How Physical Should NFL Training Camps Be?

In the NFL grown men are paid a king’s ransom in an effort to bring glory, entertainment and serious coin to the city, the fans and owners alike. With so much riding on the big-name stars of each organization coupled with the pressures of player safety—just how violent should training camps be?

The answer to this pivotal question varies greatly depending on the angle of approach. Even from a player safety standpoint alone the answer can flip simply by specifying between a player’s short-term and long-term safety.

In the long term, the accumulative damage done from years of rigorous training can eventually come back to haunt a player in severely debilitating ways, both mentally and physically.

In the short term, however, stressing the bones and muscles from a steady bombardment of hits (slightly more mild than actual game speed) can strengthen the body and better prepare it for the physicality of a 16-game season.

This improved durability may seem counter-intuitive, but it occurs when the calcification of bone coupled with added muscle density essentially forms a natural layer of protection. This process can also be used to "weaponize" the body when desired.

It’s important to note that no two bodies are created the same. What breaks one bone may bruise another.  

Here’s an excerpt from an earlier article of mine detailing an NFL training camp:

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I wish I could articulate the mental struggle involved in putting your pads and gear on before a practice…

…Your body has likely been bashed and trampled so much that you can no longer distinguish bruised flesh from normal. With muscles so stiff and fatigued, the brief walk from the hotel to locker is a challenge. Your body is screaming for rest; your mind is constantly at the breaking point. My feet would develop massive blisters on the big toes.

Pain becomes relative in the NFL. Amidst all of this, as a rookie trying to make the team on a daily basis, you have no choice but to dig deep, suck it up and slide those battered legs into a pair of freshly-washed, tight, silver practice pants. These were the moments when I thought: Is all of this worth it?

"

Eventually after several weeks of this anguish, the body begins to respond in miraculous ways. By late August it almost takes getting hit by a baseball bat to create a visible bruise on your body. Yes, your body actually becomes highly resistant to bruising after a while as your pain tolerance is increased dramatically. These are critical functions of a football training camp.

The key is finding that ever-elusive balance between hardening the body and keeping players healthy. The last thing you want to do is take out a few multimillion dollar superstars while preparing your team for a grueling run at the Super Bowl.

But how do you get to a Super Bowl without properly preparing your team to be fundamentally sound in essential elements of the game—i.e. blocking and tackling?

This paradox forces teams to make a tricky decision in determining the permissible brutality levels of a training camp. The challenge becomes simulating actual game speed to sharpen essential football skills without creating unnecessary injuries. Sounds easy right?

A boxer training for his next bout also toils with this dilemma.

As the NFL evolves throughout the years, teams become increasingly more conservative in their approach toward contact in a practice setting. As a result, television screens are traditionally inundated with poor tackling displays every Sunday. For the fan this may add to the entertainment of the game, but to the defensive coordinator trying to win a Super Bowl, it’s enough to drive him to an early grave.

So…

How is a player supposed to improve a skill if he's given no opportunity to practice it?

I'm not exaggerating when I tell you it’s common for a defender to make it all the way to a preseason game before finally performing his first tackle of the summer.

This was always a big issue for me in my acclimation to the speed of the NFL and in preparation for game-time scenarios. I struggled with the transition to special teams in the pros in part because we never ran a single live punt or kickoff in practice that would allow us to tackle the ball-carrier. Running down the field at full speed, evading the blocker and closing in on the highly elusive ball-carrier was an art that I was attempting to master without any real-time repetitions. It was no coincidence that I excelled at every part of the process except for when I actually had to break down and take the returner to the ground. I was usually running down the field so fast that I was out of control by the time I zeroed in on the ball-carrier.  

Never was I the gifted athlete who could rely on rare physical attributes alone to compensate for a lack of practice, especially considering I hadn’t played special teams since my freshman year in college. I needed practice, practice I never got.

Under the current Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), training camps are designed to reduce the wear and tear on the player’s body. Padded practices are not permitted until the fourth practice of training camp. Two-a-days are a thing of the past now as each team is allowed only one padded practice a day up to three hours long.

These current restrictions are reasonable, and there is still a lot of room within them to get valuable work in.

The Vision

In regards to contact between the guys in trenches, it is intense for most teams. Little, if any, change is needed here.

But there are other areas of training camp where I believe the intensity can and should be turned up a few notches—especially considering players only have to “armor up” once a day now.

Players absolutely need to tackle in training camp. This is something that rarely happens because teams are afraid bringing guys to the ground will result in too many injuries. Though it’s a valid concern, live drills are grossly underutilized in those summer weeks.

From my experience of NFL training camps, there are very few opportunities for live, full-go repetitions. The typical speed in practice is called thud tempo. This means every player is expected to stay on his feet. When a defender meets the ball-carrier, he is expected to give him a gentle “thud” and let him continue running. The expectation of the thud itself indirectly teaches defenders to lead with the shoulders and not wrap up.

The linemen are not allowed to cut-block and no one is permitted to dive on the ground for loose balls.

As it currently stands, once or twice a week a team will dedicate a 10- to 15-minute period for live contact. This is usually a drill focused on goal-line situations and is usually all running plays.

Ideally it would be most beneficial to the team if there was more of a middle ground between thud tempo and a live period. Offensive linemen would still not be permitted to cut-block and tackling would be implemented to a limited degree.  

Regardless of common perception, players are indeed capable of working on their tackling technique while being mindful of their teammates' health. The tackling regulations in practice would allow a defender to take a ball-carrier to the ground, but it would discourage any “blow-up” hits or diving at the knees. All tacklers should target the area between the shoulders and thighs. Of course, there will be some accidental deviations from this emphasis, but over time it will teach players how to execute proper tackling techniques. If a defender is closing in on a runner in full stride from behind, he should not take that player to the ground—a simple two-hand touch or an attempt at a strip is adequate at that point.

Any balls on the ground would be live, as players would be expected to recover a fumble at all costs in games.

A coach who is willing to allow more live contact on ball-carriers in training camp will do wonders for his team in several critical areas of the game.

He would likely see an increase in forced turnovers along with a decrease in turnovers on offense. The skilled players on offense would likely improve significantly at breaking tackles, and the defense would improve its tackling (assuming this team remains the only one implementing this rogue strategy).

The older, more established players, those who already have a better grasp on the game, will have their high-tempo reps reduced relative to the younger players who obviously benefit the most from this.

Though the straightforward argument against this policy is centered on injury concerns, I believe from experience that practicing at this hybrid tempo in training camp could potentially reduce injuries throughout the course of season. Naturally, once a team gets into the swing of the regular season, the high level of intensity is no longer needed in practice. 

Providing the team with daily exposure to hurdling bodies, form-tackles and faster practice tempo should increase player awareness during real-time situations by significantly slowing down the game. Furthermore, the daily emphasis on proper technique will eventually “hardwire” safe habits into the player’s minds while simultaneously improving critical fundamentals.

No training camp is impervious to player injuries. Even if a key contributor suffers an injury by direct result of this tempo, his injury would not override the overall value of implementing this superior practice policy.

Ryan Riddle is an NFL Featured Columnist for Bleacher Report. Before B/R, Ryan played for the Oakland Raiders, New York Jets, Atlanta Falcons and Baltimore Ravens.

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