Football: Moving forward – Brett Baer

Tim Buckley, The Advertiser, August 6, 2012

He had a season those who play his positions can only dream about.

A national-best 90 percent success rate on field-goal attempts at 18-for-20, making him 92.6 percent in his career after going 7-for-7 in 2010.

Just one fewer make than John Reveto’s 1977 school record.

An impressive 46-for-50 on extra-point attempts.

A punting average of 40.3 yards, including 12 boots among 79 of 50 yards or better and a whopping nine that were downed inside the 5-yard line.

Four-for-four on onside kick attempts, making him 7-for-9 in his career, including four he’s recovered himself.

And the kicker, of course, a 50-yard field goal as time expired to beat San Diego State in the New Orleans Bowl.

How can Brett Baer possibly top 2011?

Just try not to, the Ragin’ Cajuns’ Lou Groza Award contender suggested as he heads into a senior season that — especially if the last one is repeated — could open NFL doors.

He actually considers the one to come "a whole new year."

"I’m not trying to think about out-doing myself from last year," Baer said during the opening week of training camp for the Cajuns, who went 9-4 in 2011 thanks largely to the foot from Brandon, Miss.

"I’m not necessarily setting the bar and saying, ‘This is where I want to be this year.’ I just want to carry it over and just do the best with the whole special-teams unit, and then at the end of the year be able to say our special teams this year was a big part of why we were winning games again."

As crazy as his numbers were, however, teammates have no doubt Baer produce repeats of his many feats.

"I feel like with the confidence he has, he can be even better," said cornerback Melvin White, a key member of UL’s punt-coverage team.

"To have a year like that as a kicker is pretty incredible," added reserve quarterback Brady Thomas, Baer’s senior holder from Aledo, Texas. "So I think he’s feeling pretty good about it. He’s humble, though, so he still keeps grinding all summer. He’s in here working, so he’s gonna be good."

In the offseason Baer added 15 pounds of pure muscle to his 5-foot-11 frame, Cajuns head coach Mark Hudspeth said.

"He’s still very accurate," said Hudspeth, who doubles as UL’s special-teams coach. "But now he’s gonna be way more explosive on his punts and kickoffs, which hopefully will make us way more effective."

Having Thomas and both of his deep-snappers back, Hudspeth added, should help Baer’s extra-point and field-goal kicking too.

Senior Matt Rosenbalm and sophomore Lafayette High-product John Broussard are battling again for the deep-snapping job, which last year belonged to Rosenbalm for eight games before he sustained a season-ending knee injury at Western Kentucky.

"We’ve got a lot of continuity there," Thomas said of UL’s kick units. "So, coming off that good season, I think we’ve got a lot of positives that we can carry over from it."

UL’s punt-coverage unit, meanwhile, will have cornerback Jemarlous Moten step into the punt-team role alongside White left vacant by Dwight "Bill" Bentley.

"With their (Moten’s and White’s) speed," Baer said, "I think they’ll be able to get down there, so I’ve just got to be able to hang it up high."

Bentley, a NFL-drafted cornerback now with the Detroit Lions, had a special knack for downing punts close to the goalline.

The Cajuns, in fact, were able to pin not only the nine inside the 5, but also 12 inside the 10 and 27 inside the 20.

To Baer, though, the made field goals and downed punts all are yesterday’s news — which is why he spent so many of the last several weeks focused on repetitive labor, especially with Thomas, Rosenbalm and Broussard.

"The whole field-goal unit has been working so hard this summer," said Baer, who also had a walk-off 37-yard field goal to beat Florida Atlantic last October. "We’ve been working so hard to be as consistent as we can be, and I think that’s the most-important.

"After last season, it’s a huge confidence-booster going out like we did. But I feel like you need to have a great preseason to go into the season with that kind of confidence," he added. "All preseason, you’ve got to get back in the groove — because I think it’s all about a groove with the snapper and holder. I’m lucky to have (both) back "» but I just think you’ve got to get back into that groove."

Doing so should help ease the pressure.

So, too, should knowing already what really is possible.

Not that pressure seems to be an issue for a kicker who wants only a clean snap, a clean hold and — now, even after all he did — a clean slate.

"There’s always going to be pressure," Thomas said. "But I don’t think there’s that much pressure.

"For Brett, FAU was pretty pressure. New Orleans was pretty pressure. So he’s got a lot of experience being under pressure. But I don’t think of it as being ‘under pressure’ — because we’ve done it before, and we think we can still keep doing it."