The most recent of the exceptional New Orleans Saints return players is Rashid Shaheed.
“He puts you in the best field position possible even if they punt the ball and he recovers it at the 15-yard line and returns it to the 30-yard line.”
This season, Rashid Shaheed was chosen as the NFC’s Pro Bowl returner and a first-team All-Pro punt returner, adding him to an elite group of NFL players.
The receiver joined a smaller fraternity and joined the ranks of Saints Hall of Famers Tyrone Hughes (1993), Michael Lewis (2002), and Deonte Harty (2019) as the fourth player from New Orleans to earn the Pro Bowl/All-Pro double since 1993.
“I think he’s done a hell of a job,” Hughes said. “He’s got the speed, he seems to be very confident back there.”
“I think what he does overall is great, because it’s not that they just use him as a return guy, but also as a wide receiver, and the threat that he brings overall once he steps onto the field,” Lewis said.
Shaheed was second in the NFC and third in the NFL in punt return average (13.6), returning 25 punts for 339 yards and a 76-yard touchdown against Green Bay – the third longest punt return in franchise history – and 18 kickoffs for 384 yards. To highlight Lewis’ point, the second-year pro caught 46 passes for 719 yards and five touchdowns and totaled 1,479 all-purpose yards, 10th most in the NFL.
But the return work is what earned Shaheed’s trip to Camping World Stadium in Orlando, Fla., for the multi-day Pro Bowl festivities that will take place from Feb. 1-4. And, specifically, his ascension from one of the most prolific returners in college football history (seven touchdowns and 2,560 yards on 88 kick returns at Weber State, and 575 yards on 40 punt returns) to one of the best in the NFL in just two seasons.
“This is the best part about it: It’s not even that he returned it 76 yards for a touchdown,” said Lewis, who returned 44 punts for 625 yds and touchdown and 70 kicks for 1,807 yds and two touchdowns in 2002, when he earned his All-Pro/Pro Bowl double. Lewis remains the Saints’ all-time leader in punt returns (142) and punt return yards (1,482).
“What about when those punters are back there and they really don’t want to kick it to him, and they make a mistake and they shank the ball and it only goes 36 yards?” stated Lewis. Because of his constant threat, even in the event that they punt the ball and he recovers it at the 15-yard line before returning it to the 30-yard line, you will always be in the best field position. And having that threat has its drawbacks.”
Given the decline in kick returns, punt returns may now be more crucial than ever. Since the kicking line was relocated to the 35-yard line in 2011, there has been a decline in the rate of kick returns; kickoffs frequently result in touchbacks, and offenses frequently start around the 25-yard line.
“You don’t have as many opportunities,” said Hughes, who returned 37 punts for 503 yards and two touchdowns, and 30 kickoffs for 753 yards and a touchdown in 1993, his All-Pro/Pro Bowl season. Hughes, a Saint from 1993-96, led the NFL in kickoff return yardage from 1994-96 (63 kick returns for 1,556 yards and two touchdowns in ’94, 66 for 1,617 yds in ’95 and 70 for 1,791 yds in ’96).
“Supposedly the studies showed that a lot of the concussions came on the guys doing the ‘wall,'” added Hughes. “After the wall was removed, they declared that all special teams return teams were at risk of concussions. The yardage was then shifted up so that kickers could either put it in or take it out of the end zone.
The returner, or kickoff returns, are now officially out of the game as a result of that. which, if given the chance, I believe could and should play a significant role in the game.”
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