On 'A Specialist's Path' Fall Camp/ Two a Days

As kicking specialists enter fall practice, there are quite a few things that I have experienced over my years of kicking and being around kickers and punters that I believe are useful.

In this week's On A Specialist's Path I will give my advice for kicking specialists' going through fall practice.

Going through fall practice can be a challenge because of the physical toll that kicking everyday can do to your body and also the mental grind of competition.

The first topic I would like to discuss is the physical strain of kicking during fall camp.

Coaches are in a tough position when it comes to kickers and punters during fall practice because most of them generally don't understand kicking specialists and the rigors of kicking and punting a football.

The coaches believe that since the other position players are tired and hurting they feel that kicking specialists should just suck it up and keep kicking when their legs are fatigued. The problem with this philosophy is that many specialists don't ever make it out of camp because over kicking can often lead to an injury.

Would you rather kick well August 1st or a month later when the first game starts? That is for you to decide but it is acceptable to tell your coach you would like an afternoon off because your leg is sore.

I dealt with a similar situation my freshman year of college at Tennessee. I was competing with a fifth year senior kicker named Phillip Newman and we were in a tight battle for the kicking job.

About two weeks before our first game I developed a muscle pull in my leg. I was concerned to take any time off for the injury because of the fear of losing my job. I decided to take the time off though cause I knew that if I continued kicking I would do more damage and not have a successful season even if I did win the job.

I decided to sit down with Coach Fulmer and tell him that I needed a week off to let my leg recover from injury. That week was one of the longest weeks of my life as I had to miss a scrimmage and a few practices but the decision paid off for me.

After letting my injury heal I came back and won the kicking job and held it for the next four years. Sometimes you have to understand the bigger picture during camp and know what is best for you and the team.

Kickers and punters are very similar to pitchers in baseball because what they do is a repetitive motion. Anytime you do a repetitive motion the body is eventually going to tire and the mechanics of the movement will start to breakdown. This is what leads to injuries.

There is very little a player can do to combat what a coach decides to do during practice, but he can certainly control what he does before and after practice!

Bottom line is that there is plenty that a specialist can do without kicking a ball. Dry runs and the One Step Drill can be extremely important to a kicker and Drop Drills and the One Step Drill are important for a punter. You don't have to work harder than your competition just work smarter.

The next part of fall camp is the mental side. Either a kicking specialist is in a heated battle for his job or he has locked down a starting spot but both situations have their challenges.

If you are in a heated competition for a kicking job there is always the feeling that you are fighting for your job. This can be a challenge if you are always focusing on your competition. Specialists can get so caught up in what the competition is doing that it can take you out of your game.

It is vital to focus on what you can control rather than focusing on outside factors like how far your competition has kicked or punted a ball. I found that it is better to not even watch the other person when they kick and just focus on what I have to do.

A specialists should feel confident enough in their abilities that if they do their best than they will win the job regardless of what the competition does.

The final challenge is for specialists that have already locked down a starting spot after a successful season.

Drew Butler (pictured above on the left) won the prestigious Ray Guy Award this past year. There are a whole new set of expectations for someone who has a successful season.

The challenge for specialists who have secured their job already is learning to be self motivated. Everyday you have to be able to work on something that makes you better and avoid the challenge to over kick.

I watched our punter at Tennessee, Dustin Colquitt, kick way too much his senior year because he was trying to live up to expectations. He injured his hamstring and did not have the year he expected to have because he did not handle dealing with high expectations well.

He recovered from his hamstring injury and will be entering his 6th year in the NFL. The bottom line though is that even the best kicking specialists have their own challenges in fall camp. The important thing is to be smart and understand that camp is there to prepare you for the season and not to forget that being prepared for the season is the main goal of camp.

Visit: www.jameswilhoitkickingcoach.com

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