He Doesn’t Miss the Boom Times

Tom Malone thought it was his last, best shot to make an impression, so he did not hold back.

USC’s punter arrived at the Trojans’ annual awards banquet last week outfitted in a white-on-white checkerboard suit replete with a fuzzy white hat. The ensemble was set off by a cardinal-colored shirt and a rose boutonniere.

Coach Pete Carroll made a joking remark, but for the most part, none of the nearly 1,400 in attendance flinched.

It was as if the celebratory crowd could hardly blame Malone for seeking some attention.

As part of a team that averages 50 points a game, the unassuming senior has been mostly a forgotten man.

The top-ranked Trojans earned a shot at a third consecutive national title mostly without punting help from the 2003 All-American who passed up a chance to turn pro after last season.

Texas Coach Mack Brown, whose second-ranked team plays USC in the Rose Bowl on Jan. 4, considers Malone a mystery.

“I don’t think the poor soul got to play very much,” Brown said this week. “Somebody said, ‘So you think we can block a punt?’ And I said, ‘I haven’t seen a punt.’ ”

Neither, relatively speaking, has USC.

Malone punted only 30 times in 12 games as the Trojans completed their second consecutive undefeated regular season. Not exactly the workload Malone had envisioned when he decided to put plans for an NFL career on hold.

“From a team standpoint, this could not have gone better,” Malone said last week. “It’s the most fun you could ever imagine.

“From a personal standpoint, it’s been a little frustrating,” he added, chuckling.

Malone, though, takes his lack of activity philosophically. If he’s not summoned to kick, he reasons, it is because an offense that features two Heisman Trophy winners and averages 580 yards a game is rolling as usual. If nothing else, Malone has stayed busy as the holder for kicker Mario Danelo, who set NCAA records this season for extra-point attempts and conversions.

Snapper Will Collins described Malone as “the glue” to a special-teams unit that featured two new kickers, Danelo and freshman Troy Van Blarcom.

“We needed his leadership again,” Collins said. “As much as he knows about punting, he also knows that much about kicking.”

Malone, however, has struggled all season to overcome a torn hip muscle, an injury he suffered about a month before training camp began in August. He has hardly practiced and he said he received a painkilling injection before every game.

“I didn’t hit any of the expectations I had,” said Malone, who this season has averaged a career-low 41.7 yards.

He had, however, established high standards in his first three seasons at USC.

After graduating early from Lake Elsinore Temescal Canyon High so he could participate in spring practice in 2002, Malone started as a freshman and averaged 42.1 yards for 62 punts. The Trojans defeated Iowa in the Orange Bowl to cap an 11-2 season and Malone was voted a freshman All-American.

In 2003, he averaged a school-record 49 yards for 42 punts. More than half of his punts traveled more than 50 yards and 28 pinned opponents inside the 20-yard-line.

As a harbinger of things to come, however, USC’s offensive efficiency left Malone five punts shy of the 3.6 per game required to be included among the NCAA leaders. Nevertheless, he averaged one yard more than the national leader and he became USC’s first All-American punter.

“Things could not have gone better,” Malone said.

Last season, he may have been the only punter in the nation with a fan-constructed website devoted to a Heisman candidacy. He averaged 43.8 yards for his 49 kicks and was at his best in the biggest games. In the Orange Bowl against Oklahoma, for example, Malone put three of four punts inside the 10-yard-line, including one that Oklahoma fumbled and the Trojans converted into a touchdown.

Like quarterback Matt Leinart and linebacker Lofa Tatupu, Malone spent the days after the Orange Bowl victory pondering whether to turn pro.

“There was a period where I was gone,” he said.

But after several discussions with Carroll, Malone changed his mind.

“He wasn’t saying, ‘Oh, you have to come back. You’re stupid to leave,’ ” said Malone, who has completed requirements for a political science degree. “I had a lot of questions, a lot of things I wanted to know.

“He just mainly gave me more information than anything else. He wasn’t at all pushy one way or the other.... In the end, it felt right to come back and be with my friends and coaches.”

Carroll said he had not discouraged Malone, but had pointed out that his draft status could be determined by his performance during USC’s annual pro day, when scouts converge on campus and put draft-eligible players through a battery of tests and a workout.

“Everything would ride on that one workout,” Carroll said. “What if he had a bad workout?”

Besides, Malone’s potential payday paled in comparison to those of Leinart, who passed up millions of dollars to return this season, and Tatupu, who was drafted in the second round by the Seattle Seahawks.

In the last 10 NFL drafts, only three punters were selected in the second or third rounds. During the same span, no more than two were chosen each year in rounds four through six.

Gil Brandt, a longtime NFL executive and scouting guru, said Malone probably had not cost himself anything in draft position by returning, that he had made the right decision because signing bonuses and first-year salaries continue to escalate each year.

“By staying in school, he’s guaranteed he’s going to get a higher signing bonus if he’s drafted,” Brandt said.

And Malone has one more game.

His role against Texas could be similar to what it was in comeback victories over Arizona State and Notre Dame, when he punted seven and six times, respectively. Or it could fall somewhere between those games and the regular-season finale against UCLA, a 66-19 Trojan victory during which Malone was never summoned.

Offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin recalled, “After the game he said, ‘Well, thanks a lot, Coach. My last home game and I don’t even get to go out there and do anything,’ I just said, ‘Sorry.’ ”

No apologies necessary, according to Malone, who like all seniors addressed the team in the Coliseum locker room after the game.

“There couldn’t have been a more fitting way to end my career than not punting,” Malone told his cheering teammates.

Well, there could be one.

Malone said time off before the Rose Bowl would allow him to be at nearly full strength for the BCS title game. He dreams of booming a kick against Texas that pins the Longhorns inside their five-yard line during a victory that gives USC its third consecutive national title.

“Hopefully, I’ll get out there once in the Rose Bowl,” he said. “But not too much.”

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Bootstrapped

Senior Tom Malone has punted only 30 times this season for USC, which is No. 1 in the nation in total offense.

(* did not play because of injury):

*--* OPPONENT, RESULT PUNTS AVG *at Hawaii, 63-17 -- -- Arkansas, 70-17 1 31.0 at Oregon, 45-13 2 41.5 at Arizona State, 38-28 7 44.7 Arizona, 42-21 2 43.5 Notre Dame, 34-31 6 45.8 at Washington, 51-24 1 42.0 Washington State, 55-13 2 39.5 Stanford, 51-21 1 48.0 at California, 35-10 4 35.5 Fresno State, 50-42 4 38.0 UCLA, 66-19 0 0

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