Couch: MSU punter Bryce Baringer is dominating college football at a record-setting pace
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EAST LANSING – It’s never good when your MVP is your punter. But, holy smokes, is this particular Michigan State football team lucky to have Bryce Baringer.
Not since the late Mike Sadler has an MSU punter so captivated his audience. And not ever has an MSU punter dominated the college football punting scene like Baringer has through half a season — averaging 52 yards per punt, about 3.5 yards ahead of anyone else in the country. If he keeps this pace, he'll set the NCAA record for yards per punt (for a minimum of 36 punts), set last year by San Diego State's Matt Araiza at 51.2.
Baringer is so good that he almost makes you forget the failed third-down play just before he takes the field.
For his efforts against Ohio State — seven punts averaging 48.9 yards, an average brought down by a 36-yard pooch punt downed at the 2-yard line — he was named the Ray Guy College Punter of the Week.
This isn’t new. If you’ve been watching MSU football, you’re been watching the man with the sports goggles, mustache and massive leg rescue the Spartans for a couple seasons.
Baringer’s 48.4 yards-per-punt average a year ago broke the MSU record, held by Brandon Fields (47.9 in 2004) and before him, the late Greg Montgomery (47.8 in 1986). Fields and Montgomery each played nine NFL seasons. Baringer has a chance to do the same.
Not bad for a former walk-on, who first tried out at MSU in 2018 after transferring from Illinois — where he walked on a year earlier. Baringer’s back story is well-chronicled. He first punted at MSU in emergency relief of the injured Jake Hartbarger in 2018, before being cut from MSU’s team in 2019 when there wasn’t room for him on the roster. Dantonio brought him back just before retiring in the winter of 2020. Baringer wound up as MSU’s starter during that pandemic-shortened season, averaging 43.6 yards a punt for a new coaching staff.
FROM 2018: MSU's Bryce Baringer goes from watching TV to punting for Spartans
Back then, he was just trying to prove he belonged. Now, in his sixth year of college, he’s trying to prove he’s a pro.
“The one thing with my job that needs to be there is the consistency. Can you rely on me to go do my job?” Baringer said Tuesday, ahead of the Spartans’ homecoming game at 4 p.m. Saturday against Wisconsin. “… I never take a rep, anything for granted, a day at practice, whatever it is. So I just try and treat it as if I have the chance to maybe play at the next level. I'm trying to take every practice rep, every game rep as if I'm a pro. I'm taking care of my body, that's played a big role.”
The NFL, for punters and kickers, is a cut-throat numbers game. There are 32 jobs. To have one them, you have to nudge someone else out.
“It’s a super binary position. You either get a one or zero,” Baringer said. “You do your job or you don't. It's really just being as consistent as you can. Some guys can have a gigantic leg and they could turn 5 out of 10 balls over (with great kicks). One of the things that I took to heart – and I learned this from (Miami Dolphins punter) Thomas Morstead, who's a legend: It's not how often you can hit your ‘A’ ball. It's how consistently you can get your B to B-plus ball. Because my B-plus ball is, it's a good hit.”
Baringer says his ‘A’ ball is that 74-yard, five-second meteor he boomed against Western Michigan. His B-plus is between 45 and 50 yards with a 4.7- or 4.8-second hang time. “It’s a fair catch,” Baringer said. “I would rather have 50 (yards) and 4.8 (seconds). It’s fair catches.”
And what he enjoys even more than sending a ball to the moon is sending one fluttering just far enough to pin the opponent back near its goal line, like he did Saturday, his 36-yard punt caught by MSU freshman Tyrell Henry at the 2.
“I like those more than the big ones, honestly,” said Baringer, who also boomed a punt 58 yards, forcing Ohio State to begin at its 9-yard line, and another for 57 yards that pinned the Buckeyes at their 10. “I mean T (Henry) did a really good job of getting down there. We worked on that really hard in practice. We drill it a lot on Wednesdays with our gunners getting down and finding the goal line, finding the ball, where they are. … I do what I can to help our defense out as much as possible.”
Those detailed practices include conversations and practice kicks with MSU’s own return man, Jayden Reed, figuring out what sort of punts are most difficult to catch and return.
The number that matters most to a punter is net average, more so than how far the kick goes.
“My net is 47-something, so we’re only losing about four or five yards per return, which is good,” Baringer said. “It means we’re doing the job that we’re supposed to do.”
If it wasn’t for MSU's 2-4 record, Baringer would be living his best life. He’s taking one class this semester — administration and governance in athletics. That’s all that’s left to earn his Master’s degree in sport coaching, leadership and administration.
“I’m having some fun right now,” he said.
At 23, he jokes about a photo his dad took of him early in his time at MSU. “I looked like a toothpick. Now I’m three or four inches taller and about 40 pounds heavier.”
He’s the old man in a specialist position group that includes three sophomores, two freshmen and a grad transfer.
“It’s cool seeing how I've changed in five, six years now. Then seeing little bits of how I was and then seeing it in our freshmen and sophomores … But it's just, they keep you on your toes.”
Baringer wouldn’t mind having his number called on a trick play before he’s done, as happened for several MSU punters before him, sometimes famously. He was on the field for a fake punt in the Peach Bowl, but that was a direct snap to Connor Heyward.
“We’ll have to see. Nothing yet,” Baringer said. “I’m not going to give anything away. Maybe. Hopefully. That’d be cool.”
He’s also well aware that while he might be MSU’s best NFL prospect and MVP, he’s just a punter. What he’s enduring during this trying season is nothing compared to his teammates, including friend and quarterback Payton Thorne.
“Like I said, it's a cliche (but) I'm a punter. I don't have as much going through my head as he does. Good play? High five. Bad play? High five. I'm just trying to support him and be there for him.”
Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: MSU football: Punter Bryce Baringer is halfway to an NCAA record season
