Miami Dolphins kicker Dan Carpenter goes from Montana to Miami

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Miami Dolphins kicker Dan Carpenter goes from Montana to Miami

By GREG COTE
Miami Herald

In football they call it ''icing the kicker,'' when an opponent calls timeout expressly to rattle the guy about to attempt the winning field goal. Dolphins fans might take heart that the ploy has never worked on Dan Carpenter.

Evidently, it isn't easy to ice a kicker who has been frozen.

Here is a nomination for Carpenter as The Unlikeliest Dolphin.

This is a guy who kicked in a University of Montana outdoor stadium set deep in the Missoula valley, where the later it got in the season, the more likely he was to battle snow, sleet or the smoke, soot or fog that tended to settle in as the winter deepened.

Around those parts, you would do no double take to see elk or antelope wandering within sight of the stadium as bundled-up fans sang the school fight song that ends, ``and the squeal of the pig will float in the air, from the tummy of the Grizzly Bear.''

From this rugged setting the Dolphins plucked Carpenter this spring, signing him as an anonymous, undrafted free agent. We had little cause to think we would ever need to get to know him, considering the job was held with seeming security by veteran Jay Feely, who last year set a franchise record for accuracy by making 21 of 23 field-goal attempts.

The Dolphins waiving Feely this month in favor of an unknown small-school rookie was a stunner, Miami to Missoula.

STILL DREAMING

''I'm probably still in the pinch-me phase,'' Carpenter admitted Tuesday as he walked off the practice field and toward an NFL career that begins for real in 11 days. ``I think it'll sink in once the regular season starts and the Jets come to town.''

Many Dolfans, concerned about swapping proof for potential, were worried coach Tony Sparano and the new management had made a risky choice.

''We were shocked, too,'' Carpenter's mother, Diane, said Tuesday. ``We're still not believing it. It still does not feel real to me.''

Yet results, so far, make Team Tuna look smart. In swapping Feely for Carpenter, the Dolphins got younger, saved a bunch of money (Carpenter will make ''only'' $295,000 this season) and have seen the new man go 7 for 7 in preseason field-goal tries, four of them beyond 40 yards. Also, his kickoffs have been farther than Feely's.

The story is a reminder how NFL teams can sometimes mine nuggets of gold from the most remote little mountains.

Carpenter kicked 75 field goals and scored 413 points in four years at Montana, setting an NCAA career points record for Division I-AA. But there is a tendency to look down upon achievements that bubble under the radar and aren't on national TV.

MIDDLE OF IT ALL

The Dolphins knew better. And the player's family isn't surprised Dan has made the most of his shot.

''He's always been the kid who wants the pressure,'' said his mother by phone from her job in a Wal-Mart pharmacy in Helena, Mont., where Dan was raised. ``He likes it. He always wanted to be the one with the last shot in basketball or to take the penalty kick in soccer or kick that winning field goal.''

Diane recalls her ''Daniel'' once playing in a winter soccer tournament in Idaho around age 10. The goalkeeper got hurt. Dan stepped in.

''It was sleeting and his little hands were just frozen,'' she said. ``But he managed to stop every shot and his team won.''

Carpenter's father, Val, a retired risk manager for Blue Cross Blue Shield, said he thinks the elements helped shape his son as a kicker, mentally as much as anything.

''It was either foggy or it was cold and or snowy. And sometimes windy,'' he said. ``It could get so cold the football becomes like a rock. But whatever it was, he adapted.''

Carpenter grew up outdoors; ''He was never inside,'' his mom said. ``Rode his bike constantly. One of those wild outdoors kids.''

The kicker loves hunting elk, antelope and game birds. Spent his high school years camping in the mountains most every weekend. Fished for walleyes, trout and perch. Loves a good pheasant casserole.

Kicking has been something of a Dolphins hallmark through the years. Garo Yepremian, Uwe von Schamann, Fuad Reveiz, Pete Stoyanovich and Olindo Mare formed a nearly uninterrupted timeline from 1970-2006, combining for 17 100-point-plus seasons and 21 of 99 points or more.

SMALL FRATERNITY

It will be interesting to see if Carpenter is up to joining that list. Somehow his upbringing seems to have grounded him in a way that gives him the sort of even-keel that serves a kicker well.

Dan called home after he hit those four field goals in Jacksonville, and his father could barely contain his excitement.

Said the son: ``Dad. You know it's just a football game.''

The kid from Montana appears to have the right leg -- and the right attitude -- to be here for a good while.