NFL 101: Special teams, gunners, jammers and those wacky long snappers

DON’T know your gunners from your jammers? Ever wondered what a Spider 2 Y Banana was? Join us as we explain the National Football League in NFL 101.

TODAY we bring you the first edition in our series ‘NFL 101’ where we will delve into the complex and convoluted world of the National Football League.

Our first topic is special teams — a group with which Aussie export Jarryd Hayne can expect to spend the majority of his time during his first season with the San Francisco 49ers.

Special teams see action whenever a field goal, punt or kick off takes place and given the emphasis on field position and possession, their role has become increasingly crucial.

Overlooked for many years, teams are now beginning to see the value in having efficient and well drilled special teams units — five of the 10 best special teams units in the league, as ranked by Football Outsiders, were on teams who made the playoffs last season.

Who are they

With the offence and defence only requiring 11 players at any one time, a fair portion of the rest of the 46 man match day roster has to contribute on special teams in some way.

Kickers and punters excepted you’ll never find a player who’s come through the system solely as a special-teams player — most of them are back up running backs, safeties, cornerbacks or linebackers.

Some develop into special teams only players as their careers progress, but given the tightness of the roster coaches always prefer to have a little versatility in their players if they can help it.

Special Teams Positions

Long Snapper — The most anonymous man on the roster and a player fans will only talk about when he stuffs up.

A long snapper’s job is to snap the football back to a holder, for field goals or extra point after touchdown, or punter when the team opts to punt.

That’s it, that’s all they do. They don’t run, they don’t catch, and they don’t tackle.

Long snappers are in essence glorified tunnleballers; little wonder the position is renowned for cultivating oddballs and eccentrics.

Punter — Catch the ball and kick it to the sh*thouse right? Well not quite.

A punter is usually judged less on distance and more on hangtime as the longer the ball is in the air the more time the gunners have to get to the punt returner.

Some notable Aussie punters include Darren Bennett (the first Australian to earn Pro Bowl selection) and Ben Graham (the only Australian to have played in a Super Bowl).

A punter can run, or pass, the ball if the team opts to fake the punt as Aussie Brad Wing (playing for the New York Giants in 2015) did here when playing in the US college system in 2011 — NB Wing’s touchdown was overturned due to Wing’s ‘excessive celebration’.

Kicker — the player responsible for kicking field goals and extra points. As such the lowly kicker usually scores more points for a team than any of the high-profile superstars he shares the locker room with.

Up until this season extra point attempts required the kicker to slot the ball between the uprights from 20 yards. This they did with a 99.3% success rate.

The NFL has forced the kickers back an additional 13 yards in 2015 — and kickers ‘only’ managed the extra point 93.3% of the time. Kickers usually fill kick-off duties as well.

Gunner — The guys tasked with chasing down a kick-off or punt return and either tackling the returning player or disrupting the play. Each team deploys two gunners, one each sideline, and they are permitted to begin running downfield as soon as the ball is snapped. You need to be able to run fast and hit hard. Pretty much like this:

Returner — The guy trying not to get pancaked by the gunners. Teams often deploy different players for punt returns and kick returns. In both cases the primary job is secure the ball, once that is achieved try to gain some ground — but that really is secondary to securing the ball.

Jammers — You have one job — stop the gunner. A team will usually line up two jammers on each gunner, once the ball is snapped they push, bash and bang the gunner in an attempt to protect the returner — NFL Pro Bowl gunner Steve Tasker described it as a “running street fight at a sprint”.

Upbacks — The personal protector for the punter. There’s little glory in being an upback.

Holders — Catch the snap, place the tip of the ball on the ground with the laces facing the posts. That’s all there is to it. This glamorous role is usually filled by the punter.

Best of the special teams

The best special teams player in the NFL is probably Matthew Slater, a gunner for the New England Patriors. Slater has been named to the Pro Bowl four times and the All-Pro team three times for his work as a gunner and has been the Special Teams captain for the Patriors since 2011. Colts veteran Adam Vinatieri and Patriors kicker Stephen Gostkowski were voted into the All-Pro team as kickers and along with long-time Oakland Raider and the Ravens Justin Tucker, they’re regarded as the cream of the kicking crop. Pat McAfee of the Colts and Johnny Hekker of the St Louis Rams are at the top end of the punters.

In terms of kick returners, Jacoby Jones, once of the Ravens and now on the Chargers, Bengals defensive back Adam Jones and Philadelphia Eagles running back Darren Sproles were the best in their position in 2014 but the best returner of the modern era, and maybe of any era, is Devin Hester of the Atlanta Falcons. A long time Chicago Bear, Hester is the all-time NFL leader in terms of kick return touchdowns (19) and most return touchdowns in a season (6).

Originally published as NFL 101: Special teams, gunners, jammers and those wacky long snappers