by Bill Syken
As the crowd dissipates Jai notices me. He pulls a black T-shirt from the box and marches toward me.
“Hey, punter, come out tonight,” he says, tapping me on the chest with the shirt, which I do not grab. “Me and some of the guys are celebrating the first night of camp.”
I keep my arms folded, and Jai pulls the shirt back, holding it at his side.
“I usually celebrate the first night of camp by resting up for the second day of camp,” I say.
“Oh, come on now,” Jai says. “You can’t act all butt-hurt about me not knowing who you are and then when I invite you out, you’re all like, I need my beauty rest. Don’t be murky.”
“Fine. I’m in,” I say, giving in to an urgency—dare I say, a neediness—behind Jai’s jolly eyes. I really would prefer to get a good night’s sleep. But once I declare that I am in, I am committed. I will try to keep my appearance to under an hour.
Jai throws the T-shirt at my chest and I catch it.
“Here’s something to wear. It’s at seven or eight or something like that,” Jai says. “At Stark’s. I know you know where that is.”
I drop the T-shirt on my lockbox and leave it resting there, unfolded, as I finish dressing.
I report to the team’s main meeting room, which is a throwback to my college lecture halls, except that it is freezing. Tanner keeps the room chilled to 54 degrees, so meetings move quickly. When players started wearing hoodies to keep warm, he banned those, too. All around the room I see goose bumps on muscled forearms as guys settle into their chairs.
“We have a lot to accomplish in these three days,” Tanner says, standing at a lectern. Just looking at him, so confident in his authority, my stomach acid rises. “But before we get down to business I thought one of the coaches should say a few words about what’s been happening the last few days. Here’s Coach Huff.”
Huff, who has been leaning against a side wall, limps toward the lectern, but not all the way to it. He is only centering himself in front of his audience, as he does not use a microphone. His crisp barks needed no amplification. Tanner often called on Huff when he needed to get the guys’ engines going. Tanner and his top coordinators are tacticians first. They are the CEOs. Huff is the only one of our commanders with a soul of brimstone.
Today, our special teams coach appears somber, but purposeful.
“Four days ago, we lost a teammate,” Huff begins. He clasps his hands together and holds them under his chin. I look over at Tanner, who stands at the side of the room, arms folded, one leg crossed in front of the other, as if he were modeling for a JCPenney catalog. “Samuel Sault was shot and killed. He was twenty-one years old. He was standing outside the stadium that he never got to play in.
“And you know what? It’s an awful thing, but it happens. People die too young all the time, even football players. Especially football players, it seems. Sean Taylor. Darrent Williams. Thomas Herrion. Korey Stringer. I could go on and on. On opening day there will be nearly seventeen hundred players on a league roster. I can guarantee you at least a dozen of them will die before they’re forty. It could be murder, it could be cardiac arrest, it could be who knows what. But it will happen. Maybe to someone in this room. Maybe two of you, maybe more. There are no quotas, there is no plan. The San Diego Chargers went to the Super Bowl in 1994. Six men from that team never lived to see forty. One died in a car crash, another in a plane crash. One was struck by lightning.”
Huff unclasps his hands and holds his right fist at chest level as he takes a step forward.
“Now, if you’ve been watching the television these last couple days, you hear these commentators, they talk about how a death like Samuel’s puts everything in perspective, reminds you of what’s really important. To which I say, Bullshit. That’s only true if you don’t know what’s important to begin with. I have been playing organized football since before I had hair on my nuts. I know exactly how important this game is, and I can tell you, if I was told that I had one more day to live, I’d spend it like I’m going to spend it today, out on that practice field, competing every second, telling you to get your asses off the ground and run hard and hit harder and do what you love to the best of your abilities.”
Huff’s volume rises, as does a darkness in his eyes.
“There is only one way to play this game: like you have a hellhound on your trail. And make no mistake: there is a hellhound on your trail. He is after you. The hellhound may be me. It may be Coach Tanner, or some other coach who doesn’t like the way you do things. It may be the man sitting next to you, who plays your position better than you do. It may be age, it may be injury, it may be your own weakness of purpose. It may be a madman who shoots a rifle and drives off into the night. The hellhound can shift into many forms, and you may not always recognize him. But it’s after you.
“And you need to play like it. Because sooner or later, the hellhound will get you. And when it does, you are going to want to know that you did your best when you had the chance.” Huff raises his hand and makes a fist. “I want to see you doing your best with every minute you have been granted on that field. While it lasts. Because it doesn’t, ever, for anyone. It never, ever lasts.”
Huff’s speech is received with absolute quiet; most players aren’t even looking at him. They stare at their desks, off to the side, anywhere but forward. Some undoubtedly are listening and startled by the morbidity of Huff’s theme; most are likely confused because they came into this room expecting to be told to keep their pads low and drive through their legs, not to gather ye rosebuds while ye may.
After Huff hobbles off to the side, Tanner steps to the podium again. He has listened inexpressively to Huff’s speech, and now he moves onto Sentinels business items. The first is to inform us that he has closed our locker room to the press; usually reporters are allowed to come in following the afternoon practice, but at this camp no one will be cornered at their lockers. Tanner also asks us not to speak to reporters if they contact us elsewhere. Only Tanner and our quarterback, Bo John White, will speak to the assembled media—the two of them have had as much media training as your average senator—and then camera crews will be allowed to grab video from the first ten minutes of practice, after which they must leave. “We have enough challenges ahead of us. We can’t do anything that makes our work more difficult.”
Like having an affair with Selia Sault?
Tanner then releases our schedule for the day. In the morning session, offense and defense will work separately, and in the afternoon, we will work on a punting phase. I am pleased with this, because on any given day it is not guaranteed that we will be scheduled to punt at all.
Practice begins with the players assembled on Field 1. Our strength coach, Kurt Sauer, a young man with a shaved head and the most pronounced trapezius muscles I have even seen, leads all eighty players through fifteen minutes of warm-up, as he has dozens of times before. Even as disgusted as I am with Tanner, it feels good to be out on the grass with the guys, in our brown-and-gray colors, assuming the formations we have in years past, in better times. I am in my usual spot toward the back right, and I hear the grunts and moans and juvenile jokes. Too Big is situated directly in front of Jai, and when Too Big leans forward into a calf stretch, his pants slide down revealingly. “Easy, bro, last time I saw that many pounds of crack I was watching Cops,” Jai says, and guys laugh much more than is warranted. Everyone is happy to be home.
The horn sounds and players disperse into their groups. The thirty-eight offensive players work on Field 1. The thirty-eight defensive players are on Field 2. And on Field 3, you have the pure specialists, all four of us—me, Woodward, Pablo, and his camp competition, a thirty-year-old kicker named Rodger Hulce, who has bounced around the league, never lasting with one team for more than a season. Hulce is a little guy, only five foot seven. Pablo isn’t much taller. Woodward and I look more like regular position players, but still: if this was grade school, you would assume that Field 3 is where they put the kids who h
adn’t been picked for the game.
I begin my cycle of warm-up punts. My pace is relaxed and methodical as I take my time between kicks, which leaves me plenty of opportunity to study young Woodward.
It doesn’t take me long to see that Woodward is a formidable competitor. Long and with a youthful bounce in his step, his stroke is confident and consistent, smooth and clean. I also notice, when he works on his targeted kicks, that he is a skilled practitioner of the drop punt, where you hold the ball pointed downward instead of flat, and when it lands it bounces straight up. This technique gives coverage guys a better chance to down the ball where it’s landed.
I prefer the coffin corner to the drop kick. The coffin corner has long been out of fashion around the league because of the risk involved—if you aim out of bounds and mishit the ball, you can end up with a seven-yard punt. But I trust my own consistency; I have never shanked a punt in competition. And the coffin kick gives me complete control. I am taking the other team’s return man out of the play, and also eliminating my dependency on my team’s coverage guys, who can be dishearteningly inept; they have accidentally knocked my drop kicks into the end zone more than once.
“How you doing, Nick?” This is Huff. He has sidled up to me on the practice field. He is wearing wraparound shades and a brimmed outback hat with a cord dangling underneath his chin.
“Feeling good,” I say. “All things considered.”
“I heard you went down to Alabama for Samuel’s funeral,” he says.
“That I did.”
Huff nudges me with a conspiratorial smile. “How was the food?”
“Awesome, now that you mention it,” I say. “The fried chicken was amazing.”
“I’ll bet,” Huff says. “I grew up in Clarksdale, Mississippi, so I’ve been to a few funerals like that myself. Too many, in fact. But thank God for that food. Helps you remember that it’s good to be alive.”
“Yup,” I say.
Huff nods. “Tanner told me you stayed down there an extra day, didn’t come back on the Gladstone family jet. What was that about?”
I stiffen at the mention of Tanner’s name, and I wonder if Huff is being inquisitive on his own behalf, or that of his boss. “When we left, I hadn’t had a chance to talk to Samuel’s family,” I say. “I wanted to go back.”
Huff seems to be studying me—though it is hard to tell exactly what he is thinking behind those wraparound shades. Then he says, “You’re good people,” and punches me in the shoulder. “Stay strong, Nick. I’m looking to see what you got today.”
“You’ve been watching me for half a decade, Coach,” I say. “You already know what I’ve got.”
Huff grins. “It’s like my daughter says to me, Nick. You’re only as funky as your last cut.”
“Don’t I know it.” Huff punches me in the shoulder again and limps away.
* * *
The punting unit’s segment is scheduled for fifteen minutes. Woodward and I should kick maybe five or six times each, with each of those plays being filmed for review by the coaches. Not that the coaches will focus on just Woodward and me. The choice of punter is, from their perspective, one of the simpler questions to resolve. The trickier problem is evaluating the guys who are going to fill out the rest of the special teams units. These players are usually the most marginal guys on the roster and the turnover is heavy. Some players make a career of special teams coverage, but not many. It’s like sharing a $99-a-night hotel room in Panama Beach with six of your buddies: it’s fine when you are just out of college, but the older you get, the less right it feels.
In that analogy I am the hotel manager, watching these young men come and go, and hoping they don’t make too much trouble for me.
“Gallow,” Huff shouts. “Let’s go. You’re up.”
I trot onto the field. We are beginning with punts from the offense’s twenty-five-yard line.
It is a pleasant and comfortable day with little wind. I set myself, feeling calm, receive a perfectly centered snap from John Backlund, my long snapper, and hit the ball well, although a little chunky, just a smidge high on my foot. It turns out to be a forty-six-yarder, a decent enough distance, and with good elevation and hang. The returner can only bring the ball forward a few yards before he is tapped down by the coverage unit.
We run the play again from the same spot on the field, and my swing is more in tune.
“Yeah, Nick!” Woodward shouts, clapping, as my kick sailed upward. “Nailed it!” Like I needed to hear it from him. And what, my first attempt isn’t worth cheering? The ball flies fifty-seven yards. My only regret is that I didn’t cut entirely loose and send the ball even further.
On my third kick, Backlund snaps the ball high—I have to jump for it to keep it from going over my head. I come down and quickly collect myself, getting the kick off before the rush reaches me, but because I am hurried I do not get a strong lift from my plant foot. The kick goes forty-five yards, but it travels low and fast and reaches the returner before the coverage can get downfield. The punt is brought back seventeen yards before the returner is tapped.
As soon as the whistle blows, Backlund turns and finds me. Backlund, a bearded and burly Minnesotan who also plays defensive tackle, is an eleven-year veteran and has played in Philadelphia for three years. He has a wife and six children at home. He is truly a man doing a job, which is why I am surprised by any lapse in professional execution.
“Snap got away from me, Nick,” he says.
“I noticed, John.” I rap my knuckles against his helmet. Every one of these kicks matters, and I need him on his game. “At least I showed them the old man still has his reflexes.”
And I am an old man, at twenty-eight. That’s how I feel, anyway, competing against a twenty-two-year-old.
Huff blows his whistle and waves me off the field. It is Woodward’s turn. As I cross paths with him while running, I reach out and we slap hands in encouragement.
Woodward kicks high and hard, showing as much power and accuracy as he had on the practice field. His first kick goes fifty-two yards, and his second goes forty-eight and really hangs up there. For each, only a minimal return is possible. And Woodward really creams the last kick. He hits a sixty-three-yarder that has the returner backpedaling and turning to make an over-the-shoulder catch.
“Hoo-wee!” comes the exclamation from one of the players. “’Scuse me while I kiss the sky!”
The shouter is Jai, of course. Who else? He is on the sidelines with his helmet off, one of the group of established veterans who can slip into full spectator mode during special teams work.
Huff blows his whistle and moves the line of scrimmage up to the opponent’s forty-eight-yard line. We are moving on to short kicks, where we will try to drop the ball close to the goal line.
“Gallow,” Huff calls. “Back to you.”
I am eager to get to this segment of the drills, because this is the part of the game where I excel. Kicking for distance matters, but the ability to pin an opponent deep is the punter’s most important skill. It’s the closest we come to a big play.
With the first kick, I go for the coffin corner, and I hit a pretty good one, placing the ball out at the nine-yard line.
“Okay, number eleven, we’re all very impressed,” Huff shouts. “Let the coverage guys get in some work.” At least for our practices, this is the problem with the coffin corner; it leaves the coverage guys with nothing to do, and thus nothing for the coaches to evaluate.
For my second kick, I employ the pooch—I just have the feeling from warm-ups that my pooch will work better than my drop today, and so I go with it. I hit my kick a shade early, which means the ball’s arc of flight is more vertical than I wanted it to be. The ball is fair-caught at the sixteen-yard line. Which is an acceptable result, but I can do better.
And so can Woodward.
Huff blows his whistle and gives me the wave. I had been hoping for one more punt, but I am done.
No hand slap from Woodward thi
s time as he and I pass each other. This is his chance, and he knows it. The Super Bowl is pressure, but this may be worse. At least in the Super Bowl, you know you’ve made it that far down the road, but moments like this are the difference between making the team and watching your career die.
I watch from the sidelines, arms folded. If Woodward is feeling the stress of the situation, he doesn’t show it. He looks relaxed and even happy as he awaits the snap.
Woodward beckons and Backlund delivers the ball directly to his waiting hands. Woodward catches the ball and turns it point-down and kicks, and it goes up and up and up. And as the ball begins its descent, I can see that he nailed it. His kick might as well have been to my stomach.
The returner lets the ball drop. It hits at the three-yard line and bounces almost straight up. It actually moves a shade backward on the hop. A gunner fields the ball easily at the four, and players who have run downfield bump shoulders in celebration. Meanwhile Woodward, who had drifted halfway downfield, claps with satisfaction.
Shit.
Everyone runs back and Woodward lines up for his second kick. He can just play it safe now; if he drops the ball anywhere inside the fifteen, he will win the day. And in our two-man race, the chances are few.
Woodward fields another clean snap from Backlund—dammit, why wasn’t that bearded fuck as accurate with me, is there a conspiracy between these two Midwestern boys?—and Woodward gives the ball another one of his long, clean strokes.
From the moment the ball comes off his foot, I see that Woodward has overhit it. Severely. His punt flies so far beyond the field of play that a front-office guy in a straw hat and a golf shirt, idly spectating several yards behind the end zone, attempts to catch the ball with one hand while holding onto his coffee. He drops both the ball and his coffee cup, his bungling underlining the extent to which Woodward’s kick is a complete botch.
I stand stoically on the sideline, just as I had for Woodward’s previous kick. But I would be lying if I did not admit to a Schadenfreude-fueled rush of adrenaline. As good as Woodward’s first kick has been, the second is a disaster, a complete mental lapse. Woodward looks crushed, as if he has pulled out of the driveway without looking and accidentally run over the family dog.