 Right you guys what is going on and welcome back to another rugby player reacts to American football video today's video is a first actually I'm gonna be I'm gonna be reacting if I can get my words straight to a New Zealander who has just committed to a four year full ride scholarship to an NCAA college football program how incredible is that I don't know how many New Zealanders have played football at a Div 1 college but what I do know is that there is currently zero although now there's two but there was zero a week ago zero New Zealanders might be a load of Australians who've gone through Pro Kick they're in America now but there's been no New Zealanders and I was really really surprised because you know Australia's so close to New Zealand and I guess I was disappointed too because at the end of the day every punter that goes through Pro Kick they're all being called Aussies, Aussie, Aussie, Aussie that's all they are they're all being called Aussies they're all being called rugby players and at the end of the day we all know that New Zealand is better than Aussie at rugby and we're actually a different country we're not connected so guys so what I'm hoping guys at the end of the day is that these two guys from New Zealand can hold it down for us in the world of top level college football next year because at the end of the day I'm so sick of hearing those commentators call New Zealanders Australians just being completely unaware completely unaware guys if they started quoting that a New Zealand rugby player was playing American football that would be music to my ears I would absolutely love that and I feel like if these two guys play the cards right well we could be seeing them following in the likes of Mitch Wichnowski and Michael Dixon's journey and I guess that's what this journey is about but not for everybody not every kicker is going into that program thinking I want to make the NFL and of course not every kicker will in fact I mean there's 150 top level college football programs and yet two or three of those kickers get drafted to the professionals so you've got to be in the top one or two percent of kickers to actually make it to the next level and I guess the level that you go to is going to be completely up to you and the work that you put in now this guy Finn Rudd, Finn Rudd like I was saying before I don't know where I went off on a tangent but basically about a week ago I saw a news report come up on the six o'clock news and it was talking about a New Zealander who has committed to a full ride four year scholarship and the name was Finn Rudd and I thought you know what, fuck I recognise that name, I've messaged that guy before, yeah he's a New Zealander who's playing Juco football and I assume by the look of this news story he's finally been able to transfer from the Juco to a Div 1 school and so in total he's looking at a six year college football career extremely interesting journey due to the fact that you know I talked to Finn about 12 months earlier whilst he was at Juco playing American football, being a punter, off of his own back, I don't know the full story so what I've done is I've reached out to him again and said congratulations on achieving the scholarship but also you know telling him that I'm going to make this video and I want to make it in depth and I want to tell a story the way that he wants to be told because at age 21 having done what he's done backing himself not going through Pro Kit being offered the Pro Kit program but deciding to save that money and actually use it on his studies at a Juco instead and just back as talent I mean this guy is a legend already in my books and hopefully after reading his story he's going to be even more of a legend so guys his name is Finn Rudd, he is from New Zealand and believe it or not he's actually in Christchurch right now I'm in Christchurch, he's in Christchurch, there's about 20 minutes across town from me so after making this video, putting it together, putting it out on YouTube, depending on when he's leaving to the States to start his college football career we might catch up for a kick and in which case I'll take the camera down and that will be a pretty fucking cool video pretty cool man you know a dip like yeah I mean I don't know how it's going to go down I don't know what we're going to do we might do a challenge a challenge video or something fun but yeah definitely look out for that so with that being said let's type this guy's name into Google please don't be wasting my time with that business who you kidding man yeah yeah yeah yeah see what comes up, there we go May the 4th which was two and a half weeks ago there's a news report on stuff.co.nz the national online news reporter Kiwi, Finn Rudd lands division one scholarship after taking A. New Zealander Finn Rudd has landed a division one college scholarship as a kicker in American football trustworthy accurate and reliable news Highland community Finn Rudd, UC Davis, that's where he's going he's 6'3", wow I did not know that um okay there he is, the big man holding it down for the Kiwis oh fantastic alright we've got a few links here that we're going to read through after reading through the document that he's sent me so I'm going to go Athletes USA with his junior college profile we're going to go Scotty Athletics Highland Community College Athletics I'm going to open that one we'll go the UC Davis Athletics post or page where he's listed at 6'3", a sophomore Hometown Wellington High School, Lincoln High School in 2016 which is here in Christchurch alright so now we'll look at the news stories from Kiwi to Aggie Punta Rudd adds worldly flair Kiwi kicker a step closer to NFL Dream with scholarship to top dot dot dot yep and the awesome thing is man he's done it all on his own back but we've got one more link to save Kiwi Finn Rudd lands division one scholarship okay so there we go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 stories as well as that we will go to the video form of Google which is YouTube and we'll do the same thing because if we can get some highlights that would be absolutely awesome and I've got one video at the top there but it doesn't look too good Finn Rudd football these are his he's got one subscriber well now you've got two no likes are you kidding me bro well I'll give you a first like and your first comment go hard out there go hard out there alright so we've got his highlights sweet we've got his statistics plus news stories we're ready to read I've just read the first line of the second paragraph I shouldn't do that let's go so I first discovered there was a punting kicking aspect to American football back in 2016 so that's two years before I did it was certainly a long shot but I decided to learn the ropes for about a year or two before eventually sending film out to college coaches in the United States with most coaches showing no interest at all because of my lack of experience in the game I had a select few who replied and eventually offered me a spot on the roster I like this already this was in 2019 after about four minimum wage paying jobs three years after I first started punting kicking at a field in Christchurch, New Zealand and that's where we sit right now so we heard about it back in 2016 decided to just watch the game learn what he could take the ball down to the field and practice practice practice took some game film off of his own back sent it out to colleges all the while all the while working a full time job minimum wage thinking there's got to be a better life out there than this I eventually signed with Highland Community College a small college located in a town with a population of about a thousand people you sign with Highland Community College a small college located in a town so the college doesn't have a thousand people the town has a thousand people big culture shock at first not many people could understand what I was saying and there were a lot of adjustments to be made adapting to the game wow, I mean I went to Alice Springs a town extremely remote but we had 30,000 people not 1000 that's insane bro so big culture shock no one can understand what he's saying and it's a completely different game I ended up spending 18 months at Highland Community College I played one season and gained a degree also fast forward to today and I'm signing with Tonya Davis to play for the next four years I feel like we're missing something here I wanted to hear a little bit more about his time at Highland Community College and what he did to get to the point where he signed you know, for this top school some advice I have for anyone wanting to chase their dream no matter how crazy it may seem and listen up guys I've never read this before let's see what he has to say it's just to trust your gut and do not look back at all people including my friends and family tell me that this dream was too far fetched and not possible for some kid from New Zealand set a goal figure out what you need to do in order to reach your goal and grind you will get there eventually if you want it bad enough, I promise signed Finn Rudd okay well Finn Finn, Mr Rudd Mr Rudd, no, that sounds similar to Kevin Rudd actually Kevin Rudd is a bit of a legend in Australia Finn, look, first and foremost I want to say thank you so much for sending that through it was brief but it gave us an idea of what we're looking at, next thing we're going to do is look at Finn's highlight tape which is 4 minutes and 43 seconds long after that we're going to search for and read as many news articles on this story as possible I do want to get my head round the whole entire thing, I want to give my audience a real in depth view of Finn Rudd and with all that being said guys, it's time we look at his highlights so sit back, relax and let's see some punts okay here we go, bit of a high snap we've got the four blockers coming through I don't know what they call his three linemen that have stayed are they going to move to try and block these guys my god one guy just ran straight into them what were you expecting to happen? watch this that looked like a lot of oh mate what a kick, where's that kick from out at the two yard line from the 55 and up and under end over and punt 50 yards in the fly out at the two for a kick inside the 20 oh I miss one fucking hell that looks like a huge boot where'd you kick that from from the 22 all the way to the 28 so 22 plus 28 equals 50 50 yards on the fly you've got to have at least 50 yards I'm thinking the hangtime looks at least four seconds but we will check that that was a nice punt let me see different camera angle too I like this one I wish we had some commentary so this is from 30 25 on the 22 it's the same kick yeah it's the same kick from the other angle end over end punt fair catch called on the 15 yard line from where that is on the 40 and you call it right on the 15 so that's 45 yards now these punts between the 50 yard line and probably your own 30 yard line the punts where you can get the I guess the biggest bang for your butt if you're really camped down in your red zone all you want is the biggest booming spiral you can get but when you're within a distance that if you were to kick it as hard as you could it may go for a touch back you've really got to start using I guess more positional kicks more end over end punts more punts that you're going to be aiming for a fair catch not just as much distance as possible so at this distance that looks as if he's right within that area of just trying to camp them down within their 20 that is the result you want you don't want anything crazy you just want a consistent fair catch within the 20 yard line is that right? in there so that's from the 40 all the way holy shit and again from the 40 to V did he call a fair catch? that's 52 yards on the fly so he's using direction that's another punt within the 20 from the 40 yard line easy within the 10 that's at least a 55 yard kick and another fair catch definitely got some oh I don't know about that one where is he? hang on that was about a 30 yard punt a bit of a shank came off the side of the foot yet it probably gave the best result we've seen so far let's have a look that was a shocker but he fumbles it recover it where's the kicker? let's see his celebration kicks it, sees it oh shit am I going to have to tackle someone here and no someone needs to slap him on the helmet that was a terrible snap there now where is he kicking this from? from the 8 no was it? yes from the 8 yard line to the 35 that's 57 yards excuse me number 26 in red what what gives you the right to be celebrating after that run you bet one tackle okay we got some kickoffs we've got some kickoffs and that looks like it went for a touch back which means he's not only got the distance for punting but he's also definitely got the distance for kickoffs I didn't know he did kickoffs or maybe I did that is a monstrous kick wow from the 35 boom and once again goes dead for a touch back what's this one, three touch backs what have we got here is he holding it or is he kicking it have you ever seen someone closer to blocking a kick than this number 12 did right then Finn Rudd just gets it away in time okay so he must be showing us punting, kickoffs and field goals and this must be his practice field because it says H on it and that's Hyland right we've got some sound looks like it's down at the local field looks like Christchurch sky to be fair I'm not sure where this is but that is a that's 55 that's a 55 yard kick for sure it's from the 50 guaranteed he's placed that at the 50 meter line guaranteed he's down at the rugby field placed that at half way which is 50 meters 55 yards straight through big Finn training at the home field in fact speaking of, look at that field that is pristine he's living in a town with thousands of people yet the local juco football stadium looks like that I've never played on grass or turf or a field that nice literally I'm telling you right now and this is science you walk out of the tunnel onto a field like that your speed and your power just went up 20% no shit so this is his highlight clip he's got like 100 views so he must have used this clip to send out two prospective coaches after playing his season at Highland which is all part of the plan I'm sure he had that in his head he's like right I need a season I need to get some clips, I need to put them together I need to then send them out and lo and behold he's gone and done it so fucking hell, Finn Rudd mate absolute legend let's continue from the 50 looking for backspin looking for the kick to hold up ah not like that looking to get the kicks to land within the 20 with some direction on them end over end punts they're all looking really nice actually really nice fuck that reminds me of me I swear I've made this video before that's some fucking hangtime though I gotta say that is some decent hangtime I think I'd better I think I'd better start timing some of these we'll time these last few it's a mixture of drop and spiral punts and so just as if I was a coach watching this we're gonna get the stopwatch out and we're gonna time them it's literally like after talking to this guy I went down to the field myself I said bro if you've done one thing for me you've motivated me to go down to the field right now and test my hangtime and I did that I've got consistent four second hangtimes and if you can get that up to a 4.5 I think you're in business if this is 4.5 that's fairly decent so let's have a look oh shit that was decent actually that first one was 4.45 we might be on to something here oh 4.63 damn you got some hangtime there mate alright 4.30 3.59 specifically for hangtime 4.18 4.31 4.31 4.18 so definitely every single kick there was probably over 4 seconds you don't want to be showing coaches anything less than your best if you don't have to so anyways that is his highlights Finn Rudd he's played one season of due code football and he's managed to off of his own back like I keep saying help of his coaches and recommendations and stuff but instead of going through pro kick and putting all of his trust in them paying the money etc decided to do it on his own and I respect that I really do so Finn Rudd all the best before we move on I will just have a quick look at some of your statistics on the internet so Finn has a profile on athlete USA so he's got a profile on athlete USA but no information we've got there he is the man from New Zealand lands in town with no idea no one can understand him he's a walk on believes in himself 6-2 at that point he's listed at 6-3 now number 37 £200 from Wellington New Zealand this is fucking cool man this is incredible I love this I love this shit hopefully they've got his stats they do too so he's got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 games worth of statistics he kicked a punt in 4 of the games and he kicked kickoffs in all of the games so it looks as if he was a kickoff specialist but also did some of the punting and it looks as if they play a school called Garden City which is the school that featured on Last Chance You if I'm not mistaken that's pretty cool ok so he's got 1 tackle against Dodge City 1 tackle that's awesome I wish I could see that season started 25th of August ended 26th of October we've got a total of 26 punts for 831 yards which must be an average of around about 35 net yards per punt we've got a longest punt of 45 yards during the season we've got 8 fair catches we've got 7 punts inside the 20 and 0 50 plus punts no punts were blocked no punts were blocked which is good kickoffs we've got 32 kickoff attempts with 3 touch backs for a total kickoff yards which is a statistic that I'm not sure if anyone really cares about but for the year 32 kickoffs 83 kickoff yards with 3 touch backs and if we've got 3 touch backs that means that at least 3 kicks or 3 restarts were 65 yards or longer which is a monster of a kick that was great bro that was fucking awesome Finn let's have a look at ya there he is and here we go the next one bit of a step up UC Davis Aggies University of California Davis campus 3 sophomore from Lincoln High School and he went to Highland Community College as we know have we got some stats for this year no we don't but we will and I can't wait to see it so those were his statistics and his profiles we're going to look at a couple of news stories we're going to read a couple of news stories that have come out over the years and actually no you know what all 3 of these stories are from different news outlets but they're all covering the fact that he's just signed with the university so let's read all 3 the first one we'll read is from the major online news reporting agency in New Zealand called Stuff and it looks as if they've got a video is this the special is this the special that they played on the news if it is we're in business I was hoping I'd be able to find that I don't care about coffee this is a video on Stuff someone's grabbed it from YouTube put some music behind it he's got a nice end over end punt gotta say New Zealand Wellington, New Zealand for Island here's a high snap and a kick is away it's a low kick across the field and it's going to go inside the Butler 40 and down to the 35 yard line we'll be down there that's a nice kick by Finn Rudd who is at a Wellington, New Zealand he had a high snap and he got that kick away I've got shivers guys that's incredible hearing that he's got a name called just fucking once and he's done it but we're not going to see anything we haven't seen before so let's read a few years back Wellingtonian Finn Rudd took a punt on a less travelled sporting pathway and has been getting a kick out of it pretty much ever since now this one time Kiwi High School footballer as in soccer is getting ready to step into the frenzy arena of American division one college football with his sights on one day taking a crack at the mega millions of the NFL not bad for a self taught American football punter who had never so much as picked up the pig skin before he started exploring his options at the end of high school when his time in the round ball code meandered to an unpromising conclusion Rudd now 21 and finishing up a stint as a punter kicker at the junior college level in Kansas has just landed a full scholarship to division one university of California where he will head most likely in August after the pandemic permitting the Kiwi youngster born and bred in Wellington with a touch of Canterbury thrown in wants to shout his latest accomplishments from the rooftops partly because he's justifiably proud of what he's achieved in such unusual circumstances and partly because he hopes he just might inspire other Kiwis to follow suit I'm getting shivers again man fuck me dead Rudd's sporting story is by no means your standard boy makes good progression finished up at Lincoln High just out of Christchurch in 2016 he was a passably good first 15 footballer a long way from carving out anything special in the beautiful game then thanks to the long reach of social media he discovered something that peaked his interest and changed his life three or so years later he's about to play division one college football in the US and maybe one day line up a shot at the biggest league on the planet Rudd never knew much about American football in 2016 he started reading up on a large number of Australians carving careers as kickers in Divwan College ball some had even made the NFL I saw this guy on Instagram looked up the position and saw they literally just kicked the ball that's their sole job with no knowledge of anything I went down to the park and started kicking for three years I was just kicking kicking whenever I could three years guys here in Christchurch practice makes perfect Rudd worked for a supermarket in Wellington and would spend every morning at the park kicking the football then when he moved to a grueling factory job in Rolleston Canterbury his kicking sessions moved to an evening slot see this is the story that I wanted Finn to write but stuff's done it for us but he kept at it and got better and better eventually Highland gave this driven Kiwi a shot as a punter restarter and backup fell goal man now Davis will bring him in as a likely red shirt sophomore as they groom him for their main punting role in American football the three kicking roles punter kickoffs and at goal are specialised a kicker enters the game as part of a special teams and plays only that phase a punter could go the whole season without seeing a live ball situation or not as Rudd discovered in his one and only season playing competitive football in 2019 in the third to last game of the season at Dodge he took a kickoff with 30 seconds remaining and his team up 2016 my kickoff team wasn't as flash as I thought they were the guy caught the ball came all the way down the side and I was the last man standing this is the tackle he's a huge dude 6-3-2-20 and if he scores they win I thought oh here we go I threw my body at him went for his legs and definitely got the worst end of that hit but hey we saved the game oh the tackle of the man I want to see that Highland vs Dodge college football Iowa Central vs Highland look we've got full coverage of games oh no that's 2017 um Highland Community College Highland I'd love to be able to see this Dodge City 2019 damn ah shit ah it really sucks um Finn Rudd last one Finn Rudd tackle Dodge City nope we're not going to find it that's okay he saved the game what a legend as mentioned this is not a well-travelled pathway for Kiwis Rudd's inspiration was Auckland's Johnny Linen who had just finished his career at Brigham Young University where he first attended on a rugby scholarship but switched halfway through to become punter on the football team now Rudd hopes to use this opportunity as a stepping stone not just to a degree but potentially a career in the NFL that's the dream and has been since I started kicking the football the reason New Zealanders and Aussies are so sought after is because of the way we kick the ball it can back spin it and that's valuable in this game Davis which plays in the Blue Sky Conference has sent two punters to the NFL over the last half dozen years Rudd would love to make that three I wonder who the other two were it's an opportunity that's within reach if you work hard enough I had a 15 year old kid message asking how I did this I told him to do his research and find his pathway when I'm done with my career I'd love to come back to New Zealand and start a pathway I wasn't a freak athlete or kicker there were probably a hundred guys at my high school that could be doing this when I first picked up in American football I was terrible it's different to kicking a rugby ball you have to figure it out I just kept the faith and said to myself eventually you're going to be really good at it and that's what happened oh my god mate this fucking guy that story is inspirational if I was a Kiwi kid reading that I mean it just opens up it opens your world it opens your world to possibilities you never ever thought were possible and that only happened for me in 2018 like I mentioned when I sought after what Australians or New Zealanders have made it into the NFL and I started seeing pro kick and I started seeing all these punters and kickers and I started realising that yes I mean this position of punter or kicker you only have to kick that's all you do and I had the same reaction as Finn did I simply couldn't believe it I was like well that's just too easy I mean you've got to have a decent leg of course but anyway you know what I'm talking about so that was New Zealand's version of the story we do have another one here but I'm not going to read it it's been far too long already so the last thing I'm going to do is we're going to read a story from an American journalist talking about the same journey and this first line just makes me smile New Zealander finally Finn Rudd made the transition from rugby to US football so that's New Zealand and rugby in the same sentence my heart is full let's anoint Finn Rudd with a nickname Kicken Kiwi the Kicken Kiwi I know someone that might not be too happy about that you better trademark it Finn a 21 year old soon to be sophomore Rudd hails from Wellington New Zealand and he's headed to UC Davis in an effort to inherit the Aggie punting job Rudd has acclimated to American ways having spent last fall booting the pig skin for Highland Community College from Kansas this came after working hard in his native land to initiate moving from soccer and rugby to US football Rudd recently told Stuff.co.nz that his interest in the American game started in high school so this story has just quoted the story from New Zealand's page so really there is no reason to read it except for this final part the coach or one of the coaches from UC Davis comments Finn has a high ceiling for Hawkins promises he will bring some international flair to our program and university it's really fun to add him to our culture and I would have to agree and there he is what a journey what a story and that my friends brings us to the end of the video so Finn I hope you enjoyed any New Zealanders or Australians out there any prospective, any kids out there fuck you know whoever is watching I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did I am a proud New Zealander and I am so happy to be back in my home country of New Zealand right now I'll be supporting our local lads such as Finn and I just hope that you guys out there do too so if you do want to hit any of these guys up any of these punters, kickers that I've mentioned on the videos please do go to their Instagrams give them a follow, give them a like give them some encouragement and say Jacob sent ya and with that being said I'll see you in the next one peace out