Only if they’re taken off the field, but that applies to any player. A pitcher can be put in the outfield while another pitcher comes in to pitch to a single batter. Then a second replacement can come in to play outfield and the pitcher returns to the mound. This has happened a few times in the past dozen years, IIRC.
In football, you essentially have unlimited substitutions. They replace players on nearly every single play. Players go in an out depending the play, this includes QBs.
You never want an extra punter because you can only carry 53 players on your active roster and you can only dress 45 (46 actually; see below) for any one game. That makes roster spots highly prized. Coaches would just assume not carry any punters or kickers, much less two punters.
There is a special roster spot on NFL teams called the emergency quarterback. Let’s abbreviate that EQB for this post. Teams are only allowed to dress 45 players for any one game, but you get a special one-man exemption if you declare a player as the EQB, meaning he can be a 46th player eligible to play in the game.
Due to this roster exemption, there are special rules on how the EQB can be used. Specifically, once the EQB enters the game, no other QB on your roster is eligibile to play until the fourth quarter. Once you get to the fourth quarter it obviously doesn’t matter anymore, but if you put in the EQB at the end of the first half, you’re stuck with him until the fourth quarter.
There is no requirement to take the roster exemption. You can just dress 45 players, three of whom are QBs, and then put in any of the three of them anytime you like. But if you use the EQB exemption to dress 46, you’re subject to the fourth quarter rule.
Michael Vick was the #2 quarterback during those games when they ran the wildcat with him.
One does, on occasion, see a team carry two kickers on its active roster:
one with a an accurate, but not terribly strong leg, who handles extra points and most field goals
one with a strong, but not terribly accurate leg, who handles kickoffs and long field goals
This most often happens when a team’s primary kicker is older, and doesn’t have as much leg strength. For example, the Saints are currently carrying both John Carney and Garrett Hartley for this reason (though I believe Carney is injured right now).
I’ve never seen a team carry 2 punters for different situations; about the only time I can think of when a team carries 2 is when their punter is injured, but is expected to be back soon (and thus, doesn’t get placed on injured reserve)…but, even then, they’re only suiting up one punter on game day.
Many kickers were, indeed, also punters (and vice-versa), either in high school or college.
A few teams have tried to have one player do both in the pros; it hasn’t ever worked out well in practice. The Saints spent a first-round draft choice on Russell Erxleben in 1979, hoping he could do both for them; he washed out as a kicker, and spent his last few seasons as a pure punter. The conventional wisdom now seems to be that each job is specialized enough that it’s very difficult to excel at both.
Carney is healthy. He was on the roster as an injury replacement for Garrett Hartley, who was not.
There are a fair few teams with two kickers. Dallas, for example, has Nick Folk, who kicks field goals and extra points, and kickoff specialist David Buehler. Indy kept a kickoff guy on the roster when Viniatieri was healthy; I don’t know if he’s been on the game day roster while Stover has been handling the kicking.
True, but weirdly enough, Dallas has three kicking specialists on the roster and only one can kick field goals. Buehler is apparently even worse than Folk, and Mat McBriar is Australian and has no experience with NFL-style placekicking (ie., with somebody’s hand on the ball and people trying to block the kick).
As a Dallas fan, I know. Unfortunately, it’s a horrible time of year to hit a slump from which nobody knows if a rebound is possible. There is talk of bringing someone in to kick and maybe putting Folk on IR, giving him a chance to compete for the job next year and preventing him from being scooped up by anyone else willing to give him a shot. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of solid kickers out there to replace Folk, though.
Last year’s numbers are meaningless. Statistically, past performance for kickers has no predictive value for future performance. Only kickoff distance matters, since kickers as a rule vary wildly from season to season when it comes to FG accuracy.
One sees this occasionally in college football. Sometimes quarterbacks are employed for dink punts. (Colt McCoy has done this a few times.) Sometimes the place-kicker will double as a short punter. In the pros, however, if you are going to hold down one of the 32 precious roster spots and get paid a big salary, you had damned sure be able to punt any way the coach wants, any time he wants.
What is the requirement of the punting team when a fair catch is called? Can they just not physically touch the returner, or must they also give the returner a chance to catch the ball? What if the returner is not actively trying to catch the ball? I’m thinking or the following situation in particular.
There is a pooch kick and the returner calls fair catch then runs up and does the acting job like the punt is going to land at the 18. Kicking team doesn’t buy it and sets under the ball at the 5. Is the defense allowed to catch the ball on the fly even though the returner signaled for the fair catch since he’s not actively trying to catch the ball?
I don’t believe the defense is allowed to interfere with the return man before catching the ball even if he DOESN’T call for the fair catch. They’re just free to make mince meat of him once he catches it. I’ve never seen a “too late” call but I have seen a couple of half assed jedi-waves that the refs considered insufficient to be considered a fair catch.
The other one that used to happen was a returner would call for the fair catch with his heels on his goal line, then when the gunner came down the returner would lay out the gunner when he turned to look for the ball. I think they’ve put a stop to this too.
I’m no NFL rules expert, but I don’t see why not, assuming the defense is far enough away from the returner that they’re not interfering with him.
But what would actually happen here is that the returner would set up right under the ball at the five and signal. The defense is obligated to let him stand there with room to catch, even though everybody knows the returner is planning to step aside at the last second to let the ball bounce into the end zone for a touchback to the 20.
Though perhaps a really smart defender might try and guess which way the returner is going to step and try and run in at the last second to catch the ball. Worst case (for the defender), he runs into the returner and gets an penalty, which from the spot of the foul only brings the ball out to the 20, where it would have been anyway.
