Utah’s Tom Hackett who collected his second consecutive Ray Guy Award as the best punter in college football adding strength to the Rules players smarter than ruggers argument.
Unlike some NRL players, such as Jarryd Hayne and Tom Burgess, who are trying to break into gridiron at skill positons that involve substantial doses of violent physical contact, though, Hackett is taking the Sav Rocca path by taking on and performing well at gridiron’s cushiest job, that of punter. Rocca was the former Tigers and Roos player who cashed big paychecks as a punter for the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles and Washington Redskins.
Hackett, rather than hanging around Melbourne and taking his knocks on the oval, prefers the standing around during practice and for most of the game job descriptions that belongs to gridiron punters. With typical Aussie aplomb, he justifies his decision, saying, “The main reason I’m playing this sport is because deep down I’m fat. I don’t like running too much.”
With the prestige attached to the Ray Guy Award, it is quite possible that the only running Hackett will be doing in the near future will be when he does a slow jog carrying his checks to the bank. It would appear that he has one-upped Rocca by entirely bypassing the 14 seasons in the AFL Rocca served.
