For Sidelined N.F.L. Brothers, Training Is a Snap

When the coronavirus pandemic pressured the N.F.L. to shutter its training facilities in March and ban all journey, hundreds of gamers needed to hunker down at house like the remainder of us.

As a substitute of understanding in gyms with teammates, they’ve been working at their outdated highschool tracks and lifting weights in spare rooms. Gamers — together with rookies becoming a member of the league — have met their coaches and trainers, however solely through video convention. The N.F.L. has just started to reopen facilities, however there isn’t a date for gamers to return.

The shutdown limbo, although, has had a silver lining for Reid and Blake Ferguson, brothers who’re each N.F.L. lengthy snappers. They’ve been residing collectively for the primary time since highschool, in Reid’s suburban Atlanta townhouse, the place they’ve leaned on one another throughout this sophisticated low season, working to remain in prime form and put together for the calls for of coaching camp within the extremely regimented N.F.L.

Reid, 26, is getting into his fifth year as the long snapper for the Buffalo Bills, and Blake, 23, the only long snapper chosen in April’s draft, is prepping to affix the Miami Dolphins. There are many pairs of brothers within the N.F.L., however none sharing a place as uncommon as lengthy snapper.

The stay-at-home order has stretched the Fergusons’ relationship past brotherhood. In isolation, they’re colleagues, opponents, coaching buddies and fixed companions. They share meals, watch tv, play hours of video video games (FIFA 20 is their favourite), and go to their mother and father, who stay about 20 minutes away.

In addition they work out, individually or collectively, within the storage and swap soccer conflict tales, some from their days at Louisiana State, the place they each performed. And so they discuss endlessly in regards to the N.F.L., with Reid serving to Blake alter to his new life as an expert.

Earlier than the pandemic, the brothers anticipated to bunk collectively solely till early April, when Reid would have returned to the home he purchased this yr in Orchard Park, N.Y., the place the Payments play, for low season exercises. Blake assumed he would transfer to town of the group that drafted him. As a substitute, the brothers have remained at Reid’s three-bedroom townhouse in Smyrna, Ga.

To keep away from bumping into one another too typically in the home, the Fergusons stagger their every day schedules. As a rookie, Blake normally has longer workdays as a result of he has extra video conferences with coaches and different members of his new group’s employees.

He normally heads to the storage at 7:30 a.m. to work out whereas Reid makes breakfast, which frequently contains pancakes. After his exercise, Blake cooks 4 or 5 eggs with some turkey sausage, toast and Greek yogurt. Whereas his brother eats, Reid has a short name with a few of his teammates to overview their exercises for the day.

Then Blake heads upstairs to his bed room to arrange for as much as 4 hours of conferences together with his coaches that begin at 10 a.m. Although Reid and Blake discuss typically about soccer and their jobs as lengthy snappers, they now play for A.F.C. East division rivals, in order that they should tiptoe across the specifics of their groups’ sport plans. Blake retains the door closed when he’s in conferences, whereas Reid wears earbuds as he works downstairs in the lounge.

“I’ve to be very cognizant of who I’m speaking to,” Blake stated. “I belief him to offer me the most effective info doable. However I additionally should ask very focused questions so I’m not sharing info, as a result of we’re going to play one another twice a yr now.”

Reid has defined to Blake the delicate variations within the place on the N.F.L. degree, which embrace extra blocking.

“I’ve tried to offer him as a lot recommendation as I might, and educating him as a lot in regards to the psychological because the bodily,” Reid stated. “At this degree, everyone can play, but it surely takes somebody who’s sensible sufficient to remain and do it for a very long time.”

Their exercises are largely the identical, constructed primarily round stretching and body-weight workouts like squats. Like many different individuals beneath stay-at-home orders, they use their neighborhood to remain in form by working sprints on the street.

After conferences and exercises, the brothers deal with their lives aside from one another. Blake is solidifying plans to maneuver close to the Dolphins’ group facility in Davie, Fla., when he can. Reid normally FaceTimes his fiancée, Erica Barber, at her house in Houston. On Fridays, he meets with a Bible examine group hosted by the Payments’ group chaplain. For dinner, Reid will typically throw cheeseburgers and steak on the grill.

Soccer is never removed from their minds for an prolonged interval. Lengthy snappers have a really slender, however essential, job description: They have to chuck a soccer backward by means of their legs, at 40 miles an hour, to a holder seven yards away or a punter 15 yards away, whereas bracing to dam a rusher or getting ready to run downfield to deal with a punt returner. With no margin for error, preparation counts.

On Saturdays, the brothers head to a soccer area at close by Campbell Excessive Faculty to fulfill one of many Payments’ punters, Kaare Vedvik, 26. He used to drive two and a half hours from Birmingham, Ala., for these weekly classes however then moved to a spot nearer to the Ferguson brothers. They’re joined by the Payments’ newly drafted place-kicker, Tyler Bass, 23, who drives from South Carolina. For about two hours, they snap, maintain and kick, simply as they might at an N.F.L. coaching facility, besides the Fergusons’ father, Kevin, 54, catches the balls and tosses them again to his sons.

Then the 4 gamers head again to Reid’s home to unwind with burgers or pizza and video video games, and to arrange for an additional week of an low season that, thus far, has no finish date.

“I’ve been very lucky to have Reid,” Blake stated. “Over the past eight years, we spent little or no time collectively. To have a bit of of that point again was nice.”