the first reply is classic
The announcers mentioned it before the kick so most folks watching the game knew it could happen.
Obviously a Tide fan. 
The Bears did it twice in one season a few years back. Nathan Vasher and Devin Hester I think.
Like hell! I only saw the second half of that game - Saturday of Thanksgiving weekend, 1984, wasn’t it? - but even just from that half, it was one of the most spectacular games I’ve ever watched, with Flutie and Kosar one-upping each other until finally…
Yeah, good luck with getting anyone to forget about that.
It’s an easy call, *as long as the coach remembers to remind his kicking team of their responsibilities to prevent a return. * If he does that, the possibility of a TD on the return is a much greater longshot than the FG try. But if he forgets that critical step, it’s a whole different set of odds.
Does it really have to be spelled out?
And all of the NFL kickers were once college players. I would expect one of the best, if not the best, college team in the country to have many NFL quality players. He was not the primary kicker because he was the long kicker not the accurate kicker. Colleges can afford to have multiple kickers on the roster. Some kickers would have no problem with that distance. There are no kickers on any level that are totally accurate at that distance. If this guy was one of those kickers with the big foot who routinely puts the ball out of the end zone I can see how defending against the block would take priority over defending against a 109 yard run back. If the distance was barely at the end of his range then its not even part of the discussion.
As I’ve already pointed out, the distance was barely at the end of his range unless he came to the University of Alabama by way of Krypton.
Yes. And you were wrong. 56 yards is long but not usually so. Just talking about length, not accuracy. Top level kickers routinely kick longer than that. To try and say its super human is ridiculous. The coaching staff presumably knows his max range better than anyone else.
Here’s his bio on the Alabama football page:
I’m not sure about his ratings as #1 but he wasn’t even the #1 kicker on Bama until the main kicker messed up in the Iron Bowl. It looks like his long kick in HS was 52 yards, so this would have been his longest FG in an actual game by quite a bit.
Kickoffs are not field goals. Have you ever seen a field goal attempt where the placekicker had the opportunity to do that high-stepping 7 yard run-up to the ball they do on kickoffs? It was an absurdly long field goal attempt under the circumstances. The most likely outcome was that it would fall short.
Your repeated, totally unsupported assertions are ridiculous. It was a 57 yard attempt. Top level NFL kickers occasionally kicker longer field goals than that - as I’ve already pointed out, there have been two field goals of that distance kicked in the NFL this entire season. Nobody has kicked a field goal of that length in college football this entire season. Can kickers hit a ball further than that? Of course. But they don’t. Kickoffs are not field goals.
From that far the goal posts are a small target. Very few people in the world can hit from that far. Its not surprising that his longest is 52 yards. If what I was talking about was his ability to make a field goal that would be relevant. But I’m only talking about his ability to make the distance. Maximum range vs maximum effective range. There pool of kickers that can kick very far without accuracy is much bigger than those that can do both at the same time. If the coaching staff knew he was one of those non-superhuman kickers that routinely boom the ball out the back of the end zone then it makes sense to let him try, hope for accidental accuracy, play against the block because of the low angle of kick needed and not worry as much about a 109 yard run back. If they knew that at best he would be able to squeak it over the goalpost then they were very negligent in putting that particular package on the field. Either way the coaches were negligent in their play call. Its a matter of degree.
You are still talking about made field goals not the ability to safely kick the distance without a run back. The distance is the only factor you need to take into account when putting a player package on the field to concentrate on defending against a run back or a block. If you watch football you know that even in the NFL where the best kickers are, there are very few times when they would even try for a FG that long because of the field position battle. So of course there aren’t that many successful ones. 1 second left in the game is one of those times when they would attempt it.
Of course kickoffs aren’t field goals. But it shows in routine situations you see in every game multiple times that many top level kickers have very strong legs. Strong enough to kick a kick off 70 yards. On the NFL level the success rate at that length is not great. But the vast majority of those kicks are long enough to not be returnable. Is that really debatable? I don’t know this kicker. I presume those that watch him everyday in practice do. If he routinely was 5 yards short at that distance they were stupid to even try. If he has a strong leg it makes sense to try. If he is a boomer that knocks it into the stands it makes sense to put in the fat guys and worry about the block.
Okay, I guess that makes a bit more sense.
You still cannot compare kickoffs to field goals in that fashion. Kicking a ball off doesn’t require to get it over the heads of the linemen 7 yards away from you, it’s not up on a tee, and there’s no block rush.
If they were just hoping for him to boom it out of the endzone and hope for an accidental accurate kick I think they would have had better odds by throwing a Hail Mary pass. They believed he had a reasonable chance to get it through the uprights which means he would have been instructed to try for accuracy. This, plus the folks trying to block the kick and the pressure of the final regulation play of the Iron Bowl makes the chance of it falling short much higher. Plus he has no track record of kicking long field goals in a game situation so the risk was higher.
With that in mind, I think Saban should have put much more emphasis on the chance of a runback and reiterated to his players that they needed to play defense after the kick. He might have been fine with the players on the field if they had covered correctly after the kick but a few speedier guys couldn’t have hurt.
" one second left on the clock, Alabama elected to try a 57 yard FG, the Auburn guy caught it deep in the end zone and ran it all the way back for a TD."
The ball was kicked, and then someone caught it and ran for a touchdown, in one second?
As long as a play begins with time on the clock, it is played out to its conclusion even if time runs out.