Another missed fieldgoal dooms Chargers!

The San Diego Chargers just lost to the Patriots after Nick Kaeding missed a 54-yard field goal to tie it with 8 seconds left.
The kick wasn't close.
Granted you can't blame the entire game on the kicker, but you just KNEW he'd miss the kick.

How can either Schottenheimer or Kaeding be with the Chargers next season?
Gotta love a league where a team looks unbeatable one week and completely vulnerable the next.
I know it's "parity" but I think it stinks.
Give me the days when the 49ers blew everyone away.

Now we get another week of Manning vs. Brady.
The game just ended but I'm already sick of this storyline. You just know there's gonna be 3000 "Who's better, brady or manning?" stories next week.
Brady could beat Manning again and this discussion will still be had next year, and the next and the next.
Truth is they're just 2 players. Quarterbacks have a big influence over a game, but really, you're telling me the other 20 players have no bearing on the outcome?

 

You can't blame even a scintilla of this on the kicker.

Jeebus.

 

There's a running thread within three lines of this one, Brain. I know you're new here, so don't take that as being bitchy. Just thought you might not know.

 

Dear Brain of J: Check to see if anyone notices that Manning and Brady were far from star performers in their team's victories won by the Colts' defense and Troy Brown, Reche Caldwell, and Charger blunders for the Pats.

 

Yeah, the Chargers looked pretty unbeatable last week. Of course, they didn't have to play.

 

Of course, this thread will now go 30 pages and survive for six months...because the premise is that incredibly stupid.

Keading is one of the best kickers in football and a 54-yarder is not even a 50-50 proposition for anybody.

Of course, if Schottenheimer had let him try a 47-yarder early instead of going for it on fourth-and-11...

 

Geez, Moddy. Don't you know? It's knee-jerk journalism. How can a "supposedly" good kicker miss from fifty-four unless he was a choking dog? [/dripping with sarcasm]

 

Moddy's point is extremely well taken. The idea that a team should drive to within its kickers career-best field goal is dubious. You're basically saying, we'll leave it up to our guy to get lucky. Even a five-yard sideline route would have helped.
Frankly, the Chargers' stage presence on their final drive left a good deal to be desired. They pissed away 15 seconds after the first completion.

 

What is this fieldgoal you speak of?

 

54 yards, but I'm saying.
Playoffs are entirely different from regular season. You can't blame the kicker entirely, but the whole time before the kick I kept thinking back to that kick against the jets where they called a time out to ice him and he looked lost and confused.
Look at Vanderjagdt. The most accurate kicker, yadda yadda, then he misses against the Steelers to lose last season.
And ya, I saw the thread on the playoffs after I posted this one, sorry.

 

How many kicks were made this year from 54 yards or further?