On Tuesday Vikings punter Chris Kluwe complained that a handful of players were holding up the new CBA for selfish purposes. Later that night, another player expressed his dissatisfaction with one aspect of the CBA as well. That player is Jets linebacker Bart Scott. Scott is unhappy that the NFLPA got the owners to agree to essentially eliminate two-a-day practices during training camp.
“I think it’s wimping out; making football more soft,” Scott told The Star-Ledger (via NFL.com). “No reason to try and make camp easy.”
“I get concerned you’re making football players weaker because you don’t push them past that threshold. … I get concerned with the same thing with the quarterback stuff, that they turn it into flag football; they turn it into little pansy stuff.”
“Two-a-days, it’s what football is all about,” Scott said. “It’s about endurance, pain, will, putting yourself through something when your body is telling you it doesn’t want to go. Your mind controlling your body. That’s what camp is all about. With one-a-days, guys might not be in as good of shape as they would have been. Camp tears you down, and then a smart coach starts pulling back in enough time that allows players’ bodies to build back up.”
See, this is the territory we get in where you worry if the players got too much power. Things need to be even, things need to be fair. Coaches can’t feel like the players will pull out their contracts Roger Dorn-style if they’re asked to practice more than they want, even if this was done for player safety-purposes. As Scott said, this is taking away reps from coaches. Let’s just hope players have the same attitude as Scott where they want to practice to get better.
