What’s the most thankless job on a football field?

You don’t typically hear about a punter or offensive lineman unless their performance is so poor that it’s visible on the field. While many positions see their best players become popular stars of the game, there are positions where the work goes underappreciated and goes unnoticed by fans who’d rather focus on how many yards the quarterback has or how many sacks the edge rusher has.

But there’s one clear answer for the most thankless job, and that’s long snapper. Usually a converted tight end or undersized lineman, the long snapper is utilized with field goals and punts. While the holder and kicker/punter equally contribute to successful special teams operations, the long snapper starts it. While a bad hold or a shanked punt doesn’t always result in total failure, a bad snap does. They’re irreplaceable, yet rarely talked about.

That’s what brings us to Penn State football long snapper Tyler Duzansky, who’s entering the 2026 NFL Draft with hopes of latching on as an undrafted free agent and making a career out of the consistency that he’s displayed in college.

Duzansky was a three-year starter at long snapper for Penn State, and in two of the three years, Penn State had an elite special teams unit. While there were highlights prior to 2025, namely Duzansky leading all long snappers with six tackles and a strong punting unit in 2023, the unit was perfect in 2025, even with the chaos surrounding the program amidst a catastrophic collapse. Special teams coordinator Justin Lustig’s unit ranked No. 1 in special teams efficiency, and Duzansky was a big part of that alongside Ryan Barker, Riley Thompson, and Gabe Nwosu.

That efficiency starts with Duzansky. Barker had one of the most efficient seasons in Penn State history for a kicker, and it starts with good execution between Duzansky and Thompson to give him a perfect ball to kick. Nwosu unleashed thunderous punts all season, and you rarely, if ever, saw an off-line snap complicate the process.

There’s also one other wrinkle: trick plays. Lustig has called for two fake punts over the last two seasons, and they were both incredibly successful, with Duzansky snapping the ball to Luke Reynolds in both situations. Even a slightly off-line snap or anything less than 100% execution, and the play is immediately blown up.

Duzansky is looking to follow in the footsteps of his predecessor and Penn State’s most recent Super Bowl champion, Chris Stoll. The starting long snapper from 2019-22, Stoll won the Patrick Mannelly Award as a senior in 2022 as the nation’s best long snapper, but went undrafted in the 2023 NFL Draft, as is life for even the best at the position. Stoll signed with the Seattle Seahawks a few days after the draft and won the starting job. He’s served as Seattle’s long snapper for the last three years and recently inked an extension after winning the Super Bowl in February.

While Duzansky didn’t win the Mannelly Award in 2025 after being named a finalist, he’s one of the best long snapping prospects in the 2026 NFL Draft. While it’s unlikely that a team will use a selection on him, he’ll look to latch on to a team that’s overhauling its special teams’ units. There are nine NFL teams that either do not have a long snapper signed or have one on a fully non-guaranteed deal, opening the door for him to sign a training camp deal and look to win a job heading into the season in September.