Two decades ago, If I told you Australians would be taking the NFL by storm, you would have probably thought that I was crazy. Here we are though. It’s 2018 and colleges and universities across America are setting their sights 10,000 miles away from where the game was invented, focusing on those raised by Punting.
In Australia, kids learn to kick, and when they’ve run out of more appealing uses for their foot, they turn to punting.
Footy, for those uninitiated, is Australian-rules football, a sport that’s closer to soccer or rugby than American football. It’s the sport most Australian kids hope to play when they grow up, and when the dream fades the fallback plan is punting.
It is, in many ways, the most un-American of entry points to American football.
In Aussie rules, the kickers learn to boot it for hang time, learn to place the ball on a dime, learn to get kicks off quick and angle them just right.
However, they learn to kick long and high, because that’s what sells their game film in the U.S. They learn to kick consistently, because that’s what keeps them atop a depth chart once they arrive. They learn to boot the ball all over the field, because versatility makes them valuable.
Their unique style of booting the ball has taken the U.S by storm, replacing the more mainstream punters who have been around since the game began. Now a days, coaches rely on kick placement to limit returns from opposing teams, which is a skill sought out at an early age by Australian Footy players.
With colleges and universities such as, Wake Forest, North Carolina, NC State, James Madison as well as the Seattle Seahawks taking on Aussie punters, it is only a matter of time before they become the majority.
Football is game of field position and when coaches find those who are “experts” at what they do, it is hard to deny the impact that they can have on the outcome.
4th Down Fanatics 