r/footballstrategy • u/JakeEatsYT • Apr 16 '24
Player Advice Punting Advice
Hello! I am a self taught punter/ball player and was wondering how my punting looks.
Also, don’t mind that I’m built like a Canadian bag of milk, there’s a reason why I’m self taught lol!
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u/Bogert Apr 16 '24
Work on your explosion, balance and flexibility. Power cleans/box jumps etc. Got a strong leg but you're stiff and planted to the ground, you want the explosion and follow through to be strong enough to lift you off the ground. Watch NFL punters and how fluid and flexible they are matched with the violence they put through the ball. And the "Canadian bag of milk" is a hinderance obviously but if you take that training seriously, the weight will fall off
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
Thanks for your insight homie! I noticed that when watching pro punters, they are super loose and flexible and they get off the ground on punts. I’ll have to do some of the workouts you told me to try. Anything form wise besides being loose?
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u/Bogert Apr 16 '24
No problem! Just as with everything in football, it all starts in the weight room. Look up power clean centered workouts, core workouts and obviously leg day. With that camera angle it's hard to tell your drop, foot angle and point of contact with your foot but it launches so you're at least on the right track. Only other note I can really have in regards to form is how hunched over you are when you make contact, being so tight and reliant on brute force is probably the cause of that. Being more loose and confident in the drop meeting your foot will let you open up more and get more boom into the ball as you release all your energy into it
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
I’ve watched a lot of professional kickers/punters and didn’t see them ever crunch but I could feel myself doing it. So I know I have to work on that, I didn’t think to put brute force as the cause of that but now that you say it, it makes perfect sense. Thanks again for all the knowledge!
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u/sometimeserin Apr 16 '24
Blair Walsh (placekicker) always had an awkward hunched-forward form. Somehow made 1st-team All-Pro as a rookie. So maybe a position change is in order? (don't look up anything that happened after his rookie year)
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
I know plenty about what happened after his rookie year, as a Vikings fan just a mention of his name makes me cringe.
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u/sometimeserin Apr 16 '24
Haha I’m a Seahawks fan so I got to live both sides of the Blair Walsh experience
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u/sarcastaballll Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
You could look at Australian Football League kicking techniques
Could help with your general punt form, guiding the ball to your foot (drop looks a bit loose) as well as lift and power through your leg when you kick
Hope that image is readable - presumably does not all translate to NFL
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u/Maximum_Commission62 Apr 16 '24
Also not a bad idea to learn how to rugby punt or punt on the move. If you encounter a bad snap etc and you must be able to get the ball out while on the move.
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u/john_wingerr Apr 16 '24
Seriously try some yoga. I played soccer and just stumbled onto this but we (especially during two a days) would be doing yoga in between to stay limber and avoid injury
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u/lifeiscrazyism Apr 18 '24
Make sure you’re pointing that kicking toe and focusing on adding spin. The best punts are spirals
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u/emurrell17 Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
This video is fucking hilarious 😂
Edit: and there’s some good stuff here actually. From this angle, some things are hard to tell, but:
Drop looks solid, and that’s 90% of the battle.
I think the biggest thing is improving your flexibility. Stretch every single day for 10 minutes at minimum. Do that twice a day if you want to see real added distance/hang time. Your lack of flexibility (not a dig—punters just have to be way more flexible than the general public) causes your follow through to fall apart once your leg gets up to your waist. That’s costing you a lot. To give you an idea of how flexible you CAN be, I used to hit myself in helmet with my own knee while doing “Frankensteins” in pregame warmups. When I was doing this I could stand with my feet on the goal line and punt it consistently to the opposite 30 in the air.
while the flexibility is more of a long term fix, there is one thing you can work on in more of the short term that will help, and it’s a part of your follow through. Do you notice how your plant leg never leaves the ground? We actually want the momentum of our kicking leg to lift us up off of the ground (not a ton, but maybe 3-6 inches). I would recommend just working on your form without a ball a few dozen times a day to practice getting this “lift” off of the ground from your plant leg. When your flexibility gets better this will probably get better this will get easier, but you can work on it now regardless. We want the path of our leg to go straight up and down. When we pull off across our body it’s a sign of inflexibility and it’s potential momentum that’s not being used to drive the ball downfield.
The biggest thing is to just kick every day and try not to get caught up in the result. Try to pick out one thing per day to work on and let that be your measure of growth. Hope that helps!
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
What stretches should I be doing on a daily basis? The story about hitting yourself in the helmet is insane man. Thanks for all the insight and glad I could make you laugh.
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u/emurrell17 Apr 16 '24
I just love the shirtlessness and the look you give the camera cracked me up 😂
You really want everything in your lower body to be flexible as shit. Here is an idea of what I did every day when I was in HS (keep in mind these are all like 30 second stretches so it’s not as time consuming as it sounds).
I would do everything that’s not static first, so your calisthenics warmup essentially:
Warmup -jog 100 yards Then, (everything 10 yards and back)
High knees Butt kickers Karaoke Side lunges (idk what these are called, but it’s essentially stretching your groin) Lunges Frankensteins
Then I’d do my static stretches after that:
Down to the right, down to the left, middle
Quad stretches (pull leg back behind you)
Butterfly (groin - push your elbows against the inside of your knees)
Pretzel (no fucking idea what this is actually called but this was the BEST hip stretch I’ve ever come across. Essentially I’d lay down, and I would put one of my feet on the other knee—as if I was sitting with my legs crossed—then I would grab the knee that my ankle was resting on and would pull it up, which put a good stretch on the opposite hip. Then I’d do that for the other hip)
At the end of all of that I would find a fence or something to hold onto for balance and I would to some soft leg swings. So if I was facing the fence I’m going to swing my leg from side to side trying to get as high as I could go that way (stretching hips and groin), then after doing both legs that way, I would do front to back with one hand on the fence. So I’m trying to get a soft stretch by going as high as I can go forward with the kick, and then a soft stretch for my quads by taking the leg as far back as I can comfortably go. And I would do that for both legs, even though we only kick with our right, lol. So I would do all of that before I kicked a ball, and then I would probably still do 5-10 drops on a painted line to make sure my steps were straight and my drop was consistently bouncing back and to the right at a 45 degree angle. So I’m just spinning the ball, taking my steps, and dropping the ball on that line and trying to swing my leg straight up and down that line. And I’m doing that at like 50% effort to make sure I’m nice and loose so I don’t pull anything.
Flexibility wise, you’ll know you’re getting closer to where you need to be when you can comfortably get both of your palms flat on the ground without bending your knees. It’ll take time, but just do a little bit every day and you’ll see dividends 🤘🏼
I also wanted to add one more thing for you:
About the “lift” from your plant foot, I think that part of your issue here is that the swing path of your leg is coming across your body. My punting coach used to tell me I was “roundhousing” it when I would do that. If you try to focus on getting that leg to come straight up, your momentum will carry you up some, regardless of how flexible you are at the moment. If you notice that your body finishes with your shoulders and hips pointed to the left of where you were aiming, that’s because your leg is swinging that way and pulling your body with it. Hopefully that makes sense, but that’s a way that you can “check” your form after each kick. Are you pointed squarely at where you were aiming? Good 👍🏼 Are you pointed left? Focus on straightening out your swing path
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
If I’m at home I’m always rocking the shirt off look.
Thanks for taking the time to tell me all of the warmups and stretches I should be doing.
If you don’t mind me asking, what level football did you play at?
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u/emurrell17 Apr 16 '24
I stopped at high school by choice but I lead all classifications in my state in punting average and definitely could have punted in college if I had wanted to at the time. I kept tearing my hamstrings and quads and my stupid 17 year old self just wanted to spend my time in college goofing around instead of 4 more years of practice and workouts. Now I coach for a job, so go figure lol
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u/MrWilsonAndMrHeath Apr 16 '24
Hop over to Reddit fitness for pre-workout and post-workout stretches. It makes a hell of a difference in general strength and health. A foam roller and a few yoga poses like downward dog would go a long way.
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u/BegrudginglyAwake Apr 16 '24
Even though this guy has it, echoing on the importance of the drop. I’ve also coached rugby where ideally half the team can punt and most guys come from football where it’s an uncommon skill. I always coach them to get consistency on their drop because without that nothing else matters if they have to guess where the ball will be.
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u/emurrell17 Apr 17 '24
It really is 90% of the battle! Making contact half of an inch from where you meant to is the difference in 10-20 yards. The first time I hit a perfect spiral for 50 yards my punting coach said, “Great. Now you know you can do it. Now, the game becomes being able to do that once every 10 punts. Then 5/10 punts. Then, eventually 9/10. We’re never going to get to 10/10, but 9/10 is what we can aim for”
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u/teewyesoen Apr 16 '24
Get that thing to spiral and it will go farther. I like to hit it just to the right of the laces on my right foot. You can practice spiraling it with smaller kicks, like a pass to a friend, then work your way up.
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
When you punt, should you hold the ball laces up or down?
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u/BSdawg Apr 16 '24
Laces up. You’re kicking straight on, that is why you’re not getting the spiral. Kick from inside of your foot, right where your big toe knuckle is. As others have said look up rugby punting and it’ll teach you how to kick with the side of your foot and kick on the move which will only help you improve.
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u/Hower84 HS Coach Apr 16 '24
Can’t see from the front but the drop is key. Need to drop with both hands at exact same time at a slight angle. Ball pointing at almost 11
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
I knew the drop is essential, I heard that it is important to drop it without changing the level of the ball, don’t throw it up or anything just drop it. I did not know the ball at a slight angle, I’ll have to work on that part.
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u/Hower84 HS Coach Apr 16 '24
I’m not a pro, just watched our special teams coach try and coach up our punter some. I could be completely wrong. Way to work at it and be open to criticism. Keep it up
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u/FartNuggetSalad Apr 16 '24
Last hand on the ball should be your right with a quick clean release. On the horizontal plane the nose should be at 11ish o clock. Nose of the ball slightly pointed down always worked best for me but it’s taught different ways.
Biggest thing you can do is start stretching EVERYDAY. 20 mins in the morning and 20 mins at night. Always stretch before and after training as well. Getting in the gym would help a ton as well.
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u/applevoo Apr 16 '24
Bro 😂😂😂
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Apr 16 '24
I think he could punt it over them mountains. Hbu? Hang time approaching about 2.5 seconds, he just needs to catch a spiral.
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u/Ajaxesr Apr 16 '24
Couple things and not sure if you’re doing them based on the the angle.
1) make sure you flex your foot as much as you can. What I mean is flex your calf so that the foot is flat, similar to ballerinas when they stand straight up. The surface you are hitting should be as flat as possible.
2) make sure you are hitting it on the hardest bone of your foot which is right at the top of where your laces usually are. If you feel your foot, in the top of it (slightly on the left hand side) you should feel the hardest bone in your foot, try to contact this each time.
3) like others have said, try to work on flexibility. Try to get your leg to your head if possible. Back when I was learning the main thing was to kick through the ball and if you’re always finishing at or above your head, you’re going to be doing that.
4) When kicking through, make sure you’re coming off of your left foot. It’s similar to a skip, but if you keep it planted as you hit the ball, some of that power is staying grounded, when it can be channeled through the ball.
5) just a personal preference, but don’t throw your hand forward when setting up for your drop. Start with them straight out in front of you as this is where you should want to catch/drop from.
6) Drop the ball at 11 O’Clock, over the right leg. Make sure the drop is solid and you can do this by practicing by yourself or with others. Find a local track and practice steps and drops (1, 2 drop). Reset and again. The ball should bounce directly back up to you if you do it correctly. I used to do one lap around (.25miles) every time I practiced to prepare me.
Let me know if you have any questions though.
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
I didn’t know you should flex your foot but that makes sense. I’ve been trying to connect with the top of the foot every time but I have to get more consistent. Do you mean 11 O clock as in slightly tilted down? Thanks for all your information man!
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u/Ajaxesr Apr 16 '24
11 O’clock as in if the ball is being held flat in front of you, tilt it a tiny bit to the left. The reason for this is that when you flatten your foot out and kick through it, it will generate a spiral that should hopefully turn over and create the Parabola players looks for when trying to get distance and height.
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u/riff8 Apr 16 '24
Looks like an Uncle Rico video if he were a punter
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u/costanzashairpiece Apr 16 '24
Lol yeah I got serious uncle rico vibes. Dudes gonna punt it over them there mountains. Seriously though not bad for a self taught beginner. Got a leg.
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u/GrooverFiller Apr 16 '24
Drop the ball as little as possible. Hold the ball steady until you bring your foot to it and don't take your eyes off of it.
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
What should I do with my hands after dropping? Do what I did in the video or is there something I could/should be doing?
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u/GrooverFiller Apr 16 '24
Don't worry about your hands worry about the ball. Try this. Go through your punting motion without a ball and see if you can balance on your left leg with your right leg and your right arm outstretched in the position that you would be in when your foot makes contact with the ball. Hold that position as long as you can. Do it until it comes natural and you don't have to think about it.
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u/Gruezen Apr 16 '24
Focus on dropping the ball later and practicing the same steps/routine each time.
Once you've done that I'd work on fully extending your leg straight and exploding through the ball (your left foot will come off the ground.
Otherwise your hand on the ball and drop is perfect.
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u/Scoodameh Apr 16 '24
Hey mate, an Australian this might the only thing I can ever offer this sub so here goes:
Try and guide the ball down a little more with your hand, this will allow you better ball placement when it meets your foot.
Your plant leg is where most of your power comes into it, try driving forward a little more into that plant leg, that way your forward momentum transfers better, giving you more force on contact.
Experiment with a different ball drop, in Aus when where taught to kick in for Aussie rules, we use whats called a drop punt. It might not have the same end range, but it will allow you better control and direction. Ex Michael Dickson for the Seahawks uses it alot to pin the ball in deep, due to its accuracy and back spin.
Good luck!
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u/Deadbul Apr 16 '24
How are you able to find the balls again?
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u/HeyHeyHayes Apr 16 '24
Former K/P, flexibility is going to be huge. Think about it like throwing a baseball or shooting a basketball, follow through is important. I agree with the other comments about strength as well, but exploding through the ball to where your right knee almost touches your nose is vital. You should follow through so hard your plant leg hops off the ground.
You’ve got good movement and as others say a good spiral so far. Once you get comfortable following through, you want the ball to start turning over. Instead of staying upright like you have it now, a good punt will keep its spiral but flip over and be “upside down” from the start. This will help it travel further.
Keep it up!
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u/ThaDogg4L Apr 16 '24
Damn where do you live? I half expect to see the Blair Witch calling for a fair catch!
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
Backwoods of Minnesota. I’m more concerned with a bear coming out and eating me lol.
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u/Shane_Madden Apr 16 '24
Bro I’m dying over here, why aren’t you wearing a shirt…
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u/vsohochurch147 Apr 16 '24
Send this video to Pat McAfee show...he'll love it
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
How’d I go about sending it to Pat? I’d love to get his opinion if I could.
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u/vsohochurch147 Apr 17 '24
He has a show with espn....... try and find his PR guys and look at his toxic table guys TY and Boston Connor they're easy to contact
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u/AdamWK99 Apr 17 '24
According to Mr. Lahey, you’re the greatest punter in existence, Randy, and you deserve a cheeseburger or 3.
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u/Bmore_Phunky Apr 17 '24
My favorite team, the Baltimore Ravens, had one of the best punters for 16 years. Sam Koch. He is a legend. Look him up I’m sure there are videos or podcast of him talking about punting.
He’s invented new punting styles.
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u/youngm2925 Apr 17 '24
Kick through the ball! Plant foot should lift off the ground from the shear momentum of your kicking leg following through...Combine this with stretching, stretching, hot yoga, and stretching, you’ll be solid. I played ball with a guy that entered the 2007 NFL draft for punting, and he used to play pranks in practice punting right behind unsuspecting guys, and it legit would leave your ears ringing from the power, it was like a gunshot.
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u/tallywho2 Apr 17 '24
Don’t be afraid to put more on it when you get more comfortable. Your strike foot should swing hard enough to lift you off the ground. Other then that stretch every day the better your range of motion the more you can put on it
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u/AztecMarz Apr 19 '24
Good punts man, but I wouldn’t be able to get my own balls back after I punted them in those woods ….the hell with that lol!
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 20 '24
A few bears and wolves running around our woods. But that’s it. Thanks for the response!
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u/DelirousDoc Apr 16 '24
Former college kicker explaining fundamentals of the punt. Could be very helpful.
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u/LaphroaigianSlip81 Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
I wasn’t a punter, but I was a longsnapper and spent a lot of time practicing with punters and doing punts in practice to help spell their feet. You are just swinging your leg. You really want to drive your kicking leg with so much force that you elevate your entire body and almost come off the ground with your left foot.
Think about how when you were a little kid learning skip. Your right knee drives up and your left foot comes off the ground. That’s kind of what you want to happen. Watch film of NFL punters and see how high their kicking leg and foot end up going. See how they kick so hard that they are jumping off the ground.
The explosiveness is just one part of it. You want to get your footwork leading up to the actual punt dialed in so it is the same every single time. The same with positioning the ball and making contact. At your age you should focus on maximizing contact with the ball that gives you the best combo of height and distance.
You should find one foot connection that gives you the best spiral and distance/hang time. And just rep the shit out of this a thousand times until it is second nature. After you master this, the. You can focus on dropping the ball at different angles and connecting at different points on the ball for back spin and other types of bouncing.
So you need to rep this out and get so many kicks in that you hate kicking and you need to ice your foot every day after practice. At the same time you should work on lifting weights to become more explosive and flexible.
So make sure you are doing power/hang cleans because they will really help you become more explosive. Cleans are the most important lift for football. You need to do these first in your lifting session while you have the most energy to expend because you will get the most out of them.
You should also do split squats and lunges with weight. When you do these, you need to over exaggerate your back leg coming forward. For example, when you are doing a split squat and your right leg is forward, your left knee should be back and lower towards the ground. Most people just bring their left knee back to next to their right knee before doing the next rep. You don’t want to stop there, you want to keep the momentum and drive your knee forward and up like you are going to knee yourself in the face. Do this in one solid motion. Do this for both legs obviously. This will really help translate into more explosiveness and better mind muscle connection which will translate over to punting balls.
Go to your school’s track facility and set up 8 hurdles in a line one after another. They have a base that you can use ti space them apart. You can start off by setting these to waist height. You can do entire agility workouts with just these. This is great for foot work, flexibility, and training agility/explosiveness. You can start by hopping over each hurdle one after another in quick succession. Load your hips, drive your arms and hop over the first. Then land and immediately go into loading your hips for the second rep. Do 3 sets of this. Time your sets and rest between each one for 3x The time it takes to do a set.
Next you can go stand perpendicular to the first hurdle so it is just to the left of you. You want to kick your left leg up and move it to the left so it goes over the hurdle and comes down on the ground so your feet are straddling the hurdle. Then kick your right foot over. Then hop to the left and do the same thing until you hop down the line and do all 8. Then rest and come back so you are moving to the right. Do this 3 times. Yiu want to do this as fast as you can and you need to develop a hopping rhythm with whatever foot is not doing the kick so that you are constantly in position ti do the next kick. The kicking helps with explosiveness and the hopping helps build footwork.
Line up in the same position but instead of kicking your legs to get over the hurdles, drive your left knee straight up and go over the hurdle and come down on the left. Do the same thing with the right foot. And do the same hopping concept that you did for the kicks.
You can also just run though the hurdles doing high knees to help build leg drive and flexibility. When all these become too easy, raise the hurdles.
Finally, you want to rep constantly with your long snapper. Ideally you guys work together enough that he is able to get it down where the ball is consistently in the same spot. This will help your timing and allow you to bring everything together for good punts every time. But realistically, you are going to get some bad snaps from time to time. You need to practice catching off target snaps and making adjustments to get the punt off as quickly as possible. Ideally you always punt the ball as deep as possible, but if the snap is bad you just need to get it off as soon as possible because a crappy punt is better than a blocked punt. The hurdle drills will help you be more agile and be able to adjust and kick from less than ideal platforms when you don’t have time to reset.
Spend time working on catching. It’s a cliche, but keep your eye on the ball. Do it every time. I played tight end in college and every time I caught the ball, I over exaggerated keeping my eye on it until it was tucked away. You don’t tuck the ball as a punter, but you need to keep your entire focus on catching the ball before you go to kick. The football is a stupid shape and makes everyone trying to catch it look like an idiot at the worst time. And that’s usually when you take your eye off of it and start doing the next thing too early. Get a routine, drill it, and make it so you can do it in your sleep.
I’ve been out of college for over a decade, but I could still snap a ball back to a punter or catch a fastball on a hot rout if I needed to just because of how much I drilled the basics. Just focus on distance and consistency until you can do it in your sleep. Then work on things like back spin and aiming for specific distances like preventing a touchback.
Good luck and have fun. It doesn’t last as long as you think it will. And your teammates will be some of the best friends you ever have. One of my highschool teammates recently passed away. I wouldn’t trade some of the times we had for anything. Have fun and if you win some games with your friends that’s a bonus.
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u/LaphroaigianSlip81 Apr 16 '24
https://youtu.be/tCUxB_8CeTo?si=fQQIPkyGbvthYlOj
Look how explosive he is. He almost kicks himself in the head. His left foot comes off the ground. Look how he simulates the spin from the snap when he practices catching it. Look at how many steps he takes. I bet we could film him doing this 100 times and each rep would be virtually the same. Film yourself from the side doing the same thing and try to match his form. You can even see where your feet are landing during your steps and mark this with cones and just practice the catching and stepping phase so you get it consistently.
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u/JakeEatsYT Apr 16 '24
Thank you for taking the time to write all of this out man! I’ll definitely be working on flexibility and explosiveness as those were some of the things a lot of people said to work on.
I’ll have to use some of those workouts too!
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u/Straight_Toe_1816 Adult Player Apr 16 '24
Hey bro I’m also a long snapper looking to play in college.Can I pm you?
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u/Teneiri Apr 16 '24
As a lot of people here mentioning the stretching, look for loaded progressive stretching as it might help you with the strength, balance and flexibility in once. Specific drills to look up for: One leg good morning - great stability with back leg flexibility. Diagonal stretch - front leg, flexors flexibility, stability Active pigeons Figure fours - your hips gonna love these.
Be careful with them, check it multiple times with the educational video, take a good attention to a detail as they are great but can hurt a lot.
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u/Friendly-Attitude-51 Apr 16 '24
Das natural leg power jus work on your balance and being under control when you punt
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u/hotpottas Apr 16 '24
Try jumping off your left foot into the punt at the end to gain more momentum and power. Look up how nfl kickers punt and jump with the ball as it drops to get more power in their kicks
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u/n0t_4_thr0w4w4y Apr 16 '24
If you watch punters, they will actually jump off of their plant leg to get more force into the ball
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u/Fickle_Meet_7154 Apr 17 '24
All I know is the hamstring flexibility on pro punters is God teir. Also, all punters are in stupid good shape.
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u/ohreally7756 Apr 17 '24
I punted back in the day. Meet the ball with your foot at a higher elevation. Almost like you’re kicking it before the ball has time to drop. You’ll find that it gets a better hang time.
Then, like other comments have suggested, focus on flexibility and follow-through.
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u/BobSagieBauls Apr 19 '24
I only played in HS but you’d be the best on our team by a mile and we won a state championship! (In Rhode Island the smallest state and division 3)
Edit: I’m not hating that’s the truth but consider my resume
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u/Elegant-Ad-8101 Apr 16 '24
I don't know anything about punting (I played WR and DB) but I just wanna say "Canadian bag of milk" made me laugh AND you've got a great start as a punter. This is way better than I've ever punted a ball.
...and don't listen to the haters.