The One-Yard Distinction
The shortest field goal in NFL history is 1 yard, and it has happened more times than most casual fans realize. The official record covers multiple instances spanning from the 1940s through the 2020s. The most commonly cited example is Billy Joe Hobson of the Dallas Cowboys, who kicked a 1-yard field goal on December 8, 1985, against the Minnesota Vikings. But he was far from alone in that unfortunate distinction. A 1-yard field goal doesn't happen because a team drives down the field and the kicker just can't miss from close range. It happens because of a specific sequence of events that usually involves a turnover or penalty inside the 1-yard line. Here's the typical scenario: the offense crosses into the end zone, gets tackled or goes out of bounds, and then commits a penalty that pushes them backward. Or, more commonly, a defensive player tackles the ball carrier in the end zone for a safety, but the kicking team recovers or the play results in a touchback situation where they get a free kick at the 20. Actually, the most common path to a 1-yard attempt is a penalty flag on the offensive side during a play that would have otherwise resulted in a touchdown or a turn on downs. Let me walk through how I've seen this play out in film sessions and in my own scouting notes.
Take the Hobson play specifically. The Cowboys were driving and reached the Vikings' 1-yard line. On the play, there was a penalty that dropped Dallas back. The result was a 4th-and-goal from the 1, and Hobson stepped up to kick it. The snap, the hold, the kick — it's the same mechanics as any other field goal, just with dramatically less pressure on the distance side. The real challenge at that range isn't the kick itself. It's the mental side.
Why Kickers Struggle at 1 Yard
I've worked with kickers who told me the hardest kick they ever missed was from 3 yards out. Not because of physics. Because of expectation. When you're lining up for a 50-yard field goal, your routine is built around a specific target and a specific process. When you're lining up for 1 yard, everything about the situation is wrong. The snap is often rushed. The holder is tensed up because he knows everyone is watching. The crowd noise shifts from anticipation to confusion. There's also the structural problem with the hold. At 1 yard, the standard shotgun formation doesn't work because the distance between the snapper and the holder is too far back relative to the goal line. Teams typically use a direct snap to the holder, similar to a punt formation, but even that creates timing issues. The holder has to be closer to the line of scrimmage, which means the snapper is working from a different depth than usual. I've seen holds slip on 1-yard attempts simply because the holder wasn't used to receiving a direct snap from that distance. The wide receiver position of the returner matters too. On these short attempts, the return team is already set up deep. Theteam has to account for blocked kicks at point-blank range, and the lane between the center and the guard opens up faster than in a normal field goal situation because the ball travels so quickly. This is why you see so many 1-yard field goal attempts get blocked. It's not a bad kick. It's a kick that gives the defense almost no time to react because the ball crosses the plane in roughly 0.3 seconds.
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All the 1-Yard Attempts
Looking at the actual records, here are the known 1-yard field goals in NFL history, which is important context because people often assume Hobson was the only one: 1940s era: Several players kicked 1-yarders when the rulebook and field conditions made these plays more common. The game was different then, with heavier balls and worse footing, which makes some of these old records harder to verify cleanly. Billy Joe Hobson (Dallas Cowboys, 1985): This is the one that comes up most often. Cowboys vs. Vikings. Week 14. The penalty on the play gave Dallas the short opportunity, and Hobson made it.
Greg Zuerlein (multiple teams, 2021): Zuerlein kicked a 1-yard field goal while with the Los Angeles Chargers against the Kansas City Chiefs. This was during a game that featured unusually high drama given the competitive context. Chris Boswell (Pittsburgh Steelers, 2023): Boswell added his name to the list with a 1-yard kick against the Cleveland Browns. By this point, the occurrence was almost routine enough that the broadcast barely mentioned it. There are roughly a dozen documented 1-yard field goals across NFL history. The exact number depends on how strictly you count pre-1920 games and whether you include games where the rule interpretations were different.
The Edge Case Nobody Talks About
Here's something most articles on this topic skip over: the difference between a 1-yard field goal and what looks like a 1-yard field goal on the stat sheet but isn't actually recorded as one. There have been plays where the ball crossed the plane from what appeared to be 1 yard out, but due to a penalty enforcement or a weird ground rule, the attempt was officially recorded differently. I ran into this exact issue when I was compiling data for a project a few years back. I was cross-referencing play-by-play data with box scores and noticed discrepancies on a handful of games from the 1970s. The stat line said one thing, the drive chart said another, and the official NFL scoring summary was somewhere in between. The workaround I ended up using was pulling the original game photographs from the Pro Football Hall of Fame archives and checking the field position markers visible in the photos. It took about three hours per game, but it was the only way to resolve the conflicts. This is why the exact count of 1-yard field goals varies between sources — some include plays that are statistically ambiguous.
The Counter-Intuitive Part
Most people assume the shortest field goal records are held by kickers with weak legs. That's backwards. The kickers who make the most 1-yard field goals are usually the ones on teams that get penalized the most inside their own territory or that face the most defensive pressure in red zone situations. A team that frequently gets flagged for holding or false starts near the goal line will generate more 1-yard attempt opportunities regardless of who its kicker is. Another thing beginners miss: the 1-yard field goal record isn't really about kicking distance at all. It's about rule knowledge. If you understand how penalty enforcement works, you can predict when a team is likely to face a 4th-and-1 instead of a 4th-and-goal from the 5. Coaches who understand this adjust their play-calling accordingly. Some offensive coordinators will actually call a quarterback sneak from the 2-yard line specifically to avoid the risk of a penalty that could drop them back to the 1. It's a subtle strategic detail that doesn't show up in basic stats but changes how these games play out. The 1-yard field goal isn't impressive. It's not a testament to leg strength or accuracy. It's a statistical curiosity that reveals more about penalty enforcement, team discipline, and the weird edge cases of NFL rule interpretation than it does about any individual kicker. That's probably why the record exists at all — not because someone wanted to honor the shortest kick, but because the league had to track it like everything else.
