FLORHAM PARK, N.J. -- Braden Mann's career as a linebacker ended when he fractured his back as a high school freshman. Refusing to quit football, he switched his focus to punting, but never lost that linebacker's mentality.
It's a mentality that preserved a Week 15 victory for the New York Jets and might have changed the course of NFL history.
"I haven't looked at it that way, but I guess I could see where people would think that," Mann said Wednesday in a phone interview with ESPN.
With the Jets clinging to a 23-20 lead last Sunday, the 5-foot-11, 198-pound punter made a fantastic, open-field tackle on Los Angeles Rams punt returner Nsimba Webster at the Jets' 43-yard line with 5:33 left in the fourth quarter.