Nick Folk heard many of the old man observations and geezer jabs that came his way, and he was told about a few of the others that escaped his immediate attention.
There was his coach, Aaron Glenn, who said it was “crazy” to realize that he had played with Folk. Glenn retired in 2008. Quarterback Tyrod Taylor, himself a 36-year-old veteran, said he was glad when Folk signed with the Jets in the offseason because “that didn’t make me the oldest on the team.” And Qwant’tez Stiggers summed it all up perfectly.
“Nick, man,” the second-year defensive back and special teams contributor said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Nick old, but Nick good.”
All the 41-year-old kicker could do was shrug at the locker-room ribbing.
“Well,” he said with a sigh, “it’s true.”
Folk is old. Old enough to have been on the Jets the last time they made the playoffs in the 2010 season. Old enough to have started in the league when two-a-days were the training camp norm. Old enough to have kicked in now razed buildings like Texas Stadium and Giants Stadium and in now abandoned NFL cities like St. Louis, Oakland and San Diego.
But you know what doesn’t get old?
Trotting out onto the field with the clock whittled down to single digits and the game on the line. Taking that deep breath and nodding to the holder to start the action. Swinging that right leg through the football, feeling the foot connect, and knowing the contact was true. Then getting mobbed by teammates and celebrated for kicking the winning field goal.
That’s what he was able to do on Sunday, driving a liner through the lower left corner of the uprights from 56 yards out as time expired to give the Jets a 27-24 victory over the Falcons in a miserably cold and rainy MetLife Stadium. It was the 20th time in his career he felt that rush of a game-winner.
“There’s not a lot like it,” he said. “I might get a little more nervous at my kids’ games now than I do playing, but it’s always fun. I enjoy those moments. I’d probably be retired if I didn’t. I love it.”
The Jets love having him. That was easy to tell from the way they swarmed him in the immediacy of the kick and the jabs they took at his age afterward.
They also appreciate what he has been doing for them, not just Sunday but all season long. Folk has always been consistent, but this year he’s become something not a lot of 41-year-olds can accomplish in sport: He’s gotten better. The 56-yarder on Sunday was the longest game-winning field goal in Jets history and would have been Folk’s career-long on any kick too had he not hit from 58 already earlier this season.
Folk came into the game as the only kicker in the league with 10 or more attempts who had yet to miss on a field goal or extra point all season. That streak ended in the third quarter when he was wide-right on a 55-yard try. Folk said his 12-year-old twin sons back in Dallas gave him a hard time about that one when he Facetimed with them immediately after the game, but he definitely made up for it later.
“We knew he would come in and be able to stabilize,” Glenn said. “We knew once we got him the kicking part of our team would be on point. I’m just glad that we got him. He still has years left to play this game and he is doing a hell of a job for us.”
Folk was a Pro Bowler as a rookie for the Cowboys in 2007 but he hasn’t been one since. This season, 18 years later, he might make it back. If he does, someone will have to break the news to him that there is no longer an actual Pro Bowl game and no trip to Hawaii either. That’s another football vestige Folk has outlasted.
Folk credited his “good routine” for his success this season. After this game he took his usual dip into the tubs to take care of his body and on the way out the door he made a point of saying he would be at the facility in the morning for more upkeep.
Other parts of his life have changed since he first started this journey, though. There are things that make him appreciate days like Sunday a little more. Being a father of four kids old enough to watch and remember him playing — besides Davis and Gage, the twins, he has Anabelle, 10, and Ben, 8 — is tops on that list.
“They understand, all of them now,” Folk said. “It’s always fun because they get to live it now. The perspective is just different because I’m a dad.”
He also knows that at some point this will end. Folk probably won’t know when he kicks his last field goal, almost certainly won’t recognize his last game-winner as it happens. Maybe Sunday’s was that one. Better to savor all of them just in case.
While Folk has thrived this season, the Jets have obviously not. Folk’s kick on Sunday staved off mathematical elimination for the three-win Jets for at least one more week and the significance of the kicker from the team’s most recent playoff appearance in 2010 accomplishing that was lost on no one, least of all Folk.
Whether it’s next week or soon after, though, the Jets are going to be officially knocked out of the postseason picture for a 15th straight season. Folk understands that too.
“Hopefully this team can get back to those playoff days pretty soon,” he said. “I think A.G. has us heading in the right direction. Guys are believing, guys are fighting. It’s been a fun year for me. I know the record is not where I want it to be but we’re moving in the right direction.”
Will Folk still be kicking for the Jets if and when they get there? He’d be at least 42 by then, maybe even older.
“I just try to do it one kick at a time, really,” he said.
That’s an old axiom among kickers. It seems appropriate in that way.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday’s Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
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