Okay so it’s obvious you’ve never been a part of a D1 football program or been to any ISU practices. Most of the specialists get their work done before practice and the first few periods of practice are dedicated to special teams with the different units, sometimes a period or two at the end of practice, and on random times a period in the middle of practice.
Kickers, punters, and long snappers don’t just kick, punt, or snap the entire practice lol. Their legs would be shot come Saturday. Usually after the first few periods they’ll do some drills then when they’re needed, they’ll snap to the QB’s, catch for the QBs, hold pads for the various groups, etc.
No, I never said I wanted a special teams analyst who doesn’t even live in Iowa. I would like a special teams coordinator (who would also coach a different position, just like an OC also coaches QBs or whatever) like other teams in the country have who are good at special teams. Not position coaches who get forced into being the KOR coach (for example) who don’t know a thing about KOR, but someone has to coach that unit because we don’t have a special teams coordinator
I'm talking about what a coach/coaching can address, which is actual coverage units, return units and punt units working on protection. Those things are happening during practice, regardless of whether it's the beginning or end, the more reps you do of those things, the fewer reps you're doing on offense or defense.
When you say specialists, I don't think you're talking about the 9 guys covering punts, or the 10 guys covering the kickoff, or 10 guys blocking for a kickoff or punt. That's what I'm talking about, because that's where a ST coach can actually have an impact.
I can only speak for JC level, but K, P and LS would be off getting reps for periods during practice, and Return guys would peel off during Off or Def to get reps fielding kicks, but nothing too much. Then of course all would be there for ST reps, which typically involved everyone. We did it last, or nearly last (might do goalline or special situations stuff to finish). Because again, you can't really do much of anything of use in actual run throughs of return or coverage without everybody, since you've got guys from both sides of the ball.
The simple point is you can't do REAL ST coaching that has significant impact to the things that have plagued ISU while the offense and defense are doing their work, because those guys are also playing ST.
I'm not against a ST coach, but I think the impact of hiring a ST coach without changing how practice is run will be minimal. That's all I'm saying.
