Raiders rookie punter Johnny Townsend shows resilience

ALAMEDA, Calif. — Of all the traits Johnny Townsend possessed before the draft, besides his knack for directional punting, beyond his character when creating a nonprofit organization while at Florida, there was one the Raiders dismissed that proved useful on his second career NFL punt.

His vertical jump.

In the third quarter Monday, Townsend scaled for a snap from the Raiders’ emergency replacement snapper. He caught the sailing ball, took two short steps in his approach and — while his usual long snapper sat in the locker room, processing a season-ending knee injury — aired a 45-yarder that forced a fair catch.

Ideally, Townsend wouldn’t deal with this much turnover.

He is handling it in stride.

The Raiders will travel Saturday to Denver, where they’ll face the Broncos on Sunday. Townsend is eager for the opportunity, which affords him a chance to punt in altitude for the first time in his life. He will swap punts with former Raiders and current Broncos punter Marquette King, whom he knows from offseason camps.

These storylines aside, maybe the game won’t be as eventful for Townsend as his rookie year has been.

“It’s interesting,” Townsend said. “There’s usually not much turnover at the position, especially this early in the season. We’ve seen different snappers, different kickers. But we do a really job of game planning during the week, and we all have very good relationships with each other. We’ve all been super comfortable if we hit the field (and) there’s adversity.”

The Raiders carried two veteran specialists on their April 28 roster when drafting Townsend in the fifth round.

One, Giorgio Tavecchio, was the incumbent at kicker. The other, Andrew DePaola, was a long snapper who signed a three-year contract in March. Shortly after the draft, the club added rookie free agent Eddy Pineiro, Townsend’s college teammate.

None of the three is on the 53-man roster today.

A busy NFL start for Townsend began as his holder responsibilities on field goals and extra points. Tavecchio is a left-footed kicker, and Pineiro is right-footed. So for the entire spring and the start of the summer, Townsend alternated his stance and technique each practice while the team rotated between Tavecchio and Pineiro.

Tavecchio was waived Aug. 3. Mike Nugent was signed to provide right-footed competition for Pineiro. This simplified life for Townsend. Pundits considered Pineiro the favorite for the job. On Aug. 15, minutes before the final practice of camp, Pineiro suffered a groin strain that effectively ended his season.

Nugent it was.

On Monday, during Townsend’s first NFL punt, a 55-yarder, DePaola suffered a noncontact right knee injury when making a move in coverage just as the play had ended. Enter tight end Lee Smith, emergency long snapper. Townsend finished the evening fielding snaps from Smith on field goals and punts.

On Tuesday, Townsend attended two separate tryouts where the Raiders worked out several long snappers. The list included Andrew East, Drew Scott, Justin Drescher, Tanner Carew and Trent Sieg. Sieg, rookie, won the job and will make his league debut in Denver.

Three kickers since early August. Three long snappers since the start of the week.

One resilient punter.

“It says a lot about Townsend,” coach Jon Gruden said. “I thought he handled the adversity pretty good for a rookie player on ‘Monday Night Football.’ ”

Said Townsend: “We got in so many reps over OTAs and training camp. We were pretty much ready for any situation. We hit everything we could possibly be faced with. If adversity hits, we’re prepared for it. We were.”

More Raiders: Follow all of our Raiders coverage online at reviewjournal.com/Raiders and @NFLinVegas on Twitter.

Contact reporter Michael Gehlken at mgehlken@reviewjournal.com. Follow @GehlkenNFL on Twitter.