Mizzou Sports Email

Official Sports Report for March 8, 2008

Football Spring Position Preview: 
Specialists
by OSR Staff
Columbia, MO - Missouri Head Football Coach Gary Pinkel recently sat down with the Mizzou OSR to provide an exclusive preview of the Tigers, as they head into spring practice, which begins March 11th, and concludes with the annual Black & Gold Game on April 19th.  Today's final position preview, which includes an exclusive look for OSR subscribers at the pre-spring depth chart, will look at the Tiger specialists.

When assessing the health of the specialist positions for Missouri in 2008, which includes the placekicker, punter, snapper and holder spots, it's a little good news-bad news situation.

The bad news would be the loss of two accomplished players in punter Adam Crossett (who ranked fifth in MU career punting average and was also a first-team Academic All-American in 2007) as well as long snapper Steven Blair (who snapped virtually flawlessly for the previous three seasons).

The good news, however, is very good, as Mizzou will benefit from the return of one of the best kickers in the nation, in senior Jeff Wolfert, as well as his right-hand man, holder Tommy Saunders.

Wolfert has become one of the best stories of perseverance and defying the odds in college football over the last two seasons.  The Overland Park, KS. native kicked in only one game in his life prior to coming to college.  The one game in which he kicked in high school, he broke his hip on a kickoff.  An accomplished diver, he eventually came to MU on a diving scholarship, but never gave up his dream of kicking, and he walked on prior to the 2005 season.  After sitting behind Crossett, who set the MU place-kicking single-season scoring record in 2005, Wolfert chose to try one more time in 2006, and he went on to win the job coming out of fall camp that year. 

The rest has been history, as he's proceeded to up the MU season kick-scoring record each season from 99 in 2006 to 130 in 2007.  Wolfert won honorable mention All-American honors last season, as well as 1st-Team All-Big 12 honors, as he connected on 21-of-25 field goals and a perfect 67-of-67 extra points.  In his two seasons, Wolfert has made an astounding 151-of-157 combined kicks, and he has never missed a kick in Big 12 Conference games, going 90-of-90 overall.  Wolfert will leave holding virtually every MU kicking record in the books.  Walk-on Grant Ressell is listed second on the depth chart at placekicker heading into the spring period.

Doing the holding for Wolfert for a second straight year will be sure-handed receiver Tommy Saunders.  Saunders was outstanding in his first year of service in this role in 2007, and he even completed a couple of passes out of fake field goal sets, including one that went to TE Martin Rucker for a touchdown against Nebraska.  Others that could hold after Saunders include junior wideout Blake May and senior quarterback Chase Patton.

The area that will receive the most observation among the specialists in spring drills will likely be at punter, where the Tigers lose a three-year starter in Crossett, and look to replace him with junior college transfer Jake Harry.  The left-footer redshirted in 2007 in his first year in the program, and will look to establish himself as the man to beat for the job with a strong spring camp in 2008.  Behind Harry on the depth entering camp is Columbia, Mo. native Tanner Mills, who initially attended cross-town school Columbia College to play soccer.  Mills transferred to MU prior to the 2007 season, and after sitting out the year due to NCAA transfer rules, he's eligible and ready to compete for playing time in 2008.

One of the most unheralded roles on any team is that of long snapper, and Mizzou will definitely miss the very dependable services of Blair, who had one bad snap over the last three seasons.  Looking to replace him will be junior tight end Jon Gissinger, who has the blood lines working in his favor.  His father, Andrew, was an offensive lineman in the NFL for six years, and taught his son at an early age to long snap.  Also on the depth at long snapper heading into spring is senior linebacker Brock Christopher, who has worked extensively on the craft in practice over the past three seasons.

Here's a look at the official team depth chart at the four specialist positions heading into spring camp...

Placekicker
1) Jeff Wolfert - 6-2, 185, Sr., 2L
2) Grant Ressell - 6-1, 180, RSFr.

Punter
1) Jake Harry - 6-1, 190, Jr.
2) Tanner Mills - 6-2, 195, Jr.

Long Snapper
1) Jon Gissinger - 6-3, 240, Jr., 2L
2) Brock Christopher - 6-2, 235, Sr., 3L

Holder
1) Tommy Saunders - 6-0, 210, Sr., 3L
2) Blake May - 5-11, 190, Jr.
3) Chase Patton - 6-5, 220, Sr.

Here are some comments from Pinkel about the Tiger specialists...

PINKEL - "If you’re looking at our snapper, we graduated a player there, so we’ve got Brock Christopher and Jon Gissinger, both are very capable.  That’s something we’ve got to get taken care of in the spring.  Both of those guys play other positions, so the injury factor is there, so we need to get both of them ready to play."

"Jeff Wolfert is one of the best kickers in the country, hopefully he’ll continue to get better, which we expect he will."

"We’ll have a new punter this year, Jake Harry right now is the guy who has the opportunity to win the job.  He’s a guy has to show us the consistency, but he’s got the ability."