Can We Not Complain About How Little Work the Eagles Do at Training Camp?
Training camp is back. On Tuesday, the Eagles report to camp. Meaning we are just several weeks away from the first kickoff of the season. Soon enough, Jalen Hurts will be taking the field, throwing bombs to AJ Brown, and pissing off opposing defenses by converting every single 3rd and 1. But before that can happen, we have to wait through training camp and pre-season. And as we know from past experiences with Nick Sirianni, it will be a light schedule for the Eagles players at camp. And once preseason games roll around, we will barely see starters at all.
It was a point of much debate last season. We heard time and time again how only the Eagles did so little at training camp. Less fully-padded practices than anyone. More days off. And little to no time at all in preseason games. There was so much talk about how they would look rusty to start the season, and that they were taking the new-age stuff too far.
And then they had a better start to the season than any team in the NFL. They didn’t lose a game until week 10. And that was the only game they lost all season, besides the Super Bowl, with Jalen Hurts playing. They also had fewer injuries than any team. Going into that Super Bowl, every single starter was available to play. Yea, some players got dinged up here and there. Lane Johnson, Jalen Hurts, Avonte Maddox, CJ Gardner Johnson, and Dallas Goedert all missed some time. But compared to most teams, their injury luck was insanely good.
But was it just luck? Maybe there is something to the easier training camps. Maybe the old-school way of pushing the players to their limits before the first game even starts is adding unnecessary wear and tear to a sport that is already grueling on the body. And maybe Nick Sirianni and the Eagles staff are just onto something with this way of handling training camp.
So please, when we start hearing about how little the Eagles are doing at training camp this year, can we hold off on complaining? There was maybe some merit to those complaints this time last year. But it has been proven to work. Two years in a row now the Eagles have been healthier than most other teams, and it does not feel like a coincidence that they are also the team that has most jumped on board with this idea of a light schedule at training camp. So as much as some of you are nostalgic for the days of grueling camps, you can’t argue with the results. Light Training Camps work.