Despite sitting atop most NFL punting categories, Jack Fox and Brayden Coombs want to ‘keep raising the bar’

Despite sitting atop the NFL in most punting categories, Detroit Lions punter Jack Fox and special teams coordinator Brayden Coombs want to “keep raising the bar” moving forward.

Fox went undrafted out of Rice in 2019 and after a successful preseason in Kansas City, he was signed onto the Chiefs practice squad — an unusual move under the old practice squad rules. He was eventually released and signed to the Lions practice squad when it was clear they would not be bringing back Sam Martin.

During his stint on the Lions practice squad, Fox showed enough that the Lions didn’t feel the need to draft a punter in 2020, instead opting to sign Aaron Siposs as an undrafted free agent. Siposs put up a strong battle in camp for the job, but Fox came away from the competition the winner.

Through the first three weeks of the season, Fox has been nothing short of tremendous.

Here’s a look at some of the impressive stats he as earned so far:

• 53.1 average punt yards per attempt — leads the NFL

• 51.1 net punting yards — leads the NFL

  • “The most in NFL history through a team’s first 3 games of a season (2 punt minimum). It’s also 4.9 yards ahead of the NFL’s next-closest punter.” — Lions PR representative Greg Maiola

• 4.78 second average hang time — leads the NFL

• 65-yard punts in consecutive games — first in team history

• 92.8 grade from PFF — their highest-graded punter

  • He is actually so far ahead of the rest of the NFL that the gap separating him from PFF’s second-highest graded punter is larger than that of the gap between PFF’s No. 2 and No. 32 graded punters.

• Lions have only allowed 6 total punt return yards this season relying on Fox, as well as gunner Tony McRae and a combination of Darryl Roberts/Dee Virgin/Jamal Agnew at the other gunner spot

But Fox and special teams coordinator Brayden Coombs isn’t satisfied resting on their laurels and want to keep pushing for more.

“Me and Jack are kind of on the same page in terms of the more success we have, we’re just going to keep raising the bar,” Coombs told the media on Tuesday. “We’re not really looking back right now and talking about anything that we’ve done. As he continues to go out and do better, then we’re just going to raise the goals higher and try to accomplish more… He knows that I’m very, very confident in him. I just don’t want he, or us, ever to feel satisfied or like we’ve arrived. We’re just going to keep trying to reach higher and higher and see how far we can take it.”