Greg Zuerlein Signs with Jets: How Close Were Cowboys to Keeping Kicker?

The much-maligned kicker fell out of favor among fans, but how close was Dallas to retaining his services?

FRISCO -- He didn't quite reach Mike Vanderjagt status with Dallas Cowboys fans, but he's probably not in the Dan Bailey category either. Where does former Cowboys kicker Greg Zuerlein fall in Cowboys kicker history?

Vanderjagt, the self-proclaimed "greatest kicker of all time" was signed by the Cowboys in 2006 to a three-year, $4.5 million contract that. That experiment failed miserably as Vanderjagt didn't make it through the season, cut in November that year to be replaced by Martin "Automatica" Gramatica.

Bailey was good for the Cowboys for a long time after joining the team as an undrafted free agent in 2011. But after an injury he fell off late in 2017 and was cut the following season.

"Bones" Fassel

Greg Zuerlein

Greg Zuerlein

Zuerlein certainly had his good moments in Dallas - with several 50+-yard game-tying kicks last season - and the Cowboys tried to reward him with a new contract. But the Jets signed the veteran kicker to a one-year contract worth $2.75 million. He’s expected to compete with New York’s current kicker, Eddy Piñeiro, for the starting job in 2022.

When Zuerlein joined Dallas in 2020, it was expected he'd be the same All-Pro he was in 2017 by joining his former Rams special teams coordinator John Fassel with the Cowboys. But it never quite materialized.

While with the Cowboys, Zuerlein only made 83 percent of his field goal attempts. Hardly an All-Pro stat. His extra point percentage decreased during his time in Dallas too, nose-diving from 91.7 percent in 2020 to 87.5 percent in 2021. He also had the most extra point misses in the league last season with six.

Chris Naggar

Greg Zuerlein

Greg Zuerlein

What hurts worse is that Dallas lost three games last season by three points or less, and in those games, Zuerlein missed at least one kick.

Zuerlein was cut this month to clear up $2.5 million of cap space, but re-signing him to a smaller contract was apparently an option.

Dallas will once again be forced to find a kicker, something the team has long struggled with. Chris Nagger was signed earlier this offseason, but with his lack of experience (just one pro game) he'll have to compete with a free-agent signing or a new draftee to win the job.

Zuerlein was never as beloved by fans as Bailey was early in his career, and he certainly wasn't bad enough to be despised like Vanderjagt. He probably falls somewhere in the middle, like a lot of former Cowboys kickers, to be soon forgotten as Dallas weeds through kicking-game mediocrity once again.