First, let me know what you’ve been doing since your time in the NFL?

Obviously, I’m older now! I was let go from my job last March so I was just deciding if I want to go back to work again after all this is over or to retire.  I worked in finance for a long time and really don’t need to work now. I can retire if I want. Coming from the world of football, I’ve seen a lot of the people I know or ran across from then die a lot sooner. So that has weighed on me. Do I want to work more or spend the time I have left enjoying my life-  spending it with my wife and kids?

Was the post-football transition difficult?

I wasn’t there long. I started for a year – but it’s easer to get used to it than un-used to it. In college everything is taken care of for you, then you go get paid in the NFL doing what you love to do. Then you have to go figure out what you want to do after that, after everyone else has already gotten started in their careers. So it takes a while to get started.

Were you surprised to get drafted by the Steelers in ’82?

I had no contact with them – or really with most teams. I wasn’t a first or second round type of guy, so it wasn’t like teams were calling telling me to hold on, they were coming for me. As a lower round guy, you have no sense of things. I didn’t know what grade anyone may have had on me – I wasn’t invited to the combine as a punter. I had no idea where I was rated on anyone’s board.

How did you make the team?

Colquitt was the incumbent – Trout was the field goal kicker. I could really do both, but they brought me in as a punter. Colquitt was hurt – he had an achilles issue. And I was much bigger – I was 6’4, 220 pounds.  I was bigger than Lambert! But with Colquitt hurt there really wasn’t any competition for me.

You were one of the few barefoot punters in the NFL -how did that come about?

Growing up in Texas, it was just me and my mom. We’d go outside and play after school – this was before computers and cellphones when kids went outside! We all as kids would play football, and I was the better punter and kicker. I took off my shoes and socks when I kicked – I didn’t want to ruin them.

When I got to high school I was on the JV team. But one game we were getting beaten pretty badly and finally moved the ball to about the 35. We went three and out and I was getting ready to go out on defense when the coach decided to try a field goal. I took off my shoe as I was accustomed to doing and made a 45 yard field goal. The same thing happened and I kicked a 48 yard field goal.

The next week I was on the varsity squad as the kicker and punter. That’s how it all started and I just stuck with it.

Did anyone take you under their wing when you first got to Pittsburgh?

Jim Boston was the GM then. I remember when he called me – I did a draft interview a lot like this one! Then right after he said, “Oh, by the way, you have a flight tomorrow to Pittsburgh you need to be on for the start of camp.” I told him I had finals – and he just told me to tell them that I needed to go, that I worked for the Steelers now!

I still remember going through the Fort Pitt tunnels and seeing the Point and Three Rivers Stadium. I stayed right near the Clark Candy factory.

The thing that is so cool about Pittsburgh – we go on a lot of driving vacations. I took my family to Pittsburgh and they let us take a tour of the facility and trophies after my wife called them. They are fantastic – they appreciate all of the players no matter how long you played there. The Rooneys are great people.

Any good memories of your time there?

On the Tuesday of the first week after the final cuts were made on Monday, I remember walking into the locker room in old Three Rivers. My locker was next to David Trout’s – except his locker was empty. I thought, ok, how is this going to work?

Dick Haley walked in and I asked him who was going to kick now, and he told me I was! Well, I told him that was going to be tough since I was the holder. He told me not to worry, they were looking at the waiver wire.

Well, the next day I was in the training room and Chuck came in and said “Goodson, Webby – outside in five minutes.” We went out and Webby snapped and I held for a guy they brought in to try out. He kicked everything within five yards of dead center. I asked the guy how he was still available. He said he was drafted by Buffalo and they asked him to kick a couple of 50-plus yard field goals in the wind, and the kicks just sailed wide. So they cut him.

If Buffalo kept him, they probably would have won a Super Bowl, if not more than one. And he would have led the league in scoring. Because that guy was Gary Anderson – one of the best kickers ever in the NFL. What a screwup by Buffalo!

What happened that you only lasted a season there?

A bunch of us worked out in Austin in the offseason. Pollard, a bunch of us. Well, I was kicking to them and they’d throw them back to me. One of them landed under my foot – I came down squarely on my back left ankle and compressed it perfectly. I tore a bunch of crap in it. When you’re 23 you think you are bulletproof. I called the team and went up there. They taped it up but there’s not much painkillers can do to help – it’s not about numbing it – it was just too immobile. I had no strength in it.

Colquitt came back and that was really it. There you have it. It is what it is – that’s just the way it goes sometimes – they ended up letting me go.

Any other good stories of your time you can share?

Oh – a few.

My rookie year, coming into camp, I remember seeing a well-dressed guy riding his bike into camp – dress slacks, button down shirt, nice shoes. I hear him yell to Chuck “Chaz! Chaz!”  It was Mel Blount. Chuck turned around “Soup – what are you doing here?” Mel asked Chuck “Who’s your fastest rookie – somebody pull someone out for me – anybody good!”

I think it was Dungy who got someone – I can’t remember who it was – and Blount rolled up his pants and took off his shoes and just smoked the guy in a race. It was unbelievable.

Any other good ones?

Two good ones on Lambert.

My second year – in camp – that’s the year Lambert was trying to get his contract worked out. In the middle of practice he took a couple of trainers with him and walked to the field and had one line up on each side of the field. I was trying to figure out why he needed them there – so I walked a little closer and realized each trainer was holding a lit cigarette for him so he could take a drag before he ran back the other way!

And the first season we played Cleveland in an awful, crappy day. It was raining – mud and snow…we lost I think 13-6 or something like that. After the game we all cleaned up as best we could in that old stadium – the showers barely worked … and Noll chewed us out on the way home.

Well that next week Lambert yelled at the equipment guy – Rodgers Freyvogel – that he needed to go back to Cleveland and get his forearm pads that he left there. I asked Rodgers why he needed those pads. Rodgers told me there were custom-made. Because every week on gamedays Lambert came to the locker room early and wrapped his arms in cast material before he put those pads on. That’s why those forearm shovers were like getting hit with a sledgehammer! Just a little competitive advantage to help him!

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