24 Mar 2021
Last week, we had the pleasure of chatting with Patriots punter Jake Bailey. Here is part 1 of our conversation, lighly edited for clarity and conciseness. Stay tuned for part 2, where weāll dive more into the nitty-gritty of Baileyās approach to punting.
The Punt Runts: How did you get into punting? What sports did you play before? What made you want to become a punter?
Jake Bailey: Like a lot of football kickers and punters, I started with soccer at a young age. I would always be the center defender, so I would take all the goal kicks and then the coach would let me run up and do all the free kicks and I would just shoot a goal and try and hit the ball as far as I could. I always liked striking some sort of a ball and trying to make it go far.
And then, when I started in high school, all my friends wanted to go play football and I was like, yeah, letās go play football. I didnāt even try out for kicker or punter my freshman year, I was just wide receiver and cornerback. Those are some of my most fun football memories: freshman year through junior year of high school football, where I was playing āreal positionsā and got to tackle people. Freshman year, the varsity kicker got kicked off the team, and then the JV kicker went up to varsity so they needed a JV kicker, and I was like, I could probably do it, Iāll give it a shot.
It worked out for like a few games, and then I tried it practicing it in the offseason. I kept getting better and I was super fortunate to have a former NFL kicker, in Michael Hustead, right in my backyard. He helped me out along the way, and ended up becoming my special teams coach. It was just lucky that I grew up out here, this is where all the kickers come to train in the offseason.
The Punt Runts: How much do you remember about draft weekend? What was that process like?
Jake Bailey: Draft weekend was wild because, as a specialist you donāt know whatās going to happen at all. You can be a second round pick, even a first round pick (specialists have been drafted there, itās not like I thought I was gonna go there at all). You can go first round to undrafted and the majority of people are undrafted. And I thought there was a shot, anything could happen, and I was just super fortunate that I ended up being drafted.
It was an unreal experience. I remember Coach [Bill Belichick] calling me, and my family was filming the whole thing. It was a weird thing to just say āhey coachā for the first time. I was very excited.
The Punt Runts: You then went into your rookie season in a punter competition with Ryan Allen who had just punted his ass off in the Super Bowl [LIII Rams vs Patriots]. What was that like?
Jake Bailey: I remember watching that Super Bowl, and I was loving it. I remember, I was at my friendās house and it was one of the most fun Super Bowls Iāve ever watched, and everybody else was like ugh this sucks.
When I got out to the Patriots, I became friends with Ryan, heās one of the nicest guys Iāve ever met in football. And we became good friends, and it was just a very cordial relationship, the whole time. I met [kicker] Steve Gostkowski and Joe Cardona, my [long] snapper. It was just super fun meeting all the guys and meshing with the team.
The Punt Runts: What is the fraternity of punters like? Do you feel like you know most of the punters in the league?
Jake Bailey: Everybodyās friendly with each other, which I really enjoy. Thatās something thatās very, very cool about the NFL. Iāve played in the Pac-12 and you have a new punter every week and thereās not much continuity for teams. Sometimes theyāll just switch out punters all the time and itās nice being in the League and having friends on different teams. [Jets punter Braden Mann] was obviously a really good guy that I played against twice and itās fun coming back to San Diego in the offseason because a few guys live out here. I was golfing with Jason Myers the other day, heās the Seattle kicker, and me and [Long snapper Joe Cardona], Joeās out here too, and we were out kicking with him the other day and itās fun just having guys around all the time and the ability to have other people be out here, working with you on the same level to hold you accountable.
The Punt Runts: What would you say is your relationship to the wave of Australian punters? Itās something obviously thatās taking over. What is it like being an American in the time of Australian punters?
Jake Bailey: Itās cool! I think theyāre the funniest, nicest guys in the world. They all have the same personality, it seems. The guy I got close with was [49ers punter Mitch Wishnowsky], who was in my draft class. Really nice guy. We would hang out at all the combine events, the Senior Bowl events. Good dude. He was always a punter I looked up to in the Pac-12 and competed against non-stop. Itās been fun playing against them and we played them last year, so that was definitely fun, seeing them on the sidelines. The 49ers talked to me a decent amount before the draft, and it was fun seeing those special teams coaches. [49ers Special Teams coordinator] Coach Hightower gave me a huge hug. Itās always fun seeing everybody that you know, itās totally a fraternity.
The Punt Runts: Who were some other punters that you looked up to?
Jake Bailey: I love to tell that story. The guy I always tried to emulate was [former Saints punter] Thomas Morstead. Heās a similar style punter as me, where we take short steps to make sure weāre controlled and swing very linear, where our swing is right down the line. And when I was at the combine, he was there in Indianapolis for an NFLPA meeting, and I was just finishing up the combine, I was in the airport, just sitting down to get dinner before the flight and he starts to walk up to me and I kind of recognized him. I was like āoh my gosh thatās Thomas Morstead.ā But I didnāt say anything at first, and then he makes eye contact with me and Iām wearing my ST or PK shirt like at the combine. And he totally recognizes that I went to the combine. He didnāt know who I was, though, at the time. But he introduced himself and then he sat down and we had dinner together. Really nice dude and I remembered one of the first things I told him was. āI just got done telling all these NFL special teams coaches that you are the guy that I look up to and now Iām having dinner with you like that same day.ā So that was a wild experience for me, we talked about a bunch of different things like the mental game of punting and kicking. I had a book that Iāve read called The Inner Game of Tennis just in my backpack and I showed it to him and he was like, this is awesome, and Amazon-ed it right there on his phone. Heās a really nice dude. I got his number after then, just kept up with them on text every once in a while.
The Punt Runts: You mentioned different kinds of punters. Are there a set of punter archetypes, and who would you say are emblematic of those different kinds?
Jake Bailey: So you have Australians which we mentioned before, who kind of do their thing. Like [Texans punter Cameron Johnston], [49ers punter Mitch Wishnowsky], I would kind of put in the same issue category. Theyāre different body types, so they hit the ball differently.
Then thereās big hitters like [Rams punter Johnny Hekker], huge hitter, Thomas Morstead is a huge hitter. Thomas uses the sideline really well and mediates returns and all that. [former Billās punter Corey Bojorquez] is a big hitter too.
And then you got like your precision guysā¦ you guys chart all this stuff too. Like you did the precision, the big hitters, you guys know what Iām saying. Thereās definitely differences.
Each of those guys, thereās stuff that all those guys do really, really well and itās fun watching them from the sidelines operate. When I was a rookie I would go back and watch all the different punters on tape and kind of see if I could learn stuff from them and different ways they went about their business.
Following around [former Patriots punter Ryan Allen] actually helped me out a ton. He taught me so much about how to be, how to conduct yourself, and [former Patriots kicker Steve Gostkowski] taught me all that stuff about the mental approach of NFL football games. Iām always trying to constantly learn. Itās cool watching other guys that are on this level compete.
The Punt Runts: During the bye when youāre sitting at home, how do you watch football? Because we oscillate between watching the games in which we like the punters, or watching RedZone. But RedZone doesnāt have enough special teams plays - how do you watch football on Sundays?
Jake Bailey: Itās so funny how you guys got like this because Iām cursed watching a football game: I watch for fourth downs. So, I donāt really pay attention first through second down and then, when I see third down, especially third-and-long I start like watching a little bit, and then I see an incomplete pass, Iām like āall right weāre watching now.ā
Itās always fun, for me, watching the camera zoom in on the punter walking on the field and seeing what he looks like, a lot of body language plays into a ton of that. So itās cool watching football that type of way. I donāt have RedZone, so Iāve never really watched that way.
The Punt Runts: We need to get you to sponsor reverse RedZone. BlueZone, every time a team punts.
Jake Bailey: If you could get Pat McAfee on that, that would sell so much. I have some ideas for stuff like that. You know in golf, the TrackMan stuff, if you could get a cameraman to go up right behind the punter, it would be a dangerous job, but right behind the punter and show like the TrackMan view of his punt, that would be unreal. And have Pat do all of those.
The Punt Runts: Thatās the future.
Jake Bailey: It totally is, and I feel like people are interested in it. Whenever the NFL posts the punting highlights of the year, people love that stuff, itās interesting.
The Punt Runts: Whatās something that youād wish the world and our followers knew about punting that they might not know?
Jake Bailey: I would say, if I have a son that I would want them to be a punter, not a kicker.
Iām happy, I was always a kicker in high school, I didnāt punt till my senior year of high school actually. I loved field goal kicking in high school, I went to a small little Christian school and there were 400 people at most watching my games. It was a fun little environment to kind of grow your technique and stuff, I was super raw. Once I got to college, my college coaches were like āyeah, youāre going to be a punter,ā I was like āOkay, whatever, I just want to go to Stanford.ā
And it ended up working out so well, because he thought my body type worked well for that, and the way my leg swing worked. It worked out so well.
Kickers, thatās a tough job man. [Patriotās kicker] Nick Folk, heās the man. It takes a certain type of person to do that.
Coming soon - Part 2 of our interview with Jake Bailey. To be notified when thatās released, and for more Puntalytics in your life, be sure to follow us on Twitter @ThePuntRunts
Follow @ThePuntRunts