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Danny O'Neil covers the Seahawks for The Seattle Times.

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August 13, 2008 3:22 PM

Getting a kick out of punts -- 8.13.2008 P.M. practice coverage

Punter Ryan Plackemeier got his most extensive punting of training camp so far, returning to the field after recovering from surgery to repair a pectoral muscle.

He returns to the field in a competition with Reggie Hodges.

"I think Reggie has punted well enough to make it a competition," said Bruce DeHaven, Seattle's special teams coach.

Hodges is likely to be the only one punting in Saturday's exhibition game against Chicago as Plackemeier hasn't yet had a full week of practices. As for what Plackemeier has shown so far, the special teams coach offered some praise.

"He's punting better right now than he did last year," DeHaven said. "The third year is usually a lot of times the year that punters start to kind of get it all together. Punting is kind of an inexact science. It's not like you're hitting a golf ball. You've got to drop, chase it in there and kick it. Everything happens very fast. You don't find a lot of punters come into the league that are really polished their first couple of years."

Plackemeier averaged 45 yards per punt as a rookie in 2006. That average dropped to 40 last season. That's a little misleading, though, because Plackemeier had great placement on his punts later in the season, putting eight punts inside the opponent's 20-yard line over the final four games. That also coincided with Seattle straightening out the difficulties it had with its long-snappers.

"People don't understand how important a snapper is to a punter," DeHaven said. "It's really even more important than a kicker because you get the ball back to the holder and you put it down in the same spot every time and there's some variance on the timing. But with the punter, if the snap's not right on him, he has to move his feet to catch it. Once he moves his feet, he has to re-set."

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