A few minutes past 8 a.m., on the first Monday of May, Carlsbad resident Drew Ferris walks onto the football field at Vista Sports Park.
He’s the last of his group to arrive — a crew that includes longtime NFL kicker John Carney, NFL hopeful Gavin Lipkin, a senior long snapper from Southern Utah University, and two collegiate punters.
Gray skies hint at rain as 1980s chart-toppers play over a speaker on the adjoining field, where an ultimate frisbee game is played.
Ferris, wearing a black “Just a Kid from Carlsbad” shirt and gripping an energy drink, is zippy and talkative. He gives his opinion about the New Orleans Saints’ quarterback situation to Carney, standing between an oversized, worn New York Giants duffel bag overflowing with footballs and a tangle of training gear.
“You do like to talk,” Lipkin says, glancing at Ferris. “I thought no more energy drinks. It doesn’t look like you are lowering that caffeine intake to zero.”
With four inches of height and a leaner build, Lipkin looks more of an NFL player than Ferris, now 33, but he’s in North County specifically to work with Ferris, who not so long ago was one of the best college long snappers in the country.
“He’s given me more confidence in the steps that I need to get to the next level,” Lipkin said of Ferris. “The biggest thing is relaxing and not trying so hard and trusting my own ability.”
Ferris, starting long snapper for the Florida Gators football team from 2010 to 2014, came out of high school — San Diego Jewish Academy — ranked as the No. 14 snap specialist in the nation by Chris Rubio, the country’s preeminent long snap evaluator.
Ferris attended rookie camp with the New York Jets, then spent training camps with the Seattle Seahawks and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
“He was a couple snaps away from being Tampa Bay’s snapper,” Carney said. “He was close to nailing down both of those jobs. It’s a tight margin when you’re a specialist because they only carry one. You have to do a lot of things right and impress the right people in the organization. Drew was an NFL talent.”
“The NFL is a tough business,” added Ferris. “That was an eye-opening experience for me, competing and training with those guys. Growing up as a massive NFL fan since I was eight, it was surreal for me. I’ll always cherish it.”
Bouncing between Carmel Valley, Vista, and Carlsbad, Ferris trains 15 clients — from middle schoolers to college athletes — in the art of one of football’s toughest and most overlooked positions.
Once, he was flown out to Texas to teach a private lesson.
“Most of the time I see guys, they’re very raw — their technique is off, their body positioning is just a little off,” Ferris said. “What I do with all my clients is teach them how to snap first: stance, body position, weight distribution, how far to put the ball in front of them, how to drive your elbows, drive your legs, and really use your body with the right mechanics. I’m very much process over outcome; if your process is good, your outcome will be good. I have a drill bible — an email I send to all my clients with all the drills we do — so they can always fall back on it.”
The life of a long snapper is a high-stakes, unforgiving pressure cooker. Every snap on a punt, field goal, or extra point must be perfect, all while absorbing blocks, knowing that a single mistake could end a career.
“The quarterback goes 26 for 40, throws two touchdowns and one pick, and is hailed as a hero after winning the game,” Ferris said. “The long snapper, though, goes seven for eight, and that one mistake could have cost the game. I teach my guys to take each snap one at a time, focusing on repetition and technique to avoid drastic errors — it’s about maintaining a steady floor, not just performing at the highest level.”
Ferris, who also works as a realtor at Keller Williams in San Diego, tells the story of his long-snapping career in three plays:
“One was a short snap during a triple-overtime game against Kentucky at home in 2014,” Ferris recalled. “Florida hadn’t lost to Kentucky in over 30 years, so snapping those field goals in overtime, I knew there was a lot on the line, not just for the game but for the history of the rivalry. Later that season, we ran a fake field goal against Georgia, and I snapped a great ball that set up a touchdown, which became a highlight in the rivalry. The last one was snapping the game-winning field goal in preseason against the Dolphins with the Buccaneers, my first preseason game.”
Ferris, a lifelong Chargers fan, named longtime snapper David Binn as his personal favorite.
“Years later, I met Dave through John [Carney] and he gave me a couple lessons when I first came out of college,” Ferris said. “We focused on the blocking aspects [of the position]. I had the snapping down but needed help transitioning into blocking, so he taught me how to move my feet, slide into the A-gap, and use my body — it was surreal getting tips from one of the best in the game.”
Among his local clients is Eli Gilmour, a Del Norte product now the long snapper at Wake Forest.
“He’s had his hand in a lot of success stories of snappers here in San Diego County, which is really cool,” Carney said. “It’s a little legacy that he’s creating.”
Ferris described his coaching work as a full-circle undertaking.
“It’s cool to be able to give back to the younger guys,” Ferris said. “Just like others did for me. It’s not an overnight process; it takes time to learn, like riding a bike, but once it clicks, it’s something you can always fine-tune, and it can be a really cool niche that opens doors at the next level.”
