Our Idiot Kicker

"After all I've accomplished, I'm not going to let one kick define me," Vanderjagt said, wearing a backward baseball cap at camp. "I haven't lasted eight years in this league by lacking confidence."

Joining '60s quarterback Jerry Rhome as the only Cowboys to wear No. 13, Vanderjagt arrived in Oxnard and promptly missed his first kick to the right. His lone preseason kickoff died at the 12, and his only field goal makes came from 21 and 22 yards. Though there is reason for concern when your Vanderjagt kicks like a Vanderslice or even a Vanderbeek, the Cowboys never seriously discussed releasing him.

"You can only rest on your laurels for so long," says Vanderjagt, who's blamed his failures on everything from a new holder to a sore groin to genuine indifference toward meaningless games. "I have a lot of making up to do."

The uncertainty, however, will never escalate into panic. Because Vanderjagt has been too good for too long to decompose into Scott Norwood overnight. And because a couple of his game-winning kicks combined with a--for now--healthy and happy Owens will get the Cowboys into the playoffs.

But if Dallas has a shot to make it to Super Bowl XLI in Miami, a destination old oil wildcatter Jones is uncomfortably referring to as "the glory hole," Vanderjagt and Owens must be the team's two leading scorers.

So dawns the delicious irony to this season: Parcells, a coach who despises players that covet individual stats over team success, finds himself relying heavily on two such poster boys--T.O. and Our Idiot Kicker.