The 5 best kickers in the history of the Dallas Cowboys

There's a reason that NFL fans have a love-hate relationship with kickers. A missed field goal or extra point in a big spot can define a team's season. Conversely, kickers seldom get deserved recognition when they come through for their team.

The Dallas Cowboys know this all too well. They typically prefer to find diamonds in the rough and rarely spend draft capital on the position. Signed by the Cowboys after a banner 2022 season in the UFL, Brandon Aubrey is living proof of that.

After one season, Aubrey is already a top-five kicker in the game. His 36 made field goals led the league and he set an NFL record with 35 consecutive makes to start his career. Aubrey has already started climbing the latter of all-time great Cowboys, but he has a long way to go to crack the top five.

Criteria for selection

It's difficult to measure kicker success beyond career statistics. However, made field goals aren't the only useful measuring stick. Kicker accuracy wasn't prominent prior to the 2000s, but it is just as (if not more) important than the number of made field goals.

Additionally, made Pro Bowls and All-Pros show that a kicker was among the best in his field for a length of time. Individual accolades always reign supreme when developing all-time lists, but playoff and team success was also considered to form a top-five.

The top 5 kickers in Dallas Cowboys history

5. Richie Cunningham

This was a toss-up between Cunningham and Nick Folk. Ultimately, Cunningham made more field goals than Folk and ranks fifth in team history with 75 makes. Cunningham's 79.0% accuracy on field goals was exceptional for the 1990s generation of kickers and is the sixth-best ever for a Cowboy.

It's unfortunate for Cunningham that the Cowboys started their post-dynasty transition when he was signed as an undrafted free agent in 1997. That season he announced himself as one of the best kickers in the game. He was a First-Team All-Pro after leading the NFL with 34 field goals and finishing second with a 91.9% conversion rate.

4. Brett Maher

Maher will unfortunately be remembered for his four missed extra-points in the Cowboys' playoff victory over the Buccaneers in the 2022 playoffs. It was a meltdown of epic proportions, but Maher undoubtedly deserves recognition as a top-five kicker in team history.

Maher spent three seasons with Dallas in 2018, 2019 and 2022. Despite his truncated tenure, he ranks fourth in franchise history with 78 made field goals and is second with 19 field goals of 50 yards or longer. Only Dan Bailey has made more with 27 and he kicked seven seasons for the Cowboys. Odds are Maher would have shattered Bailey's record if not for his playoff choke.

The Nebraska product also has the second-most touchbacks for a Cowboy, ranks eighth in made extra-points and is seventh in field goal percentage. Don't allow Maher's playoff shortcomings to cloud the fact that he's among the best kickers in Cowboys history.

3. Chris Boniol

Boniol became Dallas' starting kicker in the middle of the 1990s dynasty. He was nothing short of sensational when they won Super Bowl XXX. That season, Boniol led the league with a 96.4% field goal percentage and finished second in made extra points.

In the Super Bowl, Boniol came up clutch with two made field goals that allowed the Cowboys to jump out to a 13-0 lead over the Steelers.

As far as Cowboys history, Boniol is third in made field goals and holds the team record with seven made field goals in a single game. He's also third in field goal percentage and seventh in made extra points.

2. Rafael Septien

Originally a 10th-round draft pick of the New Orleans Saints, Septien spent nine seasons as the Cowboys' starting kicker. He's among the longest-tenured kickers in franchise history and ranks first with 388 made extra-points, a whopping 112 more than the player in second place.

Only Dan Bailey has made more field goals than Septien in a Cowboys uniform. He never led the league in scoring but twice finished first in made extra points. Septien was an All-Pro in 1981 when he led the NFL with 27 made field goals.

His status as an all-time great Cowboy is cemented by the fact that he won a Super Bowl as a rookie in 1977, the second of the Tom Landry era.

1. Dan Bailey

Bailey fizzled out by the end of his Cowboys tenure, but for five years he was arguably the premier kicker in the sport. In seven seasons, Bailey missed just two extra points on 278 attempts, including a perfect 56-of-56 in 2015 when he led the league in that category.

An undrafted free agent out of Oklahoma State, Bailey is the Cowboys' all-time leader with 186 made field goals and 27 field goals of 50 yards or longer.

Furthermore, he had the longest made field goal streak in franchise history before Brandon Aubrey supplanted him in 2023, and his 88.2% conversion rate on FGs is the highest in team history among kickers who have played with Dallas for more than one season. That included leading the NFL with a 93.8% clip in 2015, his lone Pro Bowl season.

The 5 best kickers in Cowboys history by field goals made