SANTA CLARA — A 58-yard field goal cleared the crossbar with seemingly 20 yards to spare, enhanced by the South Bay breeze at Nick Moody’s back last week.
It was a good look on a sunny Wednesday in May. Not so scenic were kicks he missed last winter in the 49ers’ final four games of an exhaustive rookie season.
No miss loomed larger than a point-after attempt that got blocked on the Niners’ go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter of their Super Bowl loss to the Kansas City Chiefs.
“Jake owns that it was a low kick,” said special teams coordinator Brian Schneider, who prefaced that remark Wednesday by outlining all the important roles Moody’s supporting cast has on every kick.
Moody was far from the lone culprit in February’s overtime defeat to the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl. So much else went wrong.
But so much also went right – in that game and in Moody’s rookie year as a heavily scrutinized, third-round draft pick. He’s currently the only kicker on the 49ers’ roster, as opposed to a year ago when Zane Gonzalez lasted through the preseason.
Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group
Moody has been flawless in the 49ers’ two practices open to the media the past two weeks. Meanwhile, the Green Bay Packers have three kickers on their roster, with two hired to challenge Anders Carlson, who capped his own rookie struggles last year by missing a 41-yard, fourth-quarter try in the Packers’ playoff loss to the 49ers.
Moody’s finale – the Super Bowl – is where he also made the best kick of his rookie year, providing confidence and momentum heading into this coming season. With 1:57 left in regulation, coach Kyle Shanahan put his trust in Moody to attempt a 53-yard field goal on fourth-and-5 in a tie game. Moody made it, putting the 49ers ahead 19-16.
“To see him come back and with 1:57 hit the 53-yarder, that was his best kick of the year,” Schneider said. “So to me, I know exactly who he is because I’m around him every day. And I think the more opportunities everyone has, they’ll see it too.”
Moody went 3-for-3 on field-goal attempts in the Super Bowl, each kick putting the 49ers in the lead, starting with a 55-yarder for a 3-0, second-quarter lead. That was the longest in Super Bowl history, until Chiefs counterpart Harrison Butker converted a 57-yarder in the third quarter. Moody’s final field goal was a 27-yarder on the 49ers’ overtime possession, and those three points simply were not enough to thwart the Chiefs’ counterattack that led to a touchdown drive and their second straight Lombardi Trophy.
“Ultimately he’s built for this, and I say that because of the Super Bowl,” Schneider said enthusiastically Wednesday, in his first press conference since the Super Bowl.
As for Moody’s point-after kick that got blocked, it came after Brock Purdy’s go-ahead touchdown pass to Jauan Jennings in the fourth quarter; Moody made his first 60 point-after tries before missing wide right on his last in the regular-season finale (a one-point loss to the Rams).
Moody was understandably crestfallen after the Super Bowl. Asked in the locker room to summarize his season, Moody told reporters: “As of right now, the only thing I care about is this game, and I feel like crap.”
Moody missed field-goal attempts in each of the 49ers’ NFC playoff comebacks. A 48-yard field-goal attempt got blocked just before halftime against the Packers; the 49ers led 7-6, and eventually rallied for a 24-21 win. Moody also missed from 48 (wide right) on the 49ers’ first possession of their NFC Championship Game win over the Lions.
Schneider summed up Moody’s rookie season as “a tremendous learning experience” filled with adversity. Moody’s quadriceps needed a rest as the preseason closed, and he essentially cost the 49ers their perfect record when he missed a 41-yard field-goal attempt in the final seconds of their 19-17 loss at Cleveland.
“He always responded to adversity, which to me, that’s what kickers have to be,” Schneider said, “and we’re trying to close down the adversity.”
Pressure kicks are one thing. Now Moody, presumably, will have to show off his placement skills under the NFL’s new kickoff rule, which favors the return team. “The only advantage for a kickoff team is to have a kicker that can move it around and get the returner off balance instead of a nice clean catch and going,” Schneider said. “That happens way faster than it used to.”