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When Green Bay Packers punter Tim Masthay takes the field to kick the ball to the opposition, like every professional athlete, he’s paid for his efforts.

This year, he’s being paid very well.

No, he hasn’t gotten a raise.

Packers punter Tim Masthay has gotten most of his work on the sidelines. Raymond T. Rivard photograph

In fact, he’s making the same money that he has been making the past couple of seasons

He signed a 4 year, $5.47 million contract with the Packers in 2012, a contract that included a $1,200,000 signing bonus, $1,200,000 guaranteed, and an annual average salary of $1,366,250.

But this year, Masthay has had a tough time contributing his skills for the Packers. That’s because he’s punted only 37 times in 12 games – you do the math and you can can see he hasn’t been needed much.

When you do the math on the amount of money per-punt that Masthay is earning, it’s pretty remarkable.

$36,926 per-punt in 2014.

Yes, let me repeat that …

$36,926 per punt in 2014.

What the heck, we’ll round it up to $37,000.

We wonder if Masthay might be taking Aaron Rodgers and the Packers’ offense out to dinner any time soon.

Here is what Masthay told the Green Bay Press Gazette this week:

“This has been a weird, weird year, but particularly weird the past month for me and for our punt team. “Minnesota, the game at Minnesota, was a fairly normal rhythm. We had four punts, and they were scattered throughout the game. At least in my time here, we’ve never been a team that’s punted heavily, because we’ve always had a strong offense. So having four or five punts a game, scattered, that’s kind of the normal. “This year, it’s not been that way at all. Especially the last month, as far as home games, I’m not sure I’ve punted in the first half since September or maybe early October. I can’t remember.”

Tim Masthay hasn’t had many opportunities to show the quality kicker that he is … Raymond T. Rivard photograph

Since Oct. 19, Masthay has been extremely lonely in the first half of home games. Since that time, he hasn’t had a chance to punt in the first half of any of those last three home games.

The reason?

Green Bay has scored on 16 of the 17 first-half possessions led by Aaron Rodgers. The other was a fumble in the red zone.

When told that Masthay had made some comments about his lack of punting, Aaron Rodgers was amused.

“Has he been complaining about the lack of punts?” Aaron Rodgers asked in a recent interview. “I thought he was a good teammate, that he wanted to win first and not just get his stats up. He is the all-time leader in net average, and I think gross average. He shouldn’t be complaining too much. Give him a little rest.”

Masthay might be he loneliest Packer, but like Rodgers said … he shouldn’t be complaining too much.