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USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Robert Zeglinski

The Los Angeles Chargers scored a 4-point touchdown thanks to Cameron Dicker’s all-time blunder

It was already a tough afternoon for the Los Angeles Chargers in their blowout AFC Wild Card loss against the Houston Texans. Amid a futile comeback attempt, kicker Cameron Dicker put the awful cherry on top.

After Ladd McConkey scored an 86-yard touchdown to bring L.A. within 11 points in the mid-fourth quarter, all Dicker had to do was pot an easy extra point, and a Chargers comeback felt feasible, even if it was still unrealistic.

THE CHARGERS WERE CHARGERING: Jim Harbaugh sure could’ve used SpongeBob SquarePants’ positive attitude.

Instead, the Texans blocked Dicker’s attempt.

OK, sure, that’s bad, but it’s survivable. The issue is that the blocked football awkwardly went straight up into the air around Dicker. Rather than catch the ball and take a hit, Dicker elected to bat the ball down as if it were a pass presumably because he thought the play would be dead.

That is not the case in the NFL rulebook. A football from a blocked kick is always live. In a hilarious turn of events, the Texans returned the missed extra point after Dicker’s ill-fated decision-making borne by a player who may not have known the rules. In essence, because of Dicker, the Chargers scored a four-point touchdown with the two-point swing to Houston.

Man … what???

Here’s a better angle of Dicker trying to bat the ball down:

In a playoff game full of classic “Chargers-ing,” Dicker took the cake here. He embodied his snakebitten franchise to a tee with this all-time blunder.

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