Any Bears fan knows that Packer Week is not the time to be talking about how great the Bears’ kicker is doing.
But here goes:
- Cairo Santos has made a franchise-record 34 consecutive field goals in the regular season — including 7-of-7 this season. It’s the 10th-best streak in NFL history and 10 away from Adam Vinatieri’s NFL record of 44 consecutive field goals set in 2015-16 with the Colts.
- Santos has made 25 consecutive PATs, including 9-of-9 this season — a particularly notable accomplishment after NFL kickers missed 13 PATs last week alone.
- Santos has made 43 consecutive place-kicks (field goals and PATs) and 75 of his last 76 (98.7%). The only miss is a blocked PAT against the Lions last season. Overall, Santos has made 84-of-87 kicks (96.6%) since signing with the Bears prior to the 2020 season.
- Santos has not missed a field goal in a game the Bears have lost. His last miss was a 46-yard attempt against the Falcons in Week 3 last season — a 30-26 victory. His only other miss was the previous week — a 50-yard attempt against the Giants at Soldier Field. The Bears won, 17-13.
Santos’ success in a way is a little daunting heading into a game against the Packers — especially considering that Packers kicker Mason Crosby is the one who’s struggling. The 15-year veteran missed four kicks last week against the Bengals — a PAT and consecutive field goal attempts of 36, 51 and 40 yards in the final 2:16 of regulation and overtime before making a 49-yarder to win it. With Santos hot and Crosby not, what could go wrong?
But Santos is in such a good groove with holder Pat O’Donnell, long-snapper Patrick Scales and special teams coordinator Chris Tabor that he’s not concerned about any kind of jinx or the end of the streak, He’s on solid ground.
“It’s been a blur for awhile now,” Santos said. “My mentality has been “copy-and-paste” from week to week for awhile. It’s just been fun to be a part of when things go together — just trusting the preparation and the routine from week to week.
“I try to copy-and-paste and not worry about the result, and things are falling as they should — because I feel good out there. We’re getting great reps with the snap, hold and kick. It’s fun when we see that on Sundays.”
There’s no real secret to Santos’ success. When it’s just the snapper, holder and kicker, the routine is pretty simple.
“It’s the process,” Tabor said Thursday. “We went through Wednesday. We have our Thursday process. And then [Friday] we kick again. Hopefully we’re set up for success on Sunday. I say this and I’ve said it before: If you don’t honor the process, you don’t give yourself a chance on Sunday. If you do go through your process, you do give yourself a chance.”
As boring as that is, it’s nothing to be trifled with in Chicago. The tumult of Cody Parkey’s missed field goal in the playoffs against the Eagles at Soldier Field after the 2018 regular season that led the Bears to Santos is a memory that will not fade.
But the Bears’ luck has turned since the eight-kicker tryout in 2019 that failed to produce a winner. Eddy Pineiro finished strong with 11 consecutive made field goals in 2019. When he suffered a groin injury in training camp in 2020, the Bears signed Santos. And the rest is history.
Santos had a streak of 26 consecutive field goals at Tulane — four shy of the NCAA FBS record. It was snapped when a 32-yard attempt was blocked at Syracuse. He made a 56-yarder against Louisiana-Monroe the next week, then hit walk-off game-winners the next two weeks against North Texas (27 yards) and East Carolina (42 yards).
“It was a rough one because it was the week my dad passed away [in a stunt plane accident],” Santos said. “So I flew to Brazil for the funeral and the team said, ‘You can stay there as long as you want, or come back.’ I definitely wanted to come back. And then that game, I made a kick and then got the streak blocked there. So that was kind of a double-whammy on that week.
“But I hit a bunch of game-winners after that, so I kind of got another streak going and it ended up bing OK. So whenever this thing ends, I’m going to try to start a new one.”
