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| Position | Placekicker | ||||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||
| Born | (1944-06-02)2 June 1944 Larnaca, Cyprus | ||||||||||||||||||
| Died | 15 May 2015(2015-05-15) (aged 70) Media, Pennsylvania, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 5 ft 8 in (1.73 m) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 175 lb (79 kg) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Career information | |||||||||||||||||||
| High school | American (Larnaca, Cyprus) | ||||||||||||||||||
| College | None | ||||||||||||||||||
| NFL draft | 1966: undrafted | ||||||||||||||||||
| Career history | |||||||||||||||||||
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Garabed Sarkis "Garo"Yepremian (2 June 1944 – 15 May 2015) was an Armenian-CypriotAmerican footballplacekicker who played in theNational Football League (NFL) for 15 seasons, primarily with theMiami Dolphins. During his nine seasons with the Dolphins, Yepremian led the league in scoring in 1971, received twoPro Bowl and two first-teamAll-Pro honors, and helped the Dolphins win back-to-backSuper Bowl titles. Yepremian's first championship victory inSuper Bowl VII occurred as a member of the1972 Dolphins, the only team to complete aperfect season in NFL history. He also played for theDetroit Lions,New Orleans Saints andTampa Bay Buccaneers before retiring in 1981.
Yepremian was born inLarnaca,Cyprus, toArmenian parents.[1]
Yepremian and his brother,Krikor, who attendedIndiana University on a soccer scholarship, immigrated to theUnited States. Yepremian, who had earlier played in an organized soccer league inLondon, was not eligible to playcollege football. He was offered to play withArsenal, but Krikor wanted his brother to play football in theUnited States. With Krikor acting as his agent, he earned a contract with the Detroit Lions.[2]
Yepremian signed with the Detroit Lions on 13 October 1966.[1] In his rookie year, he broke an American football record by kicking six field goals in a single game against theMinnesota Vikings on 13 November.[3] His talent aside, Yepremian was, nonetheless, at a loss regarding football vernacular and custom. In his first game his coach told him that their team had lost the coin toss, at which point Yepremian ran to midfield and dropped to his knees looking for the coin.[2]
Yepremian was an immediate target to NFL players who considered American football the exclusive realm of Americans. Players were looking to take Yepremian's head off, and before his first kickoff his coach told him to run to the bench as soon as he kicked before his opponents could lay into him. Yepremian kicked off, then in a harried state ran to the wrong bench, finding himself sitting with the opposing team who while laughing then picked him up and threw him back onto the field. Yepremian had never worn a helmet and at first decided not to use one with a face mask, but that changed during Week 8 of the 1966 season, when he was knocked to the ground, roughed up and badly injured byGreen Bay Packers linebackerRay Nitschke.[4] Afterwards, he started using a single-bar mask.[2] He was the last player in NFL history to not wear afacemask on his helmet.[5]
During one of his early games with the Lions, they were losing but scored atouchdown in the last 10 seconds of the game. Yepremian was sent in to kick the extra point, and he was so excited after converting the point that he went running off the field with his arms raised in celebration. TeammateAlex Karras asked Yepremian, "What the hell are you celebrating?" Yepremian replied with a phrase made famous onThe Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson: "I keek (kick) a touchdown".[1][2] Yepremian later stated that he never actually said the line, but was made up by Karras.
After the 1967 season, Yepremian left football to enlist in theUnited States Army, even though he was not yet a citizen of theUnited States.[2] When he returned to the Detroit area in 1968, however, the Lions chose not to re-sign him, so Yepremian signed a contract to be a kicker/punter for the Michigan Arrows of theContinental Football League.[6] The Arrows, however, were a disaster on the field (1–11) and at the gate (drawing barely 4,000 fans a game in Detroit) and folded at season's end.[7]
After sitting out the 1969 season, Yepremian earned a spot on the Dolphins roster in 1970. In his first season with Miami, he converted all 31 extra point attempts and 22 of 29 field goal attempts.[8] He led the NFL with 117 points in 1971,[9][10] and in Super Bowl VI, he scored the only three Dolphin points against the Dallas Cowboys.[11] The next year, he was a key member of the 1972 Miami Dolphins "Perfect Season" team — he was the leading scorer and converted on many clutch field goals to help the Dolphins stay unbeaten.[12] Yepremian appeared in three Super Bowls (VI, VII, and VIII).[13][14]
Yepremian went to theNew Orleans Saints for the 1979 season, signed after their 1979 first round draft choice,Russell Erxleben (who was handling all kicking chores), suffered a season-ending injury prior to the Saints' week two game with theGreen Bay Packers. In 14 games, he made 12 of 16 attempts, with his longest being from 44 yards.[15] He spent his final two years with theTampa Bay Buccaneers. He made 16 of 23 in 1980, his lowest field goal rate since making only 45% in 1977.[16] For 1981, he went 2-for-4 to end his career as he was replaced byBill Capece.[17][18]
Over his career, Yepremian was successful on 210 of 313 field goals and 444 of 464 extra points for a total of 1,074 points.[19] He led the league in field goal accuracy three times, in 1970, 1975, and 1978.[20][21][22] Yepremian and kick returnerRick Upchurch are the only first-team members of the 1970s NFL All-Decade team to not be elected to thePro Football Hall of Fame.[23]
Yepremian is best known for two feats — one famous and one infamous. In aDivisional Round playoff game against theKansas City Chiefs on Christmas Day 1971, he kicked a 37-yard field goal 7 minutes and 40 seconds into double overtime, ending the longest game in NFL history and sending the Dolphins to the AFC Championship against theBaltimore Colts (which the Dolphins won to go on to Super Bowl VI).[2][24]
Despite all of Yepremian's success, many people remember him for a play inSuper Bowl VII in 1973. With his team leading theWashington Redskins 14–0, Yepremian was sent on to the field to kick a field goal with slightly more than two minutes left, which would have put the game out of reach. The field goal attempt was blocked byBill Brundige, and Yepremian managed to get to the ball before any other player did. Instead of falling on the ball to preserve the Dolphins' 14–0 lead, he picked it up and frantically attempted to throw a pass. As a result, the ball slipped from Yepremian's hands and went straight up in the air. Yepremian then attempted to bat the ball out of bounds but instead batted it back up in the air, and it went right into the arms of his former Lions teammate, Redskins cornerbackMike Bass, who returned it for a touchdown. The Dolphins managed to hold on to win, 14–7, thus completing the Dolphins' undefeated 1972 season. Yepremian later joked to reporters after the game, "This is the first time the goat of the game is in the winners' locker room."[2]
In the 1973Pro Bowl, Yepremian kicked five field goals to lead the AFC to a win, and was voted Most Valuable Player in that game.[25] He was elected to another Pro Bowl in 1978, and he kicked 20 consecutive field goals without a miss in 1979.[26]
Yepremian was a motivational speaker and was the Founder/CEO of the Garo Yepremian Foundation for Brain Tumor Research.[1]Reebok featured Yepremian and his teammates from the 1972 Dolphins team in a commercial which aired duringSuper Bowl XLII.[33] He guest starred in an episode ofThe Odd Couple in 1974 called "The Rain in Spain Falls Mainly In Vain".[34] He appeared in the moviePaper Lion as himself.[35] He owned his own neck tie company.[36]
Yepremian died on the morning of 15 May 2015, from high gradeneuroendocrine cancer at the age of 70.[37][38][39] He is interred at theOaklands Cemetery inWest Chester, Pennsylvania.
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