Death to the Spread Punt

The spread punt formation should die.

I might be biased on this topic because the first time I met the spread punt formation was in 2003. Michigan had a good team that year: John Navarre was a senior and the Wolverines beat OSU by two touchdowns and went on to the Rose Bowl, where they lost because that is what Michigan does in the Rose Bowl. The spread punt came into my life during that year's Iowa game, and quickly left. An innovative young grad assistant in charge of special teams had noticed some small college or high school doing it and thought "self, that looks like progress," installing the newfangled thing for the Iowa game.

The punter rolled out and rugby punted a couple times. Iowa got wise. They almost blocked one. They almost blocked another. Then they got one, causing veins to throb across Michigan. Undeterred, Michigan soldiered on. Iowa blocked a second punt, and veins started bursting, spurting blood from every home and place of business occupied by Michigan grads. From space, the state looked like a Busby Berkeley film as directed by Wes Craven. Michigan lost a game in which they outgained the opponent by 170 yards. The grad assistant reportedly had a breakdown and immediately left coaching; Michigan shelved the spread punt. Dead it remained.

But other schools continued to implement it as the Lloyd Carr era wound to a close, and for good reason: it really works. Spreading everyone across the field and telling them to run like banshees downfield turned two gunners into seven and seriously reduced the number and effectiveness of punt returns. I ran the numbers on this on my blog: in 2000, before the spread punt hit college, 46 percent of punts were returned for an average of 10.1 yards each. Last year, 39 percent of punts we returned for 9.1 yards each. If that doesn't seem like a huge reduction, keep in mind that there are still a large number of teams that, for whatever reason, are sticking with the old-school version of the punt return. The real numbers are bigger. For example, Michigan got around to re-implementing it last year when Rich Rodriguez hit campus, and these were the stark results:

	2007	2008
Kick Average	41	42
Return Pct.	41%	25%
Ret Avg	7.3	7.8
Net	35.9	39.3

Same punter, same personnel-for the most part -- but a different formation. Punt returns dropped 40 percent; what few punts were returned were usually surrounded. I'm not quite sure how the return average went up; anecdotally, I assume it was general tackling incompetence.

That's all well and good if you're the only ones doing it, but when everyone does it, the punt return goes from a potentially game-changing play to an opportunity to make a nicely executed fair catch. Vince McMahon will tell you that fair catches are boring, and while he may lack awesome football league ideas -- the XFL's "no fair catch" rule came coupled with a ridiculous five-yard halo -- he wasn't wrong about everything. Watching a guy catch a ball lacks a certain something, and that something is a bare smidgen of interest.

The NCAA already put a severe damper on the rugby punt by declaring punters live once they exit the tackle box; they should bring back the punt return by implementing the NFL rule where only eligible receivers can go downfield before the punt. Think of the children, who will be deprived of moments like this ...

... and grow up like those creepy affectless kids who don't get enough art. Punt returns are art, and they are dying. The children!

This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.