ANN ARBOR, Mich. — In 2023, his first year as the starting punter, Tommy Doman averaged 44.26 yards — not incredible, yet respectable. This year, however, Doman has been inconsistent. Thus far, he’s averaging just over 41 yards a punt, but situationally, there have been some moments where he’s done the opposite of flipping the field when that was absolutely necessary.
He’s practicing well, Michigan special teams coordinator JB Brown said on Wednesday. So it’s all about getting him to regain his confidence so that translates from practice into actual games.
“Continuing to try to change his rhythm up at practice,” Brown said. “Him and Hudson are competing at practice every day, doing a good job. Now, he’s practicing extremely well at a high level. We just need to translate it from State Street to Main Street now, and I think he’ll do that here soon.”
So, why has Doman been struggling this year? Brown says that his feet haven’t looked the same as they did a year ago, almost like how a baseball player may have the yips.
The next step is to get him back to where he’s looking as he had last year, and though he’s showing improvement during the week, it hasn’t manifested on Saturdays.
“His feet are a little bit different,” Brown said. “So, we’re working on getting those back into where they were. But, yeah, like I said, he’s been practicing extremely well. So, we’re just waiting for it to translate over to the stadium.”
Regardless of all that, Brown’s concern is limited because he’s seen progress, he knows what kind of player Doman is, and he’s confident that he can round back into form.
“Confidence is in him, really,” Brown said. “I think he works hard. He takes his craft very seriously at the end of the day. We’ve got full faith in him as a program. Everyone on the team has faith in him. So, the way he works and prepares, there’s no reason why he won’t perform well. We just need to get his feet underneath him, his hips underneath him, and be able to just get the ball out a little bit more.
“We’ve been trying to change up practice to get some of that and change his rhythm up a little bit to do a little bit more of those things during practice. So, he had an extremely great day yesterday. Just looking forward to what he does this week.”