Just for kicks, Lonie learned how to punt
Well-traveled Aussie is in the hunt for job held by Skins' Frost
BY PAUL WOODY
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Aug 9, 2006
ASHBURN Travel can offer a broadening experience, but when he left Australia in 1999, David Lonie had no idea life could become this broad.
Over the past seven years, Lonie twice has worked as a water-skiing instructor in a camp in northern Wisconsin, backpacked through Europe, played professional soccer in England, surfed in Fiji, gone snowboarding in Canada, graduated from junior college in Iowa and earned a degree in education from the University of California.
Along the way, he learned to kick a football, which paid for his junior college and college education.
Before he left Australia, he was a national class decathlete and pole vaulter.
G'day mate, indeed.
His traveling days are over for now, and Lonie wants to settle down and earn a living as a punter for the Washington Redskins.
"I never thought this would happen," Lonie said. "I had barely even watched football. I didn't know the rules of the game."
The Redskins wouldn't mind having Lonie as their punter. First, though, he must show he's a better punter than Derrick Frost, who held the job last season.
Frost averaged 40.4 yards, with a net of 36.7 yards per punt. But Frost's punts gained more distance after bouncing than any punter has a right to expect in a single season.
Frost, 6-2 and 202, is not going to yield a high-paying job quietly, though. Saturday in a scrimmage against the Baltimore Ravens, Frost averaged 58 yards per punt with good hang times on three punts.
Lonie, 6-6 and 220, averaged 47 yards per punt Saturday, and he sliced one wobbler off the side of his foot.
"It's a matter of execution under pressure," special-teams coach Danny Smith said. "A lot of guys in this league can carry it out until they have to execute under pressure."
As for Lonie being young and nervous in his first professional outing, Smith shrugged and said, "He's 27 years old."
Lonie is not your typical young punter for many reasons. Not only is he from Australia, not only was he an academic All-American at California, he also is a rookie who is older than 53 of the 88 players on the Redskins' training camp roster, nine of them starters. That includes Frost, who is entering his third NFL season.
Lonie didn't kick his first football until that summer camp in Wisconsin in 1999. He did it then only because he saw the punter for Drake University working out, and Lonie thought he could do better.
When he did kick better, people told him he should take up football.
"I only tried it for a few days and didn't think much of it," Lonie said. "I actually went to Europe and played soccer and traveled for a while."
When he returned, again to the camp in Wisconsin, a friend put him in contact with Doug Pelfry, then the punter for the Cincinnati Bengals. Lonie began working with Pelfry, put together a video tape and sent it to 10 Division I college teams.
"All 10 offered me a scholarship," Lonie said. "I was going to Ohio State, but my high school classes in Australia didn't transfer. I had a choice of going to play in the CFL -- Ottawa had offered me a contract -- or junior college."
He chose Ellsworth Community College in Iowa Falls, Iowa. After two years, he had his choice of Division I colleges again. This time, he opted for the sunshine of California over the snow of the Midwest.
At Cal, he punted and kicked off. Ideally, the Redskins would like their punter also to kick off and hold for kicks. First, though, they have to figure out who their punter will be.
In the meantime, Lonie will endure the good-natured verbal assaults of his teammates.
"They call me 'mate' and 'Mick' for Mick Dundee [from the Crocodile Dundee movies], crocodile hunter and kangaroo wrestler," Lonie said. "They tell me to throw another shrimp on the barbee. It's never ending. They're always coming up with this sort of stuff.
"It's all jokes, all good times."
Contact staff writer Paul Woody at pwoody@timesdispatch.com or (804) 649-6444.
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