whole point. I wanted a feel the burden, the weight, the pressure that they go through. Every single play of practice, of scrimmages, of preseason games, of real games. I wanted to know what that felt like so that I could describe it. I hoped that I could internalize that and perform the way that they do under pressure. The first time Mike Shanahan lets me kick in practice, he announces it to the whole team. There’s about 2,000 fans at training camp.

[CROWD CHEERING]

SF: The Broncos hold training camp in Denver. Fans can come.

DG: You had fans there too, that’s right. This was not just like your teammates.

SF: No, this is not just my teammates.

DG: It was an actual audience.

SF: Absolutely audience like when people that have sort of gotten to know me like who is this guy? Why is number nine out there? He doesn’t really look like a player and then one day like during during camp I hear someone in the stands going “Number nine is pretty good, too” It was hilarious.

DG: That must’ve meant a lot.

SF: It did mean a lot. It did mean a lot, but the reality was like when the whistle sounds when the horn blows in practice and Mike Shanahan says, “All right if Fatsis makes one from 25 yards we get 30 minutes off of meetings tonight.” And 30 minutes off of meetings is precious during training camp because the players want to get the hell out of the facility and go to their homes or their hotel.

DG: He put that on you, he made like other players free time riding on you making this kick?

SF: Yes.

DG: Oh Jesus, that’s kind of cruel and amazing all at once. Did you make that kick?

SF: I did not.

DG: Okay. (Laughs)

SF: It was the, like, it was awful. I like, I think I hit the turf.

[MUSIC]

SF: The ball went under the crossbar. And then, and then the whistle blows and Shanahan says, “Offside, offside, let’s do it again.” So that was, that one was from 30. And then he moves it into the 25, which 25, I was making 25 yarders in my sleep in training camp, like on the sidelines with the other kickers, no problem. And I, shh, I, like pushed this one to the left of the goalposts. It was awful players though, they consoled me. I mean they didn’t mock me and I was really surprised by that because to them this was the validation. This is what they wanted me to see. They had seen— they knew that I had seen them struggle with injury, with failure, with mistakes, with getting berated constantly, with the pressure of knowing that their next bad play, you know, misstep, dropped ball could be the end of their career. And they wanted me to know what that felt like. And I was kind of grateful for that. Because I did understand now, like just how burdensome this is for professional athletes, and just how the only way you survive this gauntlet of pressure is to have some sort of both trained and innate ability to work through all of the obstacles that are being thrown in your way second after second in this pressure cooker of a training camp. So I was kind of glad. I was also glad when I failed, I knew that Shanahan at some point later in training would give me a second chance.

DG: And you got one and you made, you made some kicks.

SF: I did. I did make a kick. It wasn’t my favorite. It was like, I mean, the funny thing was like I made the kick the second time a couple of weeks later, and I was bummed out. It wasn’t a great kick. I was so disappointed in myself. But the players like they carried me off the field. It was kind of hilarious.

DG: Oh, that’s a cool, that is a cool feel like you just won the Super Bowl or something.

SF: It was like I had just won the Super Bowl. You know, somebody was shouting “Rudy, Rudy, Rudy.”

DG: That’s amazing. (Laughs)

SF: Which was amazing. So I was like bumming myself out because like, oh, it wasn’t the best kick. I didn’t impress. And everybody was like, “No, no. You made a field goal.” And at that day at camp, there were some members of the military that had come to watch training camp to watch practice. And I had talked to a couple of them before while we were sort of standing on the guidelines. And afterward, I, you know, I said the same thing, like, “Oh, I’m kind of disappointed. Sorry, it wasn’t a good enough kick.” And he said to me, “Think of how many guys would love to be doing what you’re doing.” And I said, “Yeah, but it wasn’t a great kick.” And he says, “Who cares? You’re in the NFL. You kicked a field goal in the NFL.” And my teammates felt the same way. It was like, okay, now that was validation. Fatsis learned what it was like to fail, and now he has succeeded, and that’s cool.

DG: That is really cool.

More from Stefan Fatsis, a journalist and one-time place kicker for the Denver Broncos coming up next.

Welcome back to sports in America. And here’s more from my friend, journalist, and temporary place kicker for the Denver Broncos, Stefan Fatsis.

What are a couple of the biggest takeaways from the experience? Because I know you said you wanted to go in. There’s so much about the NFL and players and the culture and the pressures and the mental toughness that you can’t really experience if you’re a reporter. Like what were the takeaways that you feel like only you saw by going through this?

SF: I mean, it was the reality that this is not the glamorous, you know, media obsessed 365 24-7 world, that it is kind of miserable. And you know, my main takeaway, and I think this is the main takeaway of “A Few Seconds of Panic,” of the book is that this is so not glamorous. That players really don’t like being NFL players. That it is infantilizing, it is dehumanizing, it is degrading. It is obviously physically debilitating and life jeopardizing, not just brain injuries but every other part of your body too. And it was the pressure combined with the pain. I would sit down with players practice after practice and ask them to describe the trauma. What they were playing through. And then you have the physical stuff, the broken fingers, the aching shoulders and knees, bruised and strained muscles, toenails that have disappeared, you name it. And they all, to a person, did what they could to tape themselves up and get the training they needed, the rehab they needed and get back on the field without missing as little time as possible. Because the phrase is “You can’t make the club in the tub.” You can’t the team if you’re in the hot tub or the cold tub, you’re the training room. And they also have to live with the knowledge that when their day is done practicing that upstairs the front office is and this is happening as we speak right now because now is when NFL training camps are in session. As we speak, the front office is up there, they are reviewing every second of every play of practice, and they are making judgments. Every missed block, dropped pass, overthrown ball, botched blocking assignment, blown coverage, misstep, poor form, whatever, they are being scrutinized and they are aware of that constantly. One of my friends, my best friend coming out of training camp and remains a great friend today, Nate Jackson, and Nate I’m so proud of because he went on to, he’s written a couple of books and he is a broadcaster. He has created a real life after football for himself that’s still kind of immersed in football. Nate was a tight end in that camp and he put it to me this way one day, “Someone is getting yelled at every single play. Half the guys out there screw up basically every single play. You’ve got to be able to separate the yelling and the posturing and the bravado and be able see it for what it is.”

DG: And that applies to training camp and, and games. I mean, the whole, this is the whole thing?

SF: Totally. This is the whole thing. I mean, there’s a wave of relief when you make the final roster, but the pressure continues during the regular season. I mean more than one player said to me, “The only relief you get is Sunday.” Sunday is what’s fun. The game is what fun. You get to be creative within the constraints of the NFL playbook, but you are in control. There’s nothing the coaches can do. They can’t ride you during the game the way they ride you, during the summer and during practice. Probably no player more than kickers has to live that way to have that short term memory. Because you don’t make all your kicks. I mean, NFL kickers make more kicks now than they’ve ever made in the history of football.

DG: You’re still going to miss them.

SF: Still gonna miss. You’re gonna miss chip shots. And like field goals are now not as chip shoddy as they used to be. So you’re gonna miss some, not field goals, extra points, you’re gonna miss some extra points too, which was rare. And the players that survive, the kickers that survive are the ones that have the ability to forget it and go back to their routine, go back to their form, go back to their ability, go back their strength. And when they line up to make the next one, they have forgotten the last one. And that’s sort of the lesson for everybody in the NFL. And it’s, you know, the title of the book comes from something Jason Elam, the Broncos kicker said, when we were sitting around BSing, killing time during training camp. He described the act of kicking as something that he compared it to something that he had read about war, “Which is hours and hours of boredom followed by a few seconds of panic.” And it’s the need to be ready to do it when you are called upon. And when you fail, It’s devastating, but if you allow that one failure to ruin your psychology, you’re not going to get another chance.

DG: Do you have to be sick in some way to want to do this? I mean, it just sounds like you want to talk about the misery of the NFL in general. This is like hours of boredom, a few seconds of panic, all that pressure from fans and your team. Like, what is the payoff here?

[MUSIC]

SF: Oh my God, you know what the payoff is, David? The payoff is like a well-struck ball is also like the most glorious thing I’ve ever experienced in my life too. Like the knowledge that I have done something like approaching perfection, like within the range of my abilities. There was one ball I kicked in camp, and I described this in the book, that it just was like I was completely perfect form, the sound that my foot made against the ball. The trajectory of the ball as it rose off my foot, the distance that it traveled, the sound it made when it hit the ground and sputtered down in the grass a few more yards away. It was really like, it was art to me. Like I had created a little piece of personal art that I would never forget. And I think it’s the thrill of succeeding, of doing something so exceptionally well, that you know you can do better in the case of the actual NFL players or actual athletes, that you get to experience this thing that almost no one else gets to experience.

DG: It’s so funny. I listened to you describe that. It’s like, I want to have empathy for, you know, like Chris Boswell’s, my Steelers kicker and adore him. He’s amazing. But it’s like if he’s out there in overtime and it’s everything is on the line, it’s part of me is like, I want think about everything you’re saying. He is gonna do his best. He’s feeling the pressure. But as a fan, I’m also like, you’ve one effing job. Literally, I know you’ve been sitting on your ass for two and a half hours.

SF: Yep.

DG: Like you’ve won effing jobs.

SF: Absolutely. But that’s why players also respect fans’ desire, I guess? I mean, they think fans are weird

DG: (Laughs) We are.

SF: Because they obsess over what they do professionally. Like, so much is vested in what the players are doing on the field. They think that’s kind of bizarre. And it’s even growning more bizarre with betting and the ability to reach athletes directly.

DG: Here I am thinking like we fans are like giving them extra motivation. They love the sound of like 70,000 people.

SF: Oh, they love that, too.

DG: Oh, they do love that? Okay, but they still think they still think we’re weird.

SF: Absolutely. No, they love it. They soak it in. I mean, again, that’s part of the Sunday, right? Sunday is the reward for all of the awful stuff you’ve got to go through to be an NFL player. Sunday, you know, the people screaming does matter. And I don’t mean that to say that like to imply that players don’t respect the fans. They do respect the fans. They respect the fans with passion, but they do think it’s it can be kind of crazy.

DG: We’re weird. We’re drinking and painting our faces and screaming and waving things. I mean, we’re kind of weird.

SF: You are, but you’re doing it for me.

DG: Yeah.

SF: Which is also kind of cool.

DG: 100%. Yeah, I’m right there with you. Finish, finish this sentence for me, “Stories in the world of sports are special and unique because…”

[MUSIC]

SF: Because the people who perform the act of the athlete are remarkable. They are true obsessives. In order to become great in any sport, you have to be a little crazy. And that was true when I wrote about the world of competitive Scrabble and it was true, when I wrote about the NFL. The similarities were sort of weirdly obvious to me. You know, you often think about like Michael Jordan, right, like and Tiger Woods pinnacle of their games, right of their sports. They were like insane obsessives, right? Like Michael Jordan and gambling, Michael Jordan and humiliating every opponent. Tiger Woods starting at age two. I mean all of it in order to be as good to be that good in anything, you have to be a little bit crazy and that’s what I love about sports. Like watching these amazing people do these things and wondering as I do when I watch like a tennis major. It’s like the margins between like great, like being one of the 200 best people to do something in the world and to being, you know, Nadal-Federer, Djokovic, Alcaraz, Sinner, the Williams sisters, Swiatek, you name it. Cocoa Goff, like the margins are so thin. And yet the best ones find ways to excel and dominate for years and years. And like, what makes that possible? What makes them different? It like remains like a giant mystery to me, because it’s like, how can you be that much better than everybody else? Like, how can Sinner and Alcaraz have won, you know, seven of the last eight majors? How did the big three dominate so incredibly? How did Serena win 23 majors? It’s incredible, like just even the most minor insights to like how does anybody in the NFL get to the NFL and stay there, like I was able to witness and write about? I mean, I just view it with an incredible amount of respect and awe and still kind of, it’s mysterious, like how you get good at things, that good.

DG: Stefan, that was amazing, thank you.

SF: Oh, thank you. This was so much fun. I haven’t gotten to do this in a long time

[THEME MUSIC]

DG: Next time on Sports in America. If you live in the United States, you’ve probably heard this sound.

[PICKLEBALL SOUND]

DG: Yes, it is pickleball and it is not just your grandmother’s game anymore. What was once considered a sport for older people trying to stay active has become a bonafide phenomenon.

CLARE FRANK: Pickleball will meet you where you’re at. You don’t have to be a pro. You don’t have to exceptional or a prodigy. You will find a spot.

DG: Clare Frank, a firefighter turned author, is trying to answer some of Pickleball’s most burning questions in her latest book, “Just One More Game, A Pickle Ball Quest.” How does the sport get its name? What is the kitchen? And why can’t 24 million Americans get enough of pickleball?

CF: And it’s such a silly word, and it’s such a silly mish mash made up game, but it addresses, it allows us to heal ourselves.

DG: That is next time on Sports in America.

DG: This is Sports in America. I’m your host, David Greene.

Our executive producers are Joan Isabella and Tom Grahsler. Our senior producer is Michael Olcott. Our producer is Michaela Winberg, and our associate producer is Bibiana Correa.

Our engineers are Mike Villers. Our theme music is composed by Emma Munger. Our talent booker is Britt Kahn. Our tile artwork was created by Bea Walling.

Sports in America is a production of WHYY in Philadelphia and is distributed by PRX. Some of our interviews were originally created by Religion of Sports with special thanks to Adam Schlossman. You can find Sports in America on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, the iHeartRadio app, wherever you get your podcasts.

And we also wanna hear from you. How about you drop us a line? You can write us at sportsinamerica@whyy.org. That’s sportsinamerica@whyy.org. Thanks, everyone. And we will see you next time for Sports in America.

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Host: David Greene
Executive Producers: Joan Isabella, Tom Grahsler
Senior Producer: Michael Olcott
Producer: Michaela Winberg
Associate Producer: Bibiana Correa
Talent Booker: Britt Kahn
Engineers: Mike Villers
Tile Art: Bea Walling
Theme Song: Emma Munger
Sports in America is a production of WHYY, distributed by PRX, and part of the NPR podcast network.

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