Punters have always carried value but not to the level of Tory Taylor at Iowa, who was arguably the Hawkeyes' MVP in 2023 before being drafted in the fourth round by the Chicago Bears.
While teams have always put an emphasis on having strong special teams, Taylor's level of effectiveness at Iowa, which went to the Big Ten championship game despite a terrible offense in 2023, might give recruiters more reason to find the next Tory Taylor.who just so happens to be in their back yard. Erik Schmidt, who hails from Milwaukee and attends Marquette University , is ranked the No.
Ironically, the family that started Kohl's Professional Camp is from Wisconsin, and the camps were where rookie Minnesota Vikings kicker, Will Reichard, was discovered before becoming one of college football's greatest kickers at Alabama.Schmidt competed at Kohl's Midwest Showcase and hit a kickoff that went 91 yards and had 4.34 seconds of hang-time! He is a D1 punter and has the ability to kick field goals, punt, and kickoff at the Power Five level.
Taylor, by the way, was so good at Iowa that he owns NCAA records for average yards per punt in a career and single-season yards per punt . Even more impressive is that he did it while punting an absurd 93 times in 2023 as the Iowa offense was one of the worst in the country.