Blake
Ferguson.
Blake
Ferguson.
LSU· 6'3"· 229 lb· 5.07s 40
"Ferguson was the rare specialist worth a draft pick, a snapper whose entire résumé said the operation would never be a question for as long as he held the job."Pre-draft read
Ferguson is a specialist, and the entire evaluation lives inside about eight tenths of a second. His snaps arrive with velocity and repeatable placement, hitting the punter at the same spot on the same hip every time, and he consistently spins the laces where a holder wants them on field goals. There is no hitch and no variance between a routine snap and one on the road with the game on the line.
The second half of the job is what separates him from camp bodies: at 229 pounds with real athletic testing he releases cleanly and can actually cover. He is not a liability in protection and he gets down the field to make tackles. Consistency is the signature — the job is to be invisible, and he was.
Any special-teams operation that values continuity and wants its snapper to double as a coverage contributor
Year 1 starting long snapper on both punt and field-goal units; ceiling is a decade-long incumbent who never enters a coaching conversation.
A roster crunch situation where a team wants to carry a hybrid specialist or hand snapping duties to a backup tight end or linebacker.
Blake Ferguson Snapping Workout from Coach Zauner 2019 July Training Camp
Pre-draft training-camp work showing the release, velocity and repeatable mechanics that made him the top snapper in the class.
Blake Ferguson Highlights
A career cutup of his snapping and coverage reps, the two halves of the job he was drafted to do.
Rubio Long Snapping footage: Quentin Skinner and Blake Ferguson
Technique footage from the camp circuit that first ranked him the number-one high school snapper in the country.
Ferguson came out of Buford High School in Georgia as the top-rated long snapper in the country, then spent five years at LSU, redshirting in 2015 and appearing in 51 games from 2016 through 2019. He was the first long snapper in LSU history named a permanent team captain, did it twice, won the David Binn Award as the nation's best at the position, and finished his college run snapping for the 2019 national championship team.
The position rarely produces draft picks, so the profile has to be close to flawless — and his was. He tested at the Combine, running 5.07 in the 40 with a 31-inch vertical and a 9-foot-4 broad jump, unusual athleticism for a snapper and proof he could cover. Evaluators described perfect laces placement at a high frequency, velocity to the punter without a hitch, and repeatable field-goal snaps. He also carried an LSU MBA and elite locker-room reviews, and his older brother Reid was already Buffalo's snapper.
Boards treated him as the top long snapper in the class, the only one with a real chance to be drafted. Miami, replacing a position they had held stable for a generation, made him the first snapper off the board at 185 and handed him the job immediately.
- 01
Snap accuracy
perfect or near-perfect laces placement at a high rate on field goals, the single most valuable trait a snapper can offer a holder.
- 02
Velocity without a hitch
he gets the ball to the punter fast and on a line with no wind-up, protecting operation time on every punt.
- 03
Coverage athleticism
5.07 in the 40 with a 31-inch vertical at the Combine, rare testing for the position and enough to actually make tackles.
- 04
Proven at the highest level
two-time permanent captain at LSU, David Binn Award winner and snapper for a national championship team.
- 05
Bulletproof intangibles
exceptional character reviews, an LSU MBA and a family background in the position that scouts treated as a floor-raiser.
- 01
Zero positional flexibility
a long snapper occupies a full roster spot and contributes on roughly four plays a game with no other value.
- 02
Draft-capital cost
using a pick on a specialist means passing on a developmental defender when the position is routinely filled in free agency.
- 03
Slim margin for error
one bad snap in a season can end the job, and there is no body of other work to fall back on.
- 04
Replaceability
the league carries veteran snappers on minimum deals every year, so job security depends entirely on flawless operation.
Relative Athletic Score (Kent Lee Platte) benchmarks combine/pro-day numbers against every measured prospect at the position since 1987. 10.00 is elite; 5.00 is average.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 5.07sp50
- Vertical
- 31inp50
- Broad jump
- 112inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.43sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.52sp50
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Punts | Yds | Avg |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | LSU | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2017 | LSU | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2018 | LSU | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2019 | LSU | 15 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Career | — | 51 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Long snapper, so no conventional statistical record exists; games and coverage tackles come from The Football Database and the four seasons sum exactly to the 51-game, three-tackle career total. He redshirted in 2015, which is why no season line appears for that year. Wikipedia lists 52 career games, one more, so the Football Database count is used throughout. Snap-accuracy metrics are not publicly tracked, so none are carried.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Reliable starting snapper who owns the job for several seasons and moves teams once late in his run.
His own brother — a snapper who takes the job as a young player and holds it for the better part of a decade without a single controversy.
Competent snapper whose career depends entirely on operation and ends whenever a cheaper option looks equally clean.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Ferguson took the job as a rookie and held it for four and a half seasons. He played all 16 games in 2020, all 17 in 2021, all 17 in 2022 and all 17 in 2023, including two playoff appearances, and Miami signed him to a three-year extension in September 2023. The run ended strangely: he played five games in 2024, was placed on the Reserve/Non-Football Injury list in October after some snapping issues in a Week 5 win over New England, and never returned. The Dolphins rotated four different snappers the rest of that season and released him in May 2025. Houston signed him that August and cut him six days later. His career totals read 72 games across five seasons, all with Miami.
In hindsight this was a clean sixth-round hit by the only standard that applies to a specialist: he gave Miami four full, uneventful seasons at a position where uneventful is the goal. The pick paid its cost in stability, which is exactly what the grade promised and exactly what the Dolphins wanted after decades of continuity at the spot. The abrupt ending is the footnote, not the verdict — 72 games from pick 185 at a position most teams never draft is a fair return.