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All Jets players must report to Cortland for training camp on July 25, and practices start on July 26.
More and more, teams are training at their regular-season headquarters. This year, more than half the league (19 of 32, 59 percent) will be “staying home” for training camp. In 2000, only five of 31 (16 percent) teams stayed close to home.
For the first time in 17 seasons, the Philadelphia Eagles will not conduct training camp at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The Eagles have opted to hold training camp at their home facility, the NovaCare Complex in Philadelphia.
“I just think we have everything here so the fact that we would pack everything up and move, that didn’t make sense to me,” says Eagles first-year head coach CHIP KELLY on the advantages of training camp being held at the NovaCare Complex. “All our video stuff is here. Our training facility in terms of how we want to lift is here. Why would you move everything to go somewhere else?”
The numbers may prove home-base popularity is a growing league-wide trend, but there are still teams employing the “old-time” philosophy of encamping away.
The Pittsburgh Steelers are one of the teams that “come together” away from home (Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania).
“I love this process, I love going to camp, I love team-building, readying ourselves to pursue our goals,” says Steelers head coach MIKE TOMLIN. “I am extremely excited.”
The NFL training camp longevity king? The Green Bay Packers, who return on July 25 for their 56th consecutive summer at St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisconsin.
The Washington Redskins will conduct their training camp away from Redskins Park for the first time since 2003. The Redskins will hold training camp this year at the Bon Secours Training Center in Richmond, Virginia.
“I think us going to Richmond will be great for the team,” says Redskins quarterback ROBERT GRIFFIN III. “I think it is good for team bonding because we’ll be out in a new city. It kind of forces guys to have to hang out with each other – not that guys don’t want to. It will truly feel like a training camp. It will be the first experience for me because I’ve always been around wherever we work out, especially in college, so it’ll be fun.”
So what is the better way to handle camp – at home or away?
I know this won’t be a popular opinion with a lot of Jets fans, but I think it’s best for them to go away.
I think Rex’s idea to take the team to Cortland is a good one.
Going to Cortland, a sleepy town in Central New York, allows the Jets to focus just on football, and nothing else.
With all the constant distractions around this team, we all know how bad this club needs a single-mindedness of purpose, and that is football, football and more football.
Cortland allows their focus to be just on football.
And each other.
It really is a good bonding experience for a team to go away together to a far away place, and really get to know each other.
When the Jets trained in Florham Park a couple of years ago after the lockout, a lot of guys would go home, or go to Best Buy, the Short Hills Mall, wherever, during breaks from practices and meetings.
In Cortland, they are more likely to hang around together at the dorm, eat together, go to a movie together, and so forth. There is more together time.
This team has so many new players, going away for three weeks together will be good for them.
And traveling upstate four hours away from New York City cuts down on the amount of media at camp.
I know last summer it was a little media crazy due to Tim Tebow being on the team, but that was an aberration. Usually, the media coverage up in Cortland is toned down. Not as many reporters will travel up there, especially with budgets cut back in a bad economy.
Now you will hear negative things from the media about the Jets going to Cortland, but I think part of that stems from reporters not wanting to be there.
But this isn’t about the media, this is about football.
However, I will say this in closing – reading the tea leaves, this very well could be the Jets last year in Cortland.
This is the last year of their contract, and in a bad economy, the Jets could look to tightened their belts and move home next year.
We will see what happens then.
But for now, Cortland is the right place for the Jets to be this summer.
And it’s a nice gesture for the Jets to help the economy of an area of New York that has seen better days.
July 17, 2013
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