Billy Cundiff chose Washington over a variety of other teams a day after the Baltimore Ravens released the kicker because Mike Shanahan promised him he would be the team's starting kicker with no competition, Cundiff told the media Tuesday.
When Cundiff was cut by the Ravens Sunday, many teams, including the Redskins, came to Cundiff looking for his services. But he chose Washington because the team said he could be the starting kicker right away:
"I think that was one of the situations as we looked over all of the teams that were out there," Cundiff said. "We wanted to go somewhere where it wasn't going to be a last-minute kind of rug pulled out. We wanted to make sure they were going to make a commitment because, for us, I felt like I've earned that within my career."
The team made true on the promise, cutting Graham Gano, who had started for the team since 2009, Tuesday morning as soon as they signed Cundiff. Cundiff had already lost a position battle to undrafted Justin Tucker in Baltimore, while Gano had won the spot over Neil Rackers in Washington before he was ousted in favor of Cundiff.
Cundiff also spoke at length on his pivotal miss in the late moments of the 2012 AFC Championship game, where he couldn't connect on a 32-yarder that would likely have sent the game against the Patriots into overtime.
"I think there were about seven things that all went wrong. . . It was just a comedy of errors in a way. And that’s just how it transpired," he said Tuesday.
Cundiff said the Ravens assured him the kick played no part in them releasing the veteran kicker, and that for him, the miss is in the past.
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