Metro Detroit talent ready to give 2023 NFL draft the boot
MOBILE, Ala. – A year after metro Detroit produced two of the top four picks in the NFL draft — and the two favorites for Defensive Rookie of the Year — in Sauce Gardner (Detroit King) and Aidan Hutchinson (Dearborn Divine Child, Michigan), the region has emerged as the hot spot for one of the draft’s most historically hard-to-figure-out positions: Specialists.
Michigan’s Jake Moody won the Lou Groza Award as college football’s best kicker in 2021, was a finalist in 2022 and projects to be one of the first kickers off the board this April.
Michigan State’s Bryce Baringer is the topranked punter in this year’s draft by ESPN analyst Mel Kiper Jr., four spots ahead of Michigan’s Brad Robbins.
And Maryland’s Chad Ryland, who spent his first four seasons at Eastern Michigan, cemented his status as arguably the best kicker in this year’s draft with a strong first two days of Senior Bowl practice this week.
“It’s cool to see all the guys I sort of came up with in college in Michigan that we’d all sort of be around each other, everyone’s doing well,” Ryland told the Free Press. “I don’t think that’s really a coincidence because I think when you surround yourself with a bunch of talented guys, naturally everyone’s going to keep elevating, and I think you’re seeing that come full circle now from way back when.”
Baringer, Moody and Ryland share the same agency (Sportstars), and that trio plus Robbins spent part of their offseasons training together when they were in metro Detroit.
Baringer and Moody kicked together last month to prepare for the Senior Bowl, and Moody and Ryland joined former Lions kicker Matt Prater for workouts at a local high school during the pandemic, when Prater was in need of a holder and a neighbor put him in contact with EMU's then-punter, Jake Julien.
Ryland said he finagled a “pseudo invite” to the workouts as Julien’s tag-along partner, and called the experience “awesome” for a young kicker with dreams of making the NFL.
“That’s not something that you can just walk into any park on a Saturday and there’s a Justin Tucker, Matt Prater, those types of guys,” Ryland said. “But now, any time you can get around high-level guys, it forces you to elevate and I think that’s the best way to grow and the fastest way to grow.”
Baringer’s growth as a punter has been off the charts.
He started punting as a junior at Pontiac Notre Dame Prep when he hit a growth spurt and developed the leg speed necessary for the job, then spent one year at Illinois before walking on at Michigan State.
Baringer made the Spartans as a walk-on in 2018, was cut a season later, and returned in 2020 to have a record-setting career. He averaged 49 yards per punt last season and set the Big Ten mark for highest career punting average (46 yards).
Along the way, Baringer met Ryland at a kicking camp and the two became occasional training partners. Last month, they spent time in Florida and Texas working out for their Senior Bowl showcase, hardly believing the road they traveled as draft prospects.
“I’m so grateful,” Baringer said. “It’s awesome.”
Ryland’s rise up the kicking ranks has been similarly unexpected.
A travel soccer and baseball player growing up in Lebanon, Pa., Ryland joined the football team his junior year of high school and earned a scholarship to EMU — his only offer — the next season.
He won the starting job as a true freshman, beating out returning starter Paulie Fricano,
and steadily improved after making just 12 of 20 field goals in a rocky first season.
“I didn’t really have a great freshman year,” Ryland said. “You look back at my stats, and I honestly don’t credit that to anything that was mental, just I was raw physically. It was my third year kicking and I’m playing FBS football.”
Ryland left EMU as the school’s career leader in extra points made (141) and attempted (145) when Eagles special teams coordinator Jay Nunez left for a similar position at Oklahoma. He transferred to Maryland to showcase his kicking prowess on a bigger stage — and in front of bigger crowds.
He made 52- and 53-yard field goals in a September loss at Michigan, then finished the season 19-for-23 on field goals and 39-for-40 on extra points.
“Not that crowds ever bothered me, but you look back at my career and the MAC doesn’t quite fill up stadiums like the Big Ten was, so just making those kicks in full stadiums was what I needed to do to sort of complete my resume,” Ryland said. “And that’s what Maryland gave me the opportunity to do, so I’m super thankful for Maryland, coach (Mike) Locksley for not only giving me a chance to come in and kick but also hit the big kicks. Cause he even looked at me on that first 50(-yarder against Michigan), the 53. Cause the offense went out, Michigan calls a timeout, we come off, he’s like, ‘Hey, can you make this?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, let’s go.’ Go out, nail it, then we roll.”
As important as his success at Maryland was to his draft stock, Ryland said his time at EMU was instrumental in giving him the platform to even be in the draft conversation.
“That was probably the biggest factor in my early success and development was you can kick as many balls as you want on the practice field, but that game experience and having success, having failure, learning how to manage your body throughout the year I think was the biggest thing for me,” he said. “And just every year getting 13 games was huge. Cause we went bowl game freshman year, bowl game sophomore year, COVID year, and then bowl game my fourth year there. So we just had, I had everything I needed to develop and they put all the tools in front of me.”
Kiper ranks Ryland as the top kicker in the draft, one spot ahead of Baringer among all specialists. Both should hear their names called i Kansas City, Missouri, come April, and all of the Detroit-area specialists have each other somewhat to thank.
“It’s one of those things like I’m saying, I’m a kid from Lebanon, Pa., went to Eastern Michigan. I wasn’t supposed to be here so to speak. I feel like I am, but on paper I’m probably not,” Ryland said. “I’m not supposed to be here. So now I’ve got house money, playing with house money and the house always wins, so that’s where my mindset’s rolling.”