Cal Football: Top 10 most valuable Bears in 2009 - No. 10

June 8, 9:16 PMCal Bears ExaminerRob Calonge

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Anger gives the Bears' defense plenty of field
to defend.

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While many media publications have begun rattling off their top-20 lists, preseason All-Americans, and conference rankings, you may have noticed that you haven't seen any of those things pointed out here in this space.

I could easily be like everyone else and pretend that these rankings mean anything.  Actually, if I had any credibility in predicting sports winners and losers, I'd be living in Vegas with little interest in telling you my picks.

Let's face it, nobody has a clue what the 2009 season has in store for now.  So instead of ranking the teams of the Pac-10, let's localize our focus to the Cal Bears for now.  Prior to the start of the season, just prior, I'll give you my prediction of the Pac-10 and possibly a top 20.

The Bears may be receiving preseason accolades right now, but if they are to achieve those expectations, they'll need key players to come through in 2009.  Over the next two weeks, we'll unveil our top 10 most valuable Bears for 2009 from bottom to top, ending with the most valuable Bear.

Today, we'll start with number 10.

Number 10 - Bryan Anger

Since the Bears normally play in fairly calm weather throughout the Pac-10 schedule, it's easy to overlook the significance that field position plays on the game of football.  Even so, it was difficult to overlook Bryan Anger last season.

Ranking 18th nationally and third in the Pac-10 with a punt average of 43.1 yards, Anger often caused ooh's and ahh's to sound out after his booming punts would seem to need an FAA flight plan during games.  In his first season as Cal's starting punter, he recorded two of the top five punts (75 & 76 yards) in the history of the program.  He ended the season with the top three punts in the Pac-10.

Even after being a semifinalist for the prestigious Ray Guy award as a freshman, there may be some that still don't realize his value on the team.  They'd be right most of the time.  With an average punter, the Bears wouldn't see much of a difference in seven of the 12 games they play - those games just aren't close enough to credit a kicker.  It's the five games that are decided by 10 points or less, where Anger's contribution makes a difference.

In those close games, having a punter that can make up for the inadequacies of the offense on the preceding drive can make a difference of up to seven points.

One example of this came during the big game.  With the Bears up by three, Anger came out to punt from his 23-yard line.  After booming a 76-yard punt, he pinned the Cardinal down within their own one-yard line.  Stanford drove down field on 11 plays for 91 yards only to miss the layup-field goal.  Had Anger booted an average 40-yarder, it's not 100% certain that Stanford would've scored, but the odds do go up dramatically.

It's not uncommon for games to be decided by inches.  It wasn't long ago that a Super Bowl was decided by the nose of a football.  So in a game of inches, it's not too much of a stretch to give credit to a player that can kick a ball nearly the entire length of the field.

If he can do that as a freshman, just think of what he'll be by the time this coming season rolls around.

For a list of preseason awards and picks, Cal has many of them listed here.