![\"\"](\"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/IMG_6961-1-1024x682.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/magazine.alumni.ncsu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/MAT1555-1-1024x683.jpg\")
\u201cIt was hilarious,\u201d Cole said of his Pro Bowl experience. \u201cI was just cruising on the sidelines. I was very uninvolved in the game, but it was not boring.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cole is careful not to let his recent success go to his head. NFL teams typically bring in one or two punters each year to try out for the job, meaning that veterans like Cole always have someone gunning for them. \u201cIt\u2019s tough,\u201d he says. \u201cYou become friends with those people, but it\u2019s two dogs and one bone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A late bloomer as a punter, Cole didn\u2019t take on the role full time until his senior year in high school. He says NC State offered him a scholarship based on his performance at a Wolfpack football camp the summer before his last year of high school. \u201cI didn\u2019t feel like I deserved to have the NFL as a goal,\u201d Cole says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But midway through his time at NC State, Cole started to think the impossible might be possible. \u201cIt almost took some courage to say it out loud, that I wanted to play in the NFL,\u201d he says. \u201cBut I changed my mental approach.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The odds were still stacked against Cole. He wasn\u2019t drafted (not that unusual for a punter) and had to rely on a three-day tryout with the Raiders just to get invited to the team\u2019s pre-season camp for a full tryout. He says there is a vast difference between punting in college and doing it professionally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn the NFL, the level of competition is so much higher and everything happens so much faster,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s such an emphasis on distance and hang time. These guys are such athletic specimens that you can\u2019t give them an inch of space. I never want to be a guy that gives up a game-breaking play.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cole loves living in Las Vegas, which he says has a nice, normal pace outside of the neon lights and noise of the infamous Vegas Strip. But he also enjoys the chance to visit the Strip to see a show or get a great meal at a restaurant. \u201cYou can just do whatever you want here,\u201d he says. \u201cYou never run out of activities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cole earned a degree in industrial engineering at NC State, but hopes he never needs to use it. \u201cI\u2019d like to play until the wheels come off,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve just got to stay healthy, keep growing and don\u2019t get complacent. I\u2019d like to play for a really long time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false,"raw":"\n\n\n\n\n
As a punter in his third season with the Las Vegas Raiders, A.J. Cole III \u201918 had quite a year in 2021. He averaged 50 yards a punt to lead the NFL (his longest was 74 yards) and was named to the 2021 All-Pro Team as the league\u2019s best punter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But when asked for one of the highlights of the year, Cole mentions a tackle he made on a punt return by the Kansas City Chiefs. He forced a fumble that was recovered by one of his Raiders\u2019 teammates. \u201cIt was electric,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cole appreciates the recognition for his work, but is quick to downplay it. \u201cIt\u2019s something to celebrate for a little bit,\u201d he says, \u201cbut it\u2019s not something to find my identity in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That approach probably served Cole well in the Pro Bowl game that pitted the stars from the National Football Conference against the stars from the American Football Conference. Cole never got a chance to punt in the game, but handled it with grace during a sideline interview during the broadcast. He joked that his best stats from the day were the two hot dogs he ate at halftime and pointed to the grass stains on his knees (from holding the ball for extra points) as proof that he had been in the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt was hilarious,\u201d Cole said of his Pro Bowl experience. \u201cI was just cruising on the sidelines. I was very uninvolved in the game, but it was not boring.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cole is careful not to let his recent success go to his head. NFL teams typically bring in one or two punters each year to try out for the job, meaning that veterans like Cole always have someone gunning for them. \u201cIt\u2019s tough,\u201d he says. \u201cYou become friends with those people, but it\u2019s two dogs and one bone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A late bloomer as a punter, Cole didn\u2019t take on the role full time until his senior year in high school. He says NC State offered him a scholarship based on his performance at a Wolfpack football camp the summer before his last year of high school. \u201cI didn\u2019t feel like I deserved to have the NFL as a goal,\u201d Cole says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But midway through his time at NC State, Cole started to think the impossible might be possible. \u201cIt almost took some courage to say it out loud, that I wanted to play in the NFL,\u201d he says. \u201cBut I changed my mental approach.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The odds were still stacked against Cole. He wasn\u2019t drafted (not that unusual for a punter) and had to rely on a three-day tryout with the Raiders just to get invited to the team\u2019s pre-season camp for a full tryout. He says there is a vast difference between punting in college and doing it professionally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn the NFL, the level of competition is so much higher and everything happens so much faster,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s such an emphasis on distance and hang time. These guys are such athletic specimens that you can\u2019t give them an inch of space. I never want to be a guy that gives up a game-breaking play.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cole loves living in Las Vegas, which he says has a nice, normal pace outside of the neon lights and noise of the infamous Vegas Strip. But he also enjoys the chance to visit the Strip to see a show or get a great meal at a restaurant. \u201cYou can just do whatever you want here,\u201d he says. \u201cYou never run out of activities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cole earned a degree in industrial engineering at NC State, but hopes he never needs to use it. \u201cI\u2019d like to play until the wheels come off,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve just got to stay healthy, keep growing and don\u2019t get complacent. I\u2019d like to play for a really long time.\u201d<\/p>\n"},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A.J. Cole III \u201818 is loving life as a punter for the NFL\u2019s Las Vegas Raiders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":1309,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"views\/single-immersive.blade.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"source":"","ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"ncst\/default-immersive-post-header","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"{\"showAuthor\":true,\"showDate\":true,\"showFeaturedVideo\":false,\"backgroundColor\":\"gray_800\",\"subtitle\":\"A.J. Cole III \u201818 is loving life as a punter for the NFL\u2019s Las Vegas Raiders.\",\"caption\":\"Photograph by Matt Aguirre\/Las Vegas Raiders.\",\"displayCategoryID\":5}","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[19,109,272,443,886],"_ncst_magazine_issue":[],"class_list":["post-1308","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories","tag-a-j-cole-iii","tag-athletics","tag-college-of-engineering","tag-football","tag-nfl"],"displayCategory":{"term_id":5,"name":"Best Bets","slug":"best-bets","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":52,"filter":"raw"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1308"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1308"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1308\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1308"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1308"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1308"},{"taxonomy":"_ncst_magazine_issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_ncst_magazine_issue?post=1308"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}