Ex-NFL Kicker Joins A Different Team - Oregon State University Athletics

Ex-NFL kicker joins a different team

BRYAN DENSON

Oregon State Police are working long hours to add 100 new troopers to their roster and have found a superb free agent in former NFL kicker Jose Cortez.

Big and bilingual, the former Oregon State University standout spent six up-and-down years as a kicker in the National Football League. So when no team called him this spring -- and state police did -- the native of El Salvador decided to switch teams one last time.

Cortez and nine other recruits are scheduled to report July 30 for pre-academy training.

A budget vote in Salem last week provided state police money to add 100 more troopers and seven detectives to the 619-trooper roster, boosting patrol strength by 31 percent during the next two years. The agency hopes to train and swear in prospects such as Cortez to handle Oregon's highways.

"We're hiring 10 at a time, and it takes 10 months to get them out on the road," said state police Capt. Walt Markee, who says motorists will appreciate the investment. "You can drive from Portland to Central Point right now and sometimes never see a trooper, and I think this is going to make a big difference."

The Legislature secured the new positions Tuesday by passing a state police budget of $327 million. A bipartisan group of lawmakers hopes to add 40 more troopers to the agency by raising Oregon's beer tax by 5 cents a bottle and using some Oregon Liquor Control Commission revenue that now goes into the general fund.

State police have known since last winter that it would take about 140 extra troopers to provide round-the-clock coverage for Oregon's major highways. So in February they began a recruitment blitz for 200, which would fill the new slots, plus those expected to open because of retirements and resignations.

The timing couldn't have been better for Cortez, 32, who first applied for a state police job a year ago but was turned down for lack of U.S. citizenship.

A naturalized citizen now, Cortez has passed the state police physical and cleared the psychological exam and criminal background check. He will draw a paycheck while earning his certification through Oregon's Department of Public Safety Standards and Training.

After signing with seven teams in six years -- four in 2005 alone -- Cortez has no hopes of returning to the NFL. "I just don't see getting the phone call," he said.

Now he wants to become a trooper and get the one thing he never got as a kicker: job security.

State police are looking for recruits with rich life experiences, good moral character, and the ability to work alone, sometimes under extreme pressure, said Markee. Which pretty much describes Cortez.

Consider: He survived El Salvador's civil war, sneaked into the United States through Tijuana, Mexico, at age 15, and settled in a poor Van Nuys, Calif., neighborhood thick with street gangs. His parents were so strict they enforced a midnight curfew until he was 21. And Cortez -- trust him on this -- knows pressure.

On a Sunday afternoon in October 2005, with 62,278 fans holding their breath in Texas Stadium, Cortez kicked a 45-yard field goal in overtime to lift the Dallas Cowboys over the New York Giants. The kick sent Cowboys owner Jerry Jones into a sideline jig, but not for long.

One week later, Cortez pulled a 29-yarder wide left in a loss to the Seattle Seahawks and the Cowboys cut him.

"I've been under pressure a lot," he said with a laugh in his Portland apartment. But that's the life of a kicker.

Cortez was a standout at Oregon State in the late 1990s, making four field goals that exceeded 50 yards his final season, including a 55-yarder. He was named a semifinalist for the top collegiate place-kicking honor, the Lou Groza Award. But he booted his share, too.

After college, he kicked 53 field goals and 99 extra points in 55 NFL games for Dallas, Indianapolis, Minnesota, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washington, according to Cortez's biography in Information from Answers.com. The Indianapolis Colts released him April 3, 2006. The following season, the Colts won the Super Bowl.

Cortez has many reasons for joining the ranks of the state police. But the bottom line is, well, the bottom line: Starting pay for a rookie trooper is about $42,000 a year, with eight-year veterans' pay now topping out at about $57,000.

That's a fraction of the $400,000 that Cortez earned in his best NFL season. But it's a lot more than the $14 an hour he's making now as a dockworker on the graveyard shift at Oak Harbor Freight Lines.

Cortez says his ethnicity, immigrant roots and resistance to Southern California's street gangs will help him carve a personal role for himself with the Oregon State Police and serve as a role model, especially as Oregon's Latino population soars.

"Being bilingual," he said, "I want to represent the Hispanic community."

Cortez said he's happy to trade the hyper-scrutiny of NFL coaches such as Bill Parcells for the scrutiny of the state police sergeants he imagines will evaluate his every move. He knows that the risks out on the highway are far greater than those he faced in the NFL.

"The NFL, it's just your job," he said. "You get released, you still go on with your life. Being a state trooper, your life is at stake."

Edward Walsh contributed to this report.