Stonehouse Happy To Be What Others Might Not Expect
Rescuing dogs, building outdoor kitchens, conspiracy theories and booming punts fill his life
Mike Brohard
Consider it an exercise in futility.
Trying to figure out why Ryan Stonehouse is the way he is and not the behind-the-scenes punter people expect isn’t going to change him. He’s really happy with the person he’s become.
Check that. Becoming. Times change, and so does he. If something strikes his fancy, he’ll jump into it feet first, ask questions as he’s falling. Life is fun that way. It’s full of pleasant surprises, and Stonehouse is most definitely one of those people who is not about to miss out on one.
“He’s not just tied down to being an athlete. He’s not just tied down to the what-he’s-supposed-to-fit-into mold. He really does what he enjoys,” said his father, Paul, who has had a front-row seat for it all. “And I’m sure if you notice, but he doesn’t look for approval from other people and he doesn’t shy away if people think bad or good about it. It’s what he enjoys doing.”
His teammates love Ryan because he is brash. He is not afraid to call out what he deems a perceived wrong on his Twitter account. He’s really been at odds with the Ray Guy Award, which doesn’t seem to be smart when he outwardly admits he wants to win the award. It’s the voters, really, not the organization. Stonehouse is convinced they don’t know what they really value. Maybe it’s a conspiracy, and he knows all about those, too.
New head coach Steve Addazio is still getting to know Ryan, and he’s not up to date on his punter’s social-media graces -- or lack -- depending on one’s viewpoint. He is very up to speed on his punter’s talent, however.
“Well, he is one of the top 10 punters,” Addazio said. “My experience has always been do the work and let the stats show for themselves and don’t worry about all that. It’s about the team, it’s not about individual honors. With team success will come more individual accolades.
“The one thing I can tell you, he’s a hell of a punter. Maybe, might be, one of the best I’ve been around, and I’ve actually been around some great ones.”
His Twitter rants are not just about him, either. He defended Brandon Wright of Georgia State a few years ago when Ryan thought he was overlooked. And he didn’t even know Wright at the time. His point is give credit where it is due, not just to guys at the big schools who everybody talked about heading into a season.
His teammates love him because he’s a constant surprise. On the field, he goes with the flow thanks to his mental plan, definitely fitting the vibe of California chill with the long, flowing blond locks. Yes, he can surf, and of course he’s been told numerous times he’s the spitting image of Jeff Spicoli. While he would definitely be the guy to explain to Mr. Hand that a shared experience would be “our time”, you know the look is totally deceiving if you dig deeper.
If you need to find a dog, he’s your guy. If you need an outdoor kitchen built, call Ryan. A van conversion? He has an excellent set of tools. A clutch 50-yarder to pin a team deep? Most definitely.
“The ongoing joke is he’s always been the dad. I remember when I came here, he had a white elephant party,” longsnapper and devoted Stonehouse defender Ross Reiter said. “You walk into his house and there are lights all over the house. We had an ugly sweater party. He’s always kind of been like the dad. That’s the type of guy he is. He’s a craftsman, he’ll work around the house.
“He has a personality. He’s a vocal guy. He’ll tell you when you’re wrong and when you’re right. He’s a good guy to be around. He’s good for the program. He’s good when we’re out and we do charity stuff. He represents the team well, he represents the school well. He’s talented and he’s comfortable with the home he’s in.”
What’s more “dad” than being handy around the house?
Ryan lives in a home owned by his grandmother, but it no longer looks the same. He build an impressive outdoor covered kitchen in the backyard. It’s constructed of wood and brick, complete with two different cooking areas and a sink. It is lighted with granite countertops.
It is spectacular.
“No joke, it was the best place to host pre-COVID gatherings,” Reiter said. “You have guys come together and drink water and hang out. It turned out amazing. I’m not joking. If you go to his garage, he has power saws, drills, everything. It’s literally a guy’s heaven.”
Reiter was so impressed with a beer die table Ryan built, he and his roommates had Ryan help build them one. They all went to Home Depot for supplies, headed back to the garage of wonder tools and went to work.
Bored during the pandemic, Ryan bought an old Ford van for $750 and is converting it into a ride where one could basically take up residence, expecting he could turn around and sell it for $14,000.
Waving off what people think was a trait Ryan developed early. He was always small, and it made him more competitive. You think punter, and the mind doesn’t go directly to athlete, but he is, all 5-foot-11, 180 pounds of him. He could pick it at shortstop and he lived for the big moments on the mound.
Being good, he played up. Being small, he would get overlooked. So he always worked harder. Telling Ryan he couldn’t do something was a sure-fire way to inspire him to prove you wrong. Even though punting was the family business, Ryan wasn’t instantly attracted to the notion. But when national-camp guru Jamie Kohl told him he wasn’t good enough, a fire was lit.
It wasn’t the last time a coach would explain to Ryan he wasn’t doing good enough, and the two interactions combined produced his 2019 season, which the two-time all-Mountain West selection considers his best to date.
“Absolutely. Tough love,” Ryan said. “Seriously, I have three guys in my life – my father, obviously, but Jamie Kohl and Mike Bobo. Jamie Kohl told me my first camp I wasn’t worth a damn and didn’t even invite me to this underclass showcase that basically everyone gets invited to. That put a fire in me, and I told myself I actually have to dedicate myself in high school to this. In college. Mike Bobo my sophomore year told me it’s about the team, it ain’t about the 65-yard punt that gets returned 40 yards. You know what? I took that kind of hard at first, took it kind of defensively, but his last year I really took it to heart. It is about the team. It is about the net and not all this other stuff. The more I can help the team is what I want to do. It wasn’t what I wanted to do my sophomore year.
“Absolutely, flat out, last year was my best year. We reached third in the country at net, and we finished at sixth. It’s a testament to our guys on the coverage team. We opened up so many options with Ross as a protection guy. I think that’s a testament to just being a selfless punt team, all together, me included.”
Me included is the key part. Ryan averaged 46.4 yards per kick, down from 48.3 the year prior, but up from his freshman campaign of 45.9. He had less touchbacks, which is good. But he also produced fewer kicks of 50 yards and his inside-the-20 numbers dropped. All of those, as Ryan can attest, can be superficial depending where one is on the field. And the team plan.
The net, however, is always telling. It’s the difference of how far a punt went and how far it was returned. It’s is about flipping the field, and make no mistake, he is a valuable weapon for CSU. The Rams’ net of 42.45 was sixth in the nation, where as it stood at 36.65 to rank 88th in 2018.
So what is he after in 2020? He wants to win the Ray Guy Award. When the preseason watch list was announced, he posted this to Twitter:
“I think it’s time to win this. I’m gonna make the gap so big they’ll have no other choice.”
And with that, he said he’s done. He’ll let his season speak from here on out.
“I think I’m going chill out. I’ve already put my word out there now, and whatever happens, happens,” he said. “I’ve kind of learned at this point you have to defend yourself a little bit, but at the same time you have to back off. Not everybody’s Tweet is going to be valid.”
That doesn’t mean he’ll stay off Twitter, it just that most of his time will be touting the next generation, his cousin, Jack. He’s always praised Reiter, and his punt-coverage team all last year, though it’s not always on social media.
If you ask Ryan for an opinion, he’ll give it and be direct. Such as when Reiter came in for a visit. Ben Larson, CSU’s special team’s analyst at the time, asked Ryan if he had time to visit with Reiter. When it was done, Larson wanted to know more..
“I said, “Sign him now. He’s better than Trent,” Ryan said, referring to Trent Sieg, who is currently the Las Vegas Raiders’ longsnapper. “I still believe that, and we all know Trent is good.”
Ryan knows he’s a good punter, but he thinks his cousin Jack will be better. He’s going to give him a high bar to shoot for, however. He heads into the 2020 season as the NCAA leader in career punting average at 47.0.
And I never let somebody change me. Ray Pelfrey taught a bunch of guys. That’s always been something he taught. I’ve never let somebody change that about me, because I think it’s unique. I like being different.Ryan Stonehouse, Punter
And again, he did it his way.
Well, his father’s way, which was Ray Pelfrey’s way, which can drive a current-day special teams coach nuts. CSU’s special teams analyst Jon Goodman doesn’t like the way Ryan drops the ball, but he wouldn’t dream of changing the style. Good thing, too.
“And I never let somebody change me,” Ryan said. “Ray Pelfrey taught a bunch of guys. That’s always been something he taught. I’ve never let somebody change that about me, because I think it’s unique. I like being different.”
For once, an understatement from Ryan.
The differing opinion all comes down to the underhand drop, with the hand under the ball instead of on the side. It is harder to master, which is why coaches don’t teach the style. It requires constant practice to become consistent so the release hand does not influence the ball.
Paul did it at Stanford. His brother John did it at Southern California. Ryan does it, too. They also have the adjective All-American attached to their resumes.
The brothers used to teach the technique at their camp, The Kicking Game, which still has an active website even though they haven’t held one for years. Go to thekickinggame.com and you can still find testimonials from coaches Bill Walsh, John Robinson, Paul Pasqualoni and Mike Price.
Paul will tell you most of his students would describe the camps as “boring.” They were four-days long, but held over two weekends. The first weekend they taught technique and sent the campers home to work. Then they brought them back the next weekend to refine.
“It’s the drop, and the drop has changed since we have trained,” Paul said. “When you talk about the drop, it doesn’t matter how you hold it, it just has to be consistent. If a kid trains the newer way or the underhand drop, it’s basically what they’re comfortable doing and making it a consistent, flat drop.
“The reason for the underhand drop is to give the ball lift, or to keep it from the first action going down. If you hold it the other way, where they hold it like a claw, the ball’s immediate reaction is to actually drop. You’re trying to give lift to the ball and keep it on its drop table as long as possible. The underhand drop was more of giving the ball a float, so you could eliminate how far it dropped. You’re supposed to make contact between your knee and your hip, so the higher you can have the drop table, the better hang time, the better distance you’re doing to get.”
These days, Paul said camps are one day and are more about rankings than teaching. It’s how kids get to college, and it is also the way they fall into the trap that average rules the day, not field position. The further a kid can kick a ball, the higher they are rated, the more visible they become to college programs.
But punting wasn’t something Ryan was drawn to immediately, and Paul didn’t push it. All he ever told Ryan was if he wanted to be good, he had plenty of people around him who could help him 24/7. Not just Paul and John, but another uncle, Jeff Banks, who punted for Washington State and is currently the special teams coach at Alabama.
Ryan was so into baseball, he didn’t decide to go out for football at Mater Dei High School until the night before the first conditioning practice. And the school already had a pretty good punter, so Ryan didn’t start until his senior year as he languished behind Elias Deeb, who became a Division III All-American.
That delayed the recruiting a bit, too. It gave him something more to prove, a task he enjoys almost as much as finding what next will capture his attention.
So when his girlfriend Jacie Cates told him about her involvement in rescuing dogs, he naturally wanted to know more. It was right in his wheelhouse, because what is a better group to stand up for than dogs at shelters who need forever homes?
Cates has been rescuing and fostering dogs since she was 16, and when she introduced Ryan to the process, he was immediately excited. And no, it wasn’t another guy trying to impress a girl he wanted to date. It also showed her Ryan is someone who latches on to anything he finds important.
“He really got into it. He cared a lot about the dogs, and I think it’s something he hadn’t really experienced before,” she said. “It was a new experience for him. I’ve never really met anybody is so involved with so many things and so good at everything. He’s definitely not scared to try new things.”
Ryan developed a slight problem where he was getting too attached and he wanted to start keeping dogs. Emotionally it was hard, but he’s replaced the feeling with the joy of seeing them go to happy owners who want them. He’s fostered one dog on his own and helped Cates with multiple others, eventually finding all of them homes.
Cates said he has become really good at getting dogs to come out of their shell (no surprise) and training them. He is completely involved in every part.
“It’s a really cool experience. You can see how you can change something’s life in a way you never thought,” he said. “It’s a really cool process, and the people involved are really special. They all volunteer, and the money they get goes to medical expenses for the dogs.”
Ryan wanted to raise money for the rescue process, and he had reached out to Colorado State’s compliance department about how he and Reiter could host a camp, with all the proceeds going to The Good Dog Rescue, which is the link included in his Twitter bio. It was close to happening, but then the pandemic hit.
For now, he’s happy to know he has another season to punt. Maybe even another, but that’s a decision down the road. His goals are very well set for the season, and that’s to have the Rams’ net be even better this year.
His hang time improved last season. So did his ability to help his coverage team by placing punts between the hash marks and the sidelines with greater accuracy. He insists he can do even better, and during practice, that’s a topic in heavy rotation during sideline conversations.
Reiter, who is kinetic energy at practice, is either snapping to somebody (or a wall)) or talking with Stonehouse and the rest of the specialists. One can tell when they aren’t talking football, because that’s when Reiter and Stonehouse are laughing.
“He keeps practice interesting for us,” Reiter said. “His riddles are unreal. I can’t repeat the jokes, but he’s a funny guy. The best part about him is he knows every conspiracy theory.”
That’s not to say he believes in all of them. Well, he does believe in aliens. The Free Masons and the symbols around Washington D.C. pique his interest. And he is fascinated by the Winchester House in San Jose, Calif. Not because of the stories it is haunted, but mainly the house itself. As lore has it, construction was ongoing from the time Sarah Winchester purchased an unfinished farmhouse until her death, as it became a seven-story mansion at one point. The best part to Ryan are the oddities – secret passageways, doors which open to 15-foot drops to a garden below and stairs which lead to nowhere.
Those curiosities are why Paul believes his son watches crime-drama shows and wants to eventually work for the FBI or another government agency. There’s no better way to figure out secrets, right?
But really, there is no mystery to Ryan himself. He’s just a young man with a ton of interests. What sets him apart is he takes none of them lightly. He’s not a dabbler. But certain times require him to focus more on one than another, and for the next few months, there is no riddle.
It is the football season, the team’s success and how he can do his part. And if he sticks to the blueprint, well, the world already knows what he expects. You won’t hear another sound from him, short of the recognizable thud of the ball off his foot.