Watch: Greatest XP in history? Adam Vinatieri's clutch kick in snow is magnificent
You don’t often see a field goal take a sharp left turn in mid-flight, but then there aren’t many kickers out there like Adam Vinatieri.
Facing a must-make extra point in one of the great snow games in NFL history, Vinatieri sent his kick skyward with just over a minute remaining in the game and the Indianapolis Colts down 7-6 to the Buffalo Bills. The ball appeared headed wide right, but then, like it was a golf ball curling around the pines at Augusta, turned hard left to zip right between the uprights.
Watch the clip again and again and again. There’s so much to take in here:
• The ball looking like it was headed 10 yards wide right before it makes that fateful last-second turn.
• The Bills players celebrating like they’d won the game, only to watch in horror as the ball curled back for good.
• Vinatieri casually knocking snow off his cleats just before the kick.
• Pretty much everybody on the Colts sideline — players, coaches, probably the freaking mascot —out there clearing out space for Vinatieri to kick, until the refs ran them off:
All the @Colts came out to clear the way for @adamvinatieri to tie the game pic.twitter.com/pCEbUzh0wg
— The Checkdown (@thecheckdown) December 10, 2017
That wasn’t the most important extra-point kick in NFL history, but it may have been the finest. What a beauty.
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter or on Facebook.
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