Chargers kickers, long snapper have enviable camp routines

EL SEGUNDO, CALIF. -- After one of the Chargers' first days of training camp, linebacker Daiyan Henley posted a video on Instagram of kicker Cameron Dicker and punter JK Scott hanging out in the pool at the Chargers' new facility.

"To be a specialist during training camp," Henley joked. "... Make those kicks, boys. Make those kicks."

When training camp begins in July, it marks the end of offseason vacation for football players. Their days often start before the sun rises and end in the evenings, with meetings, lifts and practice throughout the day. For many players, these weeks of practice and the preseason games that follow serve as a daily proving ground to make the team's roster, while established players hope to build chemistry for the regular season.

For specialists, it's slightly different. NFL kickers, punters and long snappers march to a different drum than the rest of the team. They are among football's most important positions but often the most forgotten -- long snappers aren't even featured in the Madden video game -- until the game's most crucial moments.

It makes for a stressful, high-stakes job, but in practice, that job can look like a vacation: golf swings, creating the Chargers' first swim team and video gaming are among the tasks Chargers specialists tackle while their teammates are actually tackling. Many players poke fun at the lack of strenuous practice work for the specialists, who embrace the fun at perhaps the league's most competitive position, but long snapper Josh Harris often reminds his jealous teammates that they had options.

"Our routine is so different. We don't have meetings. Well, we do have meetings, but we don't have nearly the amount of meetings that every other player does," Scott said. "So we will play some ping-pong, Cameron in there playing the new college football video game. So we'll just be sitting around and everybody's like, 'Oh man, look at this specialist.' And Josh [Harris] always says, 'Everybody had a choice.'"

"Everybody wants to be a specialist until Sunday afternoon comes around and it's time to be a specialist," Harris said, "then nobody wants to trade jobs with us."

The Chargers have one of the best special teams groups in the NFL; it's a big reason why special teams coach Ryan Ficken was retained by coach Jim Harbaugh this offseason. The group helped decide wins for the Chargers multiple times last year, perhaps the most notable coming in Week 13 against the New England Patriots. The Chargers' offense had its worst game of the season on a rainy and windy day, sending Scott onto the field eight times.

Scott landed seven punts inside the 20-yard line, setting a Chargers' single-game franchise record. Dicker scored the team's only points with two field goals, continuing the best season of his career. Dicker broke the Chargers' single-season franchise record in 50+ yard field goals made in a season with seven. Harris is heading into his 12th season and was a Pro Bowler in 2021 with the Atlanta Falcons.

The group doesn't kick or snap daily, a part of ensuring that they're as fresh as possible for game days. That means they spend their time elsewhere, which Scott says is often in the weight room.

"I would argue that we spend more time in the weight room than any other group," Scott said emphatically. "I'd put that to the test with anybody. We spend more time, especially me and Cameron, we spend more time in the weight room doing specific things, doing our own things outside of practice than anybody."

When they aren't kicking or in the weight room, however, Scott admitted they are sometimes not doing anything football-related.

That was especially evident during one training camp practice when Dicker, wearing a Chargers bucket hat and tank top, practiced his golf swing on a field by himself. Dicker's makeshift golf club was a pole attached to a foam ball that the team uses to initiate a mock snap for a special teams drill.

But Dicker spends most of his free time in the pool.

In his locker hangs USA Swim trunks and goggles. He established the Chargers first swimming team, which includes Dicker, quarterback Justin Herbert, and wide receiver Ladd McConkey. Since the Chargers new facility opened in July, Dicker says he's spent more time in the pool than any other teammate and claims to be the team's top swimmer.

Dicker is attempting to reach the Olympic standard for the 50-meter freestyle, which for women is 25.69 seconds. Dicker's best time is 27.50, but he pointed out that he didn't dive into the pool for that time, because diving is banned at the pool at the facility. Dicker said he's been reprimanded for diving a few times. He also noted that the Chargers' pool is only 25 meters, so he'll need to get an official time on a 50-meter course where he can dive into the pool.

Scott is Dicker's timekeeper, and after Dicker recorded his personal best, Scott snapped a photograph of Dicker in his USA trunks and goggles with his index finger raised to show that he was No. 1. (Dicker declined to share this photo with ESPN.)

"I think that was the day Daiyan took the video," Dicker said. "They were just finishing meetings and they came out and all the guys were laughing at me."

Dicker, 24, is one of the more playful members of the team; his acting in a Chargers social video last season went viral and sparked a late push for him to earn a Pro Bowl nomination. He and the rest of the specialists say part of the reason why they enjoy their time at practice is partly because of how uncertain their jobs are. Unlike any other position on the team, there are no backups for long snapper, punter, and kicker in the NFL.

Dicker played for four teams during his rookie season in 2022 before landing with the Chargers in Week 7 after an injury to Dustin Hopkins. Last offseason, he and Hopkins competed for the spot throughout training camp, with Dicker eventually earning the starting job. The Chargers traded Hopkins to the Browns.

Scott played with the Packers for his first three seasons but was cut after his third year. He spent the next year out of the league except for one game with the Jaguars before joining the Chargers last year.

"It's a fun time, but at the same time, everybody's in that same situation where you never know when your last day is," Dicker said. "In the specialist position, you tweak something, or you just have a bad day and you're out real quick. So I think a lot of the guys enjoy where they are."

Defensive tackle Morgan Fox is the most frequent critic of the specialists, often joking with them after practice about their easy workload. "He's always like, 'Oh, what? Did you do anything today? Today's tennis shoe day?'" Dicker said with a laugh.

After the first half of the Chargers' first preseason game against the Seahawks, Fox and many of the other team's starters were out of pads and in street clothes hanging out on the sidelines. In that game, Dicker made a 58-yard field goal; it was a career-long.

"So then I had to hit him with the, 'Oh, it must be nice,'" Harris said. "And I looked at him and he goes, 'Everybody had a choice.'"