'Maher'y Christmas': Cowboys Cut Struggling Kicker And Sign Kai Forbath
FRISCO - The Dallas Cowboys have made a much-anticipated change at kicker, releasing Brett Maher (and his beloved pillow) while signing much-traveled veteran Kai Forbath.
The Cowboys scheduled a pair of workouts in recent days in search of either information or a replacement for Maher, who despite his long-range prowess has missed more field goals in the last half-decade than anybody in the NFL. Forbath, Nick Rose and Tristan Vizcaino were the tryout names as of Monday morning and now Forbath has emerged as the winner.
"From our side it's tough to watch that happen,'' Cowboys center Travis Frederick told 105.3 The Fan. "I wish him nothing but the best moving forward.'
While that sentiment is surely sincere, it was also "tough to watch'' Maher miss a 42-yard field goal and clunk a kickoff out of bounds against the Bears last Thursday in a loss that dropped Dallas to 6-7.
Maher's exit was possibly greased by his odd postgame reaction to the failures, when he insisted, “I hit every ball pretty well ... I’ll put my head on the pillow tonight feeling good about I did this week. I feel good.”
Forbath, meanwhile, is a career 85.8-percent kicker who played with five teams in eight years. most recently the Patriots for one game for an injured Nick Folk. Forbath was actually Cowboy once before, in the 2011 camp as competition for Dan Bailey.
Forbath, 32, has a lifetime mark of 121-of-141. Maher leaves Dallas having made 49 of 66 field-goal attempts in his two seasons, but just 20 of 30 this year. ... and in a bigger-than-football note, his final act in a Cowboy uniform was to join teammates at Monday's annual players' tour of children's hospitals.
