I missed this year.
The Eagles finally pick up a punter and I hadn’t even dug into him. But I’m here to atone and, I have to say, while the Eagles didn’t bite on one of the three guys drafted, they got somebody really interesting.
Kansas State kicker-punter Ty Zentner
Many knew Kansas State’s Ty Zentner better as a kicker as he was the one that famously beat TCU in the Big 12 Championship on a 31-yard field goal in overtime and got carried off the field.
It was his 9th straight field goal on way to a perfect 11-for-11 season including two over 40 yards and a 53-yarder against West Virginia. But what got Ty quickly picked up in the UDFA period by the Eagles was his punting.
I have wanted the Eagles to draft a punter for two years now. Long the ignored and forgotten position, it became very real in the Super Bowl when a poorly directed punt was one more blow chiseling the Eagles lead away. The Eagles punting situation is not terrible, but it can – and needs to – be upgraded. When you are planning to compete for the Super Bowl every year, margins are thin.
What are the Eagles getting in Ty as a punter?
Below shows how Ty stacks up on the core punting stats with the other top punters that were drafted. Here’s the summary:
- Good, pro-level hangtime of 4.27 seconds
- Decent distance of 44.2 yards per punt, with a 41.5 net
- Limits returns with a 6.3 average and only 3 returns of 10 yards or more
- Consistently gets balls downed inside the 20 instead of touchbacks
| Punter | YPA | Avg Hangtime | Yards per Return | Inside 20 | Touchbacks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ty Zentner | 44.2 | 4.27 | 6.3 | 29 | 5 |
| Brad Robbins | 42.3* | 4.27* | 6.9 | 21 | 0 |
| Ethan Evans | 45.7 | – ** | – ** | 39 | 13 |
| Bryce Baringer | 49.0 | 3.76 | 5.9 | 24 | 4 |
| Michael Turk | 46.6 | 4.18 | 2.9 | 23 | 10 |
| Adam Korsak | 44.0 | 3.61 | -0.3 | 35 | 2 |
* Brad Robbins suffered an injury part way through the season which dramatically hurt his numbers. His punts prior to the injury averaged 47.6 yards and a 4.37 hangtime.
** Ethan Evans punted DII which is severely lacking in punting statistics, so not all data is available for him.
One thing to remember is the new, punter-unfriendly Vapor Elite Slim ball used by many colleges distorts a lot of the above stats. It’s a smaller ball to help QBs but the smaller surface area to strike hurts punters, especially on mis-hit balls. Remember that point as I will get back to it.
Open field punting
Open field punts – those from a team’s own side of midfield where a punter should be able to fully kick the ball – are what the league cares about. Most think punting is dying in the NFL but it is really short-field punts that are decreasing in frequency as teams get more aggressive in plus territory. How does Ty stack up on open field punts? I charted all of his punts (and the other punters in this class) below:
| Punter | # Open Field Punts | Avg Punt from Yardline | Avg Distance | # of 50+ Yards | # of 60+ Yards | # under 35 yards |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ty Zentner | 50 | 60.7 | 46.4 | 18 (36.0%) | 4 (8.0%) | 7 (14.0%) |
| Brad Robbins | 40 | 60.3 | 43.9 | 7 (17.5%) | 2 (5.0%) | 6 (15.0%) |
| Bryce Baringer | 45 | 64.6 | 50.9 | 22 (48.9%) | 10 (22.2%) | 4 (8.9%) |
| Michael Turk | 55 | 58.5 | 47.5 | 19 (34.5%) | 3 (5.5%) | 3 (5.5%) |
| Adam Korsak | 71 | 59.9 | 44.3 | 13 (18.3%) | 3 (4.2%) | 5 (7.0%) |
When able to just rear back and kick the ball, Ty averaged 46.4 yards in the open field which would be behind every punter above except Adam Korsak (Robbins averaged 47.6 yards in the open field prior to his injury).
But Ty actually had more big punts (over 50 or 60 yards) than any punter except Bryce Baringer, with 18 punts going over 50 yards and 4 over 60 yards. Additionally, he had 29 punts over 4.5 seconds of hangtime.
Here are some examples of what he is capable of. Against Missouri and kicking from his own 31 yardline, Ty sends a ball that carries 59 yards in the air and checks up perfectly to be downed at the 2 for a 66 yard punt.
Here against Texas he punts from his own 35 yardline, lands the ball near the goaline and has it kick sideways out of bounds at the 4 yardline.
You aren’t going to see many punts better than those. He can kick. And he showed this at the Kohls Pro Combine where he had kicks of 50 yards and a 4.55 hangtime, 54 and 4.86, 52 and 4.51, and 48 and 4.70.
But there’s a “but”…
But you know how math works… if he has one of the highest percentage of big punts but is behind the other punters in overall average distance, it means he has a lot of short punts that are pulling the average down. And you see that in the table above.
Ty had 7 punts, or 14%, that went less than 35 yards and four that went under 30 yards, including 2 of his 6 punts in the Sugar Bowl against Alabama below:
His shank rate is at least double the other punters in this class (again, Robbins shows high above at 15% but he only had one shank, or 6% of his punts, prior to his injury). Both of the above examples had bad bounces but they still only carried 30-35 yards in the air and the punter’s job is to generate better bounces.
Short field punting
Short field punting, those punts in plus territory where you are trying to get the ball downed inside the 20 or 10, are important but a dying play in the NFL.
These are all smaller sample sizes with every rookie punter having fewer than 10 short field punts in their final college season. But Ty compared well here.
Don’t look at average distance here, what is important is where you force the opponent to start and what percentage of the remaining field position your punt can consume. Ty started opponents at the 13 yardline, gaining over 71% of the remaining field position, and only put one ball into the endzone.
| Punter | # Short Field Punts | # Touchbacks | Avg Distance | Avg Opponent Start Yardline | % of Yards Gained |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ty Zentner | 9 | 1 | 29.2 | 13.6 | 71.6% |
| Brad Robbins | 5 | 0 | 31.2 | 12.0 | 73.6% |
| Bryce Baringer | 5 | 1 | 28.0 | 14.8 | 65.4% |
| Michael Turk | 8 | 4 | 29.0 | 14.4 | 70.5% |
| Adam Korsak | 6 | 0 | 35.8 | 6.3 | 85.0% |
Ty is right with the best punters in this class with the exception of Adam Korsak – if a team was going to only short field punt, Korsak is your guy.
Comparing to Arryn Siposs
You can’t directly compare numbers from college to pros due to the difference in the ball – last year’s rookie punters consistently showed several yards of distance improvement as well as 0.2 to 0.3 seconds better hangtime in the NFL
But for what it is worth, here is how Arryn Siposs performed in 2022:
- Averaged 47 yards per punt on 40 open field punts, bottom 10 in the league
- Averaged a 4.22 second hangtime, 27th in the league
- Put 8 of 40 punts (20%) over than 50 yards and none over 60 yards
- Had 3 that went 40 yards or less, including the Super Bowl punt, and none that were under 35 yards
So what should we look for with Ty?
Ty definitely has a bigger leg than Siposs. He also is way less consistent and shank rates of near 15% aren’t going to fly in the NFL.
But remember earlier when I said the college ball was less forgiving than the pro ball? I am not sure if that is causing some of the inconsistency but it is something to watch. If Ty can up his consistency and cut his “under 40 yard” punts dramatically, he’s going to punt in the NFL.
Back to his kicking, Ty does kick in addition to punt, but dual-duty kicker-punters are interesting but overvalued – NFL teams are not going to go with one guy. The positions are too important and they still need a holder. But as we saw this past season, if you get an injury to one of the specialists, somebody like Ty can fill in.
Me personally, I still think Howie is missing value in the draft by not grabbing one of the top punters coming out. We have had back-to-back years with a handful of top guys, guys with both big legs and consistency come out. But, I am excited that we finally have competition coming in and Ty is somebody that has great potential. He is going to impress when we see his first handful of punts, but we need to see if the shanks sneak back every 8 to 10 punts.
The Eagles will figure it out in camp but if Ty can limit his shanks, his bigger leg is going to win the camp battle easily and the Eagles found a great upgrade in the UDFA period.
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