Rookie, 27, kick-starts Raiders
For five years, it was the same disheartening scenario.
Giorgio Tavecchio would intrigue a team just enough to make its preseason roster and go through training camp, only to get cut. Sometimes it was earlier, sometimes it was later. But always he’d find himself at home, watching yet another NFL season start without him.
“Close,” Tavecchio said when asked if he’d ever considered calling it quits. “You can’t imagine
how close.”
Oh, what he would have missed if he had.
A day after being signed from the practice squad, the 27-yearold rookie kicked four field goals Sunday, including two 52-yarders, to seal the Oakland Raiders’ 26-16 victory against the Tennessee Titans. Tavecchio is the first kicker since the 1970 merger to make two 50-yard field goals in his debut and joins Sebastian Janikowski as the only Raider with two 50-yarders.
Tavecchio also had field goals from 43 and 20 yards and nailed two extra points. That means he’ll finish Week 1 with more points than quarterbacks Tom Brady and Matt Ryan. More points, too, than Derek Carr or the many other weapons in Oakland’s highpowered offensive arsenal.
“It couldn’t happen to a better person,” Carr said. “When he was knocking those kicks, from coaches to players to staff, there wasn’t anyone who wasn’t smiling. Obviously, he’s doing things to help us win the game, but it’s more so for the person.
“I think that’s what makes our group special. Everyone out there — obviously we want to win, but we really cared more for him that he was having some success and that he could feel a little joy after the game.”
Janikowski has been Oakland’s security blanket for the better part of two decades. He’s been as productive as he is durable, missing one game in the last 15 years. But the Raiders were concerned enough about his aching back — to say nothing of his contract — that they brought in three kickers last week and signed Tavecchio to the practice squad Friday.
By Saturday, Janikowski was on injured reserve and Tavecchio was on a 53-man roster for the first time in his career. This was his fourth year in training camp with the Raiders, and he’s also been on the preseason rosters for the San Francisco 49ers, Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions since 2012.
“There was something all week that I just, I felt it,” Tavecchio said. “As terrible as I was feeling and disappointment after being released, it’s not about me. If the team were to need me, I needed to be able to step up.”
But there’s stepping up, and there’s what Tevecchio did.
His first kick of the game, an extra-point attempt, was delayed for what seemed like “an eternity” while Amari Cooper’s touchdown catch was reviewed.
“It was like, ‘Come on! Just let me go out there!’ ” Tavecchio said.
That was nothing, though, compared with his second field goal. With two seconds before halftime, Tavecchio trotted out onto the field for the 52-yard try. That’s a long kick for anyone to make, let alone a guy who four days ago was unemployed and working out at his high school in the Bay Area.
But Tavecchio coolly put it through the center of the uprights, setting off a raucous celebration on the Raiders sideline.
As if to prove that was no fluke, he did it again in the third quarter. A penalty on Marquette King ’s punt put the ball at the edge of Ta- vecchio’s range and, after a timeout to decide whether to punt again or go for it, he converted.
“An outstanding performance from our kicker,” Raiders coach Jack Del Rio said, breaking into a smile.
“That’s grit. That’s perseverance.”
And it was every bit as good as Tavecchio had imagined.
He has a degree in political economy from California and last year did an internship with a tech company. He’s fluent in Italian — he was born in Milan — and quoted Aristotle during his postgame interview.
So he has options.
But dreams have a way of taking hold, regardless of what common sense tells you. More often than not, that’s a guarantee for disappointment.
Every once in a while, though, it results in a gift.
“It’s special,” said Tavecchio, who was given the game ball by his teammates. “I can look back at this time when all this is said and done and just be grateful for this day.”
Six years in the making, and it was worth every second.