Training camps spark sparing sessions
Just days into NFL training camps, and we have already seen our first fight. Training camp can bring a team together, but that is usually after all heck breaks loose and subsequent to all the trash talking and cheap shots that goes on between players eager to establish that they are the alpha males on their squads.
Bills head coach Chan Gailey's was the first to see his players get into a scrap when Geoff Hangartner and Aaron Maybin got in each others grill.
"I think it's part of the game," Gailey said. "I've been in them and everybody that has played the game has been in them. It comes with the territory."
Round one went to Bills’centre Hangartner as he was ahead on the judges score card at the sound of the bell. Hangartner was unhappy with Maybin's blind side hit on running back Fred Jackson.
"You hit our 1,000-yard rusher in the back when he's not looking, then it's going to kind of cause some hard feelings with the O-line, so that's kind of the way things go," Hangartner said afterward. "I've got to protect our guy."
But players and coaches will tell you that tempers flare, emotions run high and guys are just excited to get back on the gridiron and start hitting after a long off season.
"If you got passion about the game it is going to come out," said Gailey of the skirmish. "Sometimes it comes out the wrong way. If it becomes an issue then you have to talk about it because it could be an issue during a ball game."
It is not uncommon to even see some of the game’s most talented athletes get into a scuffle from time to time. Panthers’ wideout Steve Smith punched defensive back Ken Lucas in the face back in 2008, which led to Smith being suspended by his team.
Quarterbacks have also mixed it up with defenders. This is their only chance to earn a few stripes and establish themselves as tough guys and a leader who is not afraid to stand up for his receivers. In his second year, Vince Young, got into a pushing match and helmet slapping contest with Donnie Nickey, after Nickey tackled a receiver with excessive force for the kind of team activity that the Titans were playing.
Sometimes fighting is not always a bad thing. Young won the respect of his teammates that day and has increasingly shown his commitment and desire to succeed with the Titans organization.
"Stuff like that happens. No hard feelings," Hangarner said. "And it'll happen again with somebody else before this camp's over with I promise you. It may not be me and him, it'll be somebody else, but it'll happen again."
Maybin laughed when speaking about his wrestling match.
"I think it's a little bit less of a big deal than everybody makes it out to be, but it is what it is, it's a physical game," Maybin said. "Emotions are always going to be a little bit higher because you have pads on. So it is a little bit of a heightened emotional level."
In the end, football is a contact sport and there's nothing to make out of the fact that a few fights will occur during the weeks of camp and preseason games. Competition heats up, as close to 90 guys report for camp and only 45 players are aloud to be suited up to play each week for the season.
Players are just trying to compete for a spot in the lineup and once the roster is complete, guys no longer fight amongst themselves, they unite and fight as a group on Sundays against opposing teams.
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