Long Snapper's Delight

The football team is one of the biggest student organizations on campus, with over 100 members. Junior long snapper Ryan Pritchard fills just one of the team's dozens of positions, yet his job is one of the squad's most important, but least recognized, roles.

Though obscure to most casual football fans, the long snapper position is crucially important to any special teams coordinator. Long snappers are essentially special teams centers, charged with snapping the ball during punts, extra-point attempts and field goals and then ensuring that the kick isn't blocked by the opposing team.

"It's one of the positions that people just take for granted until something wrong happens," offensive coordinator Dave Rackovan said.

Like many long snappers, Pritchard started out his football career as an offensive lineman. After some experience as a center, his high-school coaches made him double as a long snapper.

The change worked and helped get the Novi, Mich., native recruited by big-name Division I schools, including the University of Michigan, a perennial football powerhouse, as well as other Ivies like Yale. But Princeton began eyeing the Novi High School standout early, and, after going to a Tiger football camp in the summer before his sophomore year of high school, Pritchard had made up his mind.

"That's when I realized that I wanted to come here," Pritchard said.

Pritchard has been the starting long snapper for the Tigers since he arrived at Princeton, where he takes a simple approach to his position.

"Just don't screw up," Pritchard said.

That's something easier said than done. Long snapping is an extremely complex position, requiring both strength and finesse. The player's strategy changes depending on whether he is snapping to a holder — such as during a field goal or extra-point attempt — or to a punter.

For punts, the long snapper is expected to snap the ball 15 yards to the waiting kicker in less than a second before jumping up and blocking the enormous oncoming linemen. Then, after the punter successfully kicks away the ball, the long snapper has to run 40 yards across the field to help tackle the return man.

This year, Pritchard has yet to deliver a bad snap.

"It really makes a big difference to know that he's going to snap the ball in the right place every time," junior punter Ryan Coyle said. "It's really comforting for me and for the rest of the punt team to have someone out there like him. He's really valuable, and I think the entire team appreciates that."

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For placekicking situations, Pritchard has less than a quarter of a second to get the ball to senior captain and placeholder Brendan Circle, before popping up again to thwart the defensive line's field goal-blocking attempts.

In either situation — before a punt or before a placement kick — a slightly errant snap can cause a touchback, give the other team excellent field position or directly result in a touchdown for the opposing team.

"They say about long snappers, no press is good press because they only talk about you when you screw up," Pritchard said.

Not only has Pritchard managed to avoid mistakes, he's also brought an air of professionalism and consistency to the gridiron.

"He's our guy because he's really one of the most consistent [long snappers] in the league," Rackovan said. "He's a very steady, very focused kid on the field, not bothered by any pressure situations."

In some instances, NFL long snappers acquire fame and money for their consistency. As long snapping becomes a specialized position and the benefits of having it done well become more apparent, colleges are increasingly willing to give out scholarships to long snappers. Professional teams are willing to fork over high draft picks and millions of dollars to a top snapper. In 2005, the average salary for an NFL long snapper was $645,928. Some earn much more.

Though Pritchard's long-snapping talent has yet to earn him fame or money, it has gotten him a group of his own on facebook.com. At press time, the group "Ryan Pritchard Should Be Long Snapping for Michigan" had four members.

Considering the dependability Pritchard has provided for the Tigers over the past two-and-a-half years, the group's lack of popularity shouldn't be surprising.