Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

RichardBak wrote: ↑Thu May 07, 2026 7:23 pm If you can't find video, check out Baltimore's 1980 guide. Sounds like the kind of arcana that usually appears in the player's notes or in the game recaps.

RichardBak wrote: ↑Thu May 07, 2026 7:23 pm

timcastelli wrote: ↑Wed May 06, 2026 5:41 pm

TodMaher wrote: ↑Mon May 04, 2026 6:17 pm
This was a kick not a run.

Thank you for your feedback. For a play with inconsistent record keeping due to its near-automatic nature, the Steve Mike-Mayer play is easily the most inconsistent. My research shows that a slight majority of the dozen or so local newspaper box scores I reviewed had the Mike-Mayer play as a run and not a kick. Interestingly, a Delaware paper has the only mention I found of the play in a game description; it noted it as a kick in the article but listed it as a run in the box score. I suspect the lack of mentions in game articles was because it was a close high-scoring game and newspapers did not want to use column space on an XP in the first quarter. The LineScore shows as a run, ProFootball Reference lists as a run in the box score and a kick in the play-by-play (https://www.pro-football-reference.com ... 80clt.htm), while the Gamebook and Pro Football Archives show it as a kick.
Despite the split in scoring the play, my strong belief is that it was a run. Because PAT runs were very unusual and kicks were a near-certainty, it is highly improbable a scorer would mistakenly list it as a run when it was actually a kick. On the other hand, scorers often were on “automatic pilot” for extra points and marked the play as a kick out of habit. Additionally, because the kicker ran in the PAT, not the holder, it is easy to speculate that the scorer would more easily make a mistake about the type of conversion. Earlier I tried contacting Mike-Mayer with no luck. I still hope to find definitive proof either way, hopefully via video, but I think the circumstances heavily favor it being a run.

The Steve Mike-Mayer PAT in question was def a run. Although I'm in Detroit, the reason I remember it (if vaguely) is because Mike-Mayer had kicked for the Lions a couple years earlier, and the play was kind of unusual, so it had a somewhat local connection. The mention of it popped up on a sports hi-lites show--TV or radio, can't remember---and its mention may have had something to do with the Lions' loss that same day to Buffalo, whose kicker was Steve's brother, Nick. It's all a jumble, but just for the hell of it I checked a few online newspapers. About 1 out of 3 described it as a run in the box score, but even in those instances there was no mention of it in the main piece. If you can't find video, check out Baltimore's 1980 guide. Sounds like the kind of arcana that usually appears in the player's notes or in the game recaps.

RichardBak wrote: ↑Thu May 07, 2026 7:23 pm

timcastelli wrote: ↑Wed May 06, 2026 5:41 pm

TodMaher wrote: ↑Mon May 04, 2026 6:17 pm
This was a kick not a run.

Thank you for your feedback. For a play with inconsistent record keeping due to its near-automatic nature, the Steve Mike-Mayer play is easily the most inconsistent. My research shows that a slight majority of the dozen or so local newspaper box scores I reviewed had the Mike-Mayer play as a run and not a kick. Interestingly, a Delaware paper has the only mention I found of the play in a game description; it noted it as a kick in the article but listed it as a run in the box score. I suspect the lack of mentions in game articles was because it was a close high-scoring game and newspapers did not want to use column space on an XP in the first quarter. The LineScore shows as a run, ProFootball Reference lists as a run in the box score and a kick in the play-by-play (https://www.pro-football-reference.com ... 80clt.htm), while the Gamebook and Pro Football Archives show it as a kick.
Despite the split in scoring the play, my strong belief is that it was a run. Because PAT runs were very unusual and kicks were a near-certainty, it is highly improbable a scorer would mistakenly list it as a run when it was actually a kick. On the other hand, scorers often were on “automatic pilot” for extra points and marked the play as a kick out of habit. Additionally, because the kicker ran in the PAT, not the holder, it is easy to speculate that the scorer would more easily make a mistake about the type of conversion. Earlier I tried contacting Mike-Mayer with no luck. I still hope to find definitive proof either way, hopefully via video, but I think the circumstances heavily favor it being a run.

The Steve Mike-Mayer PAT in question was def a run. Although I'm in Detroit, the reason I remember it (if vaguely) is because Mike-Mayer had kicked for the Lions a couple years earlier, and the play was kind of unusual, so it had a somewhat local connection. The mention of it popped up on a sports hi-lites show--TV or radio, can't remember---and its mention may have had something to do with the Lions' loss that same day to Buffalo, whose kicker was Steve's brother, Nick. It's all a jumble, but just for the hell of it I checked a few online newspapers. About 1 out of 3 described it as a run in the box score, but even in those instances there was no mention of it in the main piece. If you can't find video, check out Baltimore's 1980 guide. Sounds like the kind of arcana that usually appears in the player's notes or in the game recaps.

RichardBak wrote: ↑Thu May 07, 2026 6:56 pm The Butkus PAT game was Nov. 14, 1971 vs Washington.

https://www.chicagobears.com/news/butku ... s-19009184