Brett Maher (American football)
Brett Maher is an American football placekicker for the New York Jets of the National Football League. He was signed by the Jets as an undrafted free agent in 2013. He played college football at the University of Nebraska. He has also been a member of the Dallas Cowboys, Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Ottawa Redblacks, Hamilton Tiger-Cats, and Cleveland Browns.
Early years
Maher attended Centennial Public Schools, in Utica, Nebraska, for his first three years of high school before transferring to Kearney High School, where he played high school football for the Bearcats.As a senior, he made 8-of-14 field goals, 41 of 46 extra points, and averaged 41.2 yards per punt. He also played wide receiver, posting 775 receiving yards and 10 touchdowns. He received All-state honors from the Lincoln Journal Star and Omaha World-Herald at the end of the season.
In basketball, he was an honorable-mention Class A all-state pick as a senior. In track, he won the long jump and pole vault state championships as a senior, setting a state record in the latter.
College career
Maher turned down other football scholarship offers to walk-on at the University of Nebraska. As a redshirt freshman and as a sophomore, he appeared in all games as the holder for field goals and extra points, while also serving as the backup punter behind Alex Henery.As a junior, he was named the starter at placekicker and punter after Henery graduated. He made 19-of-23 field goals, 43-of-44 extra points and averaged 44.5 yards per punt. He received Big Ten Special Teams Player of the Week honors three times, while being named Eddleman-Fields Big Ten Punter of the Year and Bakken-Andersen Big Ten Kicker of the Year. He became one of the few specialist in Big Ten history to be named All-Conference both at kicker and punter in the same season.
As a senior, the school awarded him with a football scholarship. He made 20-of-27 field goals, all of his 59 extra point attempts, 57 touchbacks out of 96 kickoffs, and averaged 41.8 yards per punt. His 20 field goals ranked second in school history for a season, and his 119 points set a record for most points scored by a kicker. He ranked third overall in conference in scoring and first among kickers. He received the Bakken-Andersen Big Ten Kicker-of-the-Year Award for the second straight year.
He finished his career with 39-of-50 made field goals, 219 points, 120 punts for a 43.2-yard average and 43 punts inside the 20-yard line.
Collegiate statistics
Professional career
New York Jets
Maher was signed as an undrafted free agent by the New York Jets after the 2013 NFL Draft on May 12, earning the contract following a rookie minicamp tryout. He was waived on July 23, to make room for placekicker Billy Cundiff.Dallas Cowboys
On August 11, 2013, Maher was signed by the Dallas Cowboys, to play in the preseason while Dan Bailey recovered from an injury. He was released two weeks later on August 27.Winnipeg Blue Bombers
On May 1, 2014, Maher signed a contract with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League. He played in two pre-season games for the Bombers before being released by the team due to the restrictions on the number of national and international players on the team's roster; the team kept their Canadian incumbent.Ottawa Redblacks
A few weeks after being released by Winnipeg, he signed with the Ottawa Redblacks. In week four of the season, Maher was named the CFL's Special Teams Player of the Week after going 6-for-6 on field goals, scoring all the Redblacks' points in an 18–17 decision over the Toronto Argonauts. The victory marked the expansion club's first-ever win. On May 13, 2015, he was released by the Redblacks because of a hip injury he suffered in the prior month, before the start of training camp. He missed all but 4 games during the season due to the injury.Hamilton Tiger-Cats
On May 19, 2016, Maher signed with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats after taking part in a team mini-camp. He completed 82% of his field goal attempts that season, going 41-for-50, and had a punt average of 45.9 yards.Cleveland Browns
On March 20, 2017, Maher signed with the Cleveland Browns.On May 2, he was released after not being able to pass rookie Zane Gonzalez on the depth chart.
Ottawa Redblacks (second stint)
On June 10, 2017, Maher signed with the Ottawa Redblacks. He achieved the same completion percentage as the previous season in Hamilton, recording the same amount of field goals on 50 attempts. His punt average was 46.7 yards.Dallas Cowboys (second stint)
2018 season
On April 4, 2018, Maher signed with the Dallas Cowboys, to limit the off-season workload of Dan Bailey. He was 4 out of 5 field goal attempts in preseason, which included two 45-yarders and a 57-yard field goal. On September 1, in a surprise move, the Cowboys released Bailey, making Maher the team's kicker to start the season. His NFL debut came in the season opener against the Carolina Panthers, where he missed his first career field goal attempt. He would then go on to make fifteen straight field goal attempts.In Week 4, Maher kicked all four field goals, including a 38-yard game-winner as time expired, in a 26–24 comeback win over the Detroit Lions, earning him NFC Special Teams Player of the Week. On October 14 in a game against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Maher converted 4 field goals, including a 55-yarder which at the time was his career long and the second-longest field goal in AT&T Stadium behind Dan Bailey's 56-yard field goal. From Week 7 to Week 11, he missed either a field goal or an extra point in 4 straight games.
On November 18, Maher kicked a 48-yard game-winning field goal to beat the Atlanta Falcons. On December 9, 2018, Maher kicked a new career-long 62-yard field goal against the Philadelphia Eagles as time expired in the first half. The field goal also set a franchise record and tied for the third-longest in NFL history.
In Week 16, Maher converted two field goals and three extra points in a 27–20 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, earning him NFC Special Teams Player of the Week. He made 5-of-8 field goal attempts in the final 4 games, missing a field goal in three of the last 4 games.
He finished with 29-of-36 field goals, 32-of-33 extra points and 67.5% touchbacks of his kickoffs. He ranked eighth in the league with 29 field goals and tied for most field goals of at least 50 yards, which also tied a franchise record for a single-season. He was 25th in field goal percentage and tied for 11th in the league in accuracy from 40–49 yards.
2019 season
In 2019, Maher struggled with his accuracy during the preseason, but the team showed confidence on his ability by not bringing another kicker to compete with him. On October 13, in a loss against the New York Jets, Maher became the first kicker in NFL history to have two made field goals of 62 or more yards in a career. On October 6, he made one out of 3 field goal attempts against the Green Bay Packers.On October 20, Maher set a new career long and broke his own Cowboys franchise record when he scored a 63-yard field goal against the Philadelphia Eagles. On the game, he converted all four of his extra points and all three of his field goals, earning him NFC Special Teams Player of the Week. Maher kept struggling during the season with accuracy issues, but the team was patient, waiting for him to play through it. On November 28, he missed 2 field goals in the 15–26 loss against the Buffalo Bills.
On December 5, he missed a 42-yard field goal in the 31–24 loss against the Chicago Bears, his 10th miss of the season. Although he connected on a 31-yard attempt in the final two minutes to cut the lead to 7 points, he also hit a kickoff out of bounds early in the fourth quarter, helping the Bears take over at their own 40-yard. After the game he was quoted in the media as saying: “I felt like I hit every ball pretty well tonight. I’ll put my head on the pillow tonight feeling good about what I did this week and moving forward”.
On December 9, with the team experiencing a streak of 3 straight losses and in danger of missing the playoffs, Maher was released by the Cowboys due to accuracy concerns. He finished the season converting just 20-of-30 field goals, 7-of-13 on attempts between 30 and 49 yards, missing at least one attempt in 8 of 13 games and making all 36 extra points. He also set NFL career and single-season records for most field goals made of over 60 yards. He was replaced with Kai Forbath.