These are the kick returns for touchdown in Green Bay Packers history
It's hard to fathom a more momentum-shifting play than a kick return for a touchdown, but you might be surprised how rarely they happen. StatMuse (which has data back to 1940) regards Keisean Nixon's return on Jan. 1 as just the 31st in Packers history and the first since Randall Cobb in 2011, which itself happened to be the first Packers touchdown on a kick return in 11 years.
So yes, since the year 2000, the Packers have achieved the feat only twice. We bet you can remember Cobb's. What about the one before that? We know for certain you remember one on Jan. 26, 1997.
These aren't always household names, but they certainly left a mark, even if only for one play.
Keisean Nixon (Jan. 1, 2023)
There are so many fascinating elements to the Nixon story. Signed in March to play for special teams coach Rich Bisaccia, with whom he'd worked as a member of the Las Vegas Raiders for the previous three years, Nixon didn't open as the team's return man in 2022. That role went to Amari Rodgers, a 2021 draft pick who struggled fiercely and ultimately got released after Week 10.
Nixon helped the kickoff return game show immediate improvement, and he nearly scored on a kickoff the preceding week, taking a first-quarter kick 93 yards to the Miami 9-yard line. The Packers had to settle for a field goal then, but they were able to claw back for a 26-20 must-win. Nixon, however, injured his hip in the game and didn't practice during the week, coming into another must-win against Minnesota as a game-time decision.
The decision to let him play was a good one. After Minnesota blocked a punt and put itself on the 1-yard line before settling for its own field goal, Nixon took the ensuing kickoff 105 yards for a touchdown, setting the stage for a 41-17 victory that put the Packers one win away from a playoff berth.
Randall Cobb (Sept. 8, 2011)
One of Nixon's teammates on the 2022 Packers is veteran receiver Randall Cobb, who was just a rookie when he authored the previous Packers kickoff return for a touchdown. This one came in the NFL season opener, a Thursday night game featuring the defending Super Bowl-champion Packers and a powerful Saints team that would go on to a top-three seed in the NFC playoffs.
After a field goal brought the Saints to within 28-20 midway through the third quarter, the University of Kentucky alumnus tied an NFL record when he fielded the ball deep in the end zone and returned it 108 yards for the touchdown, a crucial score in what became a 42-34 victory for the Packers. Cobb was nearly brought down at the 22-yard line but spun out of a tackle and somehow kept his balance.
The NFL record for distance on a kick-return touchdown was surpassed by Cordarrelle Patterson of Minnesota in 2013 against the Packers (109 yards).
Allen Rossum (Nov. 19, 2000)
The Packers might have been in trouble if Rossum hadn't returned a kickoff for a 92-yard score in the fourth quarter, breaking up three Indianapolis touchdowns in the final period for a tense 26-24 Packers win. Indianapolis had just pulled to within 19-17 when Mike Vanderjagt's kick turned into a thrilling moment at Lambeau Field. Rossum, who had been acquired in late August from Philadelphia in exchange for a draft pick, retired in 2009 as one of the NFL's all-time leading kick returners, including four returns of 40 yards or more during his time in Green Bay. Rossum had returned a kick 90 yards the week before but gotten stopped at the 1-yard line.
Basil Mitchell (Jan. 2, 2000)
The Packers have gone 11-year windows between their most recent kickoff returns, but Rossum's came just 11 months after the next-most recent entry. In one of the craziest regular-season moments in team history, Green Bay found itself in a battle to outscore Carolina, playing in another part of the country against New Orleans, to secure the playoff tiebreaker between the two squads. Green Bay, meanwhile, was playing Arizona, and the teams went back-and-forth for control of the tiebreaker before the Packers pulled ahead (though neither team wound up going to the playoffs). Part of the 49-24 win was an 88-yard kickoff return by Basil Mitchell.
Roell Preston (Oct. 5, 1998 and Sept. 6, 1998)
The last time the Packers took a kickoff back for a touchdown in a losing effort came against the Vikings on Oct. 5, 1998, marking the first loss at Lambeau Field since 1995 in a 37-24 Minnesota win on a rainy night. Randall Cunningham and rookie Randy Moss put on a show in a game general manage Ron Wolf called a "total embarrassment for everyone connected with the team." Preston's 101-yard return was most of the offense in the first half.
Preston also was the last Packers player to return two kickoffs for scores in the same season. Against Detroit in the opener, his 100-yard kickoff return gave the Packers a 31-19 lead, followed by an 84-yard touchdown pass between Brett Favre and Antonio Freeman to seal the 38-19 triumph. It was the debut of new Packers special teams coach Johnny Holland and it came as an immediate response to Green Bay's own special teams problems, allowing a 101-yard touchdown on a kick return from Detroit's Terry Fair. It was the first NFL instance of back-to-back kick-return scores since 1987.
Preston also had a kick return for a score during the exhibition season.
Desmond Howard (Jan. 26, 1997)
Howard's Super Bowl MVP moment was his only kick return of the year for a touchdown, though he did also return three punts for touchdowns in the regular season and another in the playoffs. Howard came back a couple of years later in 1999 for eight games, but the 1996 season was his only full year as a member of the Packers, and he averaged a league-best 15.1 yards per punt return.
Don Beebe (Oct. 6, 1996)
During the Super Bowl season, it was Beebe who returned a kickoff to the end zone, a 90-yard strike in the third quarter of an early-season 37-6 blowout of the Bears. Chicago had just picked up a field goal from Jeff Jaeger to pull the Bears within 20-6. It was the first kickoff return for a score in Beebe's eight-year NFL career to that point, and the 31-year old initially ran into the back of Keith McKenzie, before McKenzie helped block for Beebe's path.
Robert Brooks (Dec. 4, 1994 and Oct. 3, 1993)
Brooks was known as a receiver first, and one who authored many Lambeau Leaps into the end zone seats. But don't forget his acumen as a kick returner.
His 98-yarder against the Lions in 1994 helped the Packers take an early lead in Detroit, though Green Bay ultimately lost 34-31 in an upset that put the team's playoff aspirations in jeopardy (though Green Bay won its final three games of the year and would up defeating Detroit at Lambeau in the wild-card round, where Barry Sanders was famously held to minus-1-yard rushing). Brooks actually tweaked a hamstring on the return but returned to the game after some plays off.
Against Dallas early in the 1993 season, Brooks took one back 95 yards, though it only stemmed the tide briefly in the Cowboys' 36-14 win. Dallas went on to beat the Packers that year in the divisional round of the playoffs, too, 27-17.
Charles Wilson (Oct. 6, 1991)
Wilson returned the opening kickoff of the second half 82 yards for a score at Lambeau Field, raising the ball in the air by the time he got to the Dallas 15-yard line. Dallas, however, was able to hold on for a 20-17 win and drop the Packers to 1-5 to start the year. The Packers were working with backup quarterback Blair Kiel with Don Majkowski injured.
Darrell Thompson (Dec. 22, 1990)
Thompson is regarded as a draft miss, with the Packers selecting him 19th overall in what became an otherwise spectacular 1990 draft, but he did have a touchdown on a kickoff, going 76 yards to open the second half against Detroit in an eventual 24-17 loss at freezing Lambeau Field. Thompson, who wasn't the deep man on the return, bobbled the ball before finding his footing and sprinting down the left sideline.
Del Rodgers (Dec. 9, 1984)
Rodgers brought a squib kick back 97 yards in the third quarter to break a 7-7 tie and help the Packers hold off Chicago 20-14. Third-string quarterback Rich Campbell found Phillip Epps for a 43-yard touchdown with 34 seconds left on third-and-long to win, not long after Bears coach Mike Ditka accepted a holding penalty that pushed Green Bay back, even though an incomplete pass had made it fourth-and-10 and would have required a 50-yard field goal from rookie kicker Al Del Greco.
Rodgers had enjoyed a strong return year but had been tripped up by the opposing kicker on multiple occasions.
Aundra Thompson (Nov. 4, 1979)
Even though he was battling the flu and dropped passes and a reverse handoff in the game, Thompson brought a kick back 100 yards to give the Packers a 15-14 lead over the Jets in the second quarter, though New York would eventually prevail 27-22. John Anderson missed the extra point and the Jets were able to follow with a score before halftime despite barely more than a minute left before the break.
Steve Odom (Oct. 15, 1978 and Oct. 12, 1975)
Odom took the opening kickoff to the end zone for a 95-yard return at County Stadium that helped Green Bay jump out to an eye-popping 28-0 lead after the first quarter, part of a 45-28 win over Seattle in 1978. The win moved the Packers to 6-1 on the year, though they finished 8-7-1 and missed the playoffs.
Odom had told, Greg Peeters, an 11-year-old from Shiocton who'd lost both legs in a tractor accident, that if he scored a touchdown, he'd give the ball to the boy. Peeters, who was fitted for artificial legs and later competed in college on the wrestling team, kept the ball and reconnected with Odom decades later.
Three years earlier, Odom took the opening kickoff 93 yards against the Saints in New Orleans, but the Packers fell 20-19 and dropped to 0-4 on the year thanks to Rich Szaro's 20-yard field goal as time expired. Defensive tackle Mike McCoy picked up a fumble on the Saints' second play from scrimmage and ran 19 yards to give Green Bay a shocking 14-0 lead in the first 65 seconds of play, and the lead would grow to 16-0 before the Packers blew it.
Odom remains the franchise leader in career kickoff return yardage with 4,124.
Terdell Middleton (Nov. 6, 1977)
Odom fielded this kickoff, too, but he handed it to the rookie Middleton on a reverse and caught the Chiefs napping, allowing Middleton to go 85 yards in the fourth quarter to pull the Packers to within 17-10 of an eventual 20-10 loss. Odom took the ball at the 4-yard line and headed to his right, where Middleton snatched it away at the 15-yard line and surged to the other sideline and up the field. It was a breakout day overall for Middleton with 49 yards rushing, as well, but he was stuffed on fourth-and-2 on the Packers' last-gasp drive.
Dave Hampton (three times)
A weaving 90-yard kickoff return against the Saints pulled the Packers to within 19-14 at County Stadium on Nov. 28, 1971, but New Orleans pulled away for a 29-21 win thanks in large part to six Green Bay turnovers, including Doug Wyatt's 55-yard interception touchdown later in the same fourth quarter.
A year earlier, on Oct. 4, 1970, Hampton's 101-yard return against Minnesota in the fourth quarter proved massive in a 13-10 win, with Hampton taking off his helmet in the end zone and throwing it high into the air.
His first career kickoff return Sept. 28, 1969, also proved highly consequential when he took the second-half kickoff 87 yards for the first points of the game in what became a 14-7 win over the 49ers. San Francisco had kicked the ball out of bounds and then re-kicked a liner right to Hampton, who threw the ball to the ground before he crossed the goal line in celebration. Officials didn't see it, however, allowing the rookie to keep his touchdown instead of a 49ers touchback.
Larry Krause (Dec. 6, 1970)
Taking the opening kickoff back 100 yards helped the Packers strike first in a 20-12 win over the Steelers, though Green Bay missed the kick and eventually fell behind before rallying on two touchdown passes by Bart Starr. Krause, a rookie who'd been drafted in the 17th round out of St. Norbert College in De Pere, fumbled the kick but picked it up at the goal line, keeping tacklers at bay all the way up the sideline for his first pro touchdown.
Travis Williams (five times)
The king of kick returning in Packers history, Williams procured the fifth of his kickoff returns in the third quarter of a 38-34 win over the Steelers on Nov. 2, 1969 — the same game in which he also returned a punt 83 yards and scored on a 1-yard rush in the fourth quarter, plus a key 31-yard run that set the stage for the winning touchdown to Carroll Dale. It was an absurd game that featured six combined interceptions, eight fumbles (three lost) and five quarterbacks. It was the most combined points in a Packers game in 14 years.
In 1967 as a rookie out of Arizona State, Williams returned a staggering four kicks for touchdowns, including a 104-yarder against the Rams in the third quarter to tie the game at 17 (though the Rams went on to win, 27-24) on Dec. 9.
Incredibly, Williams had two kickoff returns for scores Nov. 12 before the end of the first quarter against the Browns in November, part of a 55-7 shellacking. He took the opening kick 87 yards and then added an 85-yarder to end the quarter after Cleveland recorded its only points of the game, leaving the Packers with a 35-7 edge by the start of the second. By the time the Packers had a 28-0 lead, Cleveland had managed five scrimmage plays, and two resulted in turnovers. Williams became the first player in NFL history to return two kicks for touchdowns in the same quarter.
His 93-yarder in the fourth quarter against the Cardinals on Oct. 30 gave the Packers a 24-23 lead, part of a rally for a 31-23 win in October at the second-year Busch Stadium in St. Louis.
Williams still shares the record for most kickoff touchdowns in a season. His 41.1 yards per kickoff return also remains an NFL record (739 yards on 18 kickoffs).
Herb Adderley (Oct. 6, 1963 and Nov. 18, 1962)
The Hall of Fame defensive back took the opening kickoff 98 yards in a 42-10 win over the Rams in 1963. A year earlier, he ran one back 103 yards as a response to the Colts' opening field goal, giving the Packers a 7-3 lead en route to a 17-13 win. It was a game full of Hall of Fame efforts: a previous Baltimore drive had stalled just short of the goal line when Ray Nitschke recovered a ball shaken loose by Willie Wood, and Jerry Kramer added a field goal that cashed in an Adderley interception later in the game.
Al Carmichael (Oct. 7, 1956 and Oct. 23, 1955)
Carmichael brought back a first-quarter kickoff 106 yards to immediately answer the Bears' opening score, but Chicago prevailed 37-21. Carmichael, a first-round draft choice and seventh overall pick out of USC in 1953, set an NFL record at the time with the return, one that wasn't surpassed until 2007. Carmichael led the league in kickoff returns with a 28.1 average in 1956.
One year earlier, he returned a kickoff 100 yards to the end zone against the Browns in the second quarter, but the Packers lost 41-10.
Andy Uram (Oct. 25, 1942)
He returned a kick 98 yards at Detroit in a 28-7 win over the Lions, and he became known for his long-distance magic. Uram's 90-yard punt return in 1941 stood as a Packers record for distance until 1954, and his 174 yards on four receptions in 1942 (with three touchdowns) also established a Packers record for receiving yards by a back. In 1939, Uram also set an NFL record with a 97-yard touchdown run from scrimmage, a mark that was tied 10 years later but not broken until 1983 (and not surpassed by a Packer until Ahman Green in 2003).
JR Radcliffe can be reached at (262) 361-9141 or jradcliffe@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @JRRadcliffe.
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: These Green Bay Packers returned kickoffs for touchdowns
