6/11/2007 1:41:47 PM
Settle Down

Week 2 of training camp has begun and the feel is much different from the first day of the previous week. The initial buzz and excitement of just being in camp and having the opportunity to show your talents has faded into a blur of soreness, cramping, mild injuries and mental fatigue. The new faces that were flashing across your vision as drills progressed are now recognizable faces with names, stories and distinguishing features in their game that have worn themselves into your mind in the past week of spending so much of your time with the same guys. Everything seems to slow down at this point in camp. We walk slower, time seems to creep by in meetings, practice seems to drag and you feel like you’re not moving as fast as you were initially when camp first opened, but in actuality you’re moving faster in most cases…it’s the game that’s slowing down. As an offensive player, we’re at the point where we’ve installed our entire base offence in its entirety. So naturally, the next thing on the to do list is to fine tune and coach up the specifics involved to make the offence smooth and efficient. Interestingly enough, it takes one week to install a whole offence but takes years to fine tune it to the point where it’s fully functional and efficient in the eyes of the coordinator at the helm.
I’ve never been in the same offence for more than 1 year since college, so I can only speculate as to what it must be like to come into camp knowing the playbook and not having that mental overload aspect of the game to worry about. Come to think of it, that would be fantastic! I could get so much more rest and take much better care of my body for sure, and there would be no awkward days because the mental part of the game is not in play, which means no thinking…no thinking means just reacting…and reacting is just being an athlete. What a life that must be!!
But that hasn’t been the road for me. This will be my 12th offensive scheme learned in only 7yrs of professional football, so naturally I’ve had to learn how to digest and understand schemes quickly in order to make a statement in camp early, and this camp has been no different. Fortunately for me and the rest of the 2007 Eskimos, the worst is behind us. All we must do now is fine tune, game plan and then execute when it counts. In training camp though, it’s not just the pre-season that counts…it’s every snap of every day that is being evaluated. So the best thing to do is keep the playbook open for reference every chance you get, settle down, and make the plays that come to you. ©

KP8