Well interesting conversations so far. So using them, reports from reporters and my vast ability to make blind inferences without being on the scene; here is what I'm hearing.
1. Diggs has made a rather spectacular recovery from an ACL and is likely to be ready to start the season and ready to make an impact for the next year or two.
2. The WR room in general looks to be quite a bit better than what was predicted going in. There are no big stars like everyone wants, but there is TALENT, experience, and drive can make stars in the future. Players rarely come into the league as stars. They BECOME stars as they get better. Again, I see too many fans seeing a clip of a practice rep and make and instant evaluation that the player is a star, bum or jag as a knee jerk reaction. It's dumb yet continues to happen with frustrating frequency.
3 DL looks like it will be in a fight with the secondary for the dominant group on the defense. We know about Williams, Young, and Barmore, but good news keeps surfacing about guys like Pharms and Tonga, while we wait to hear about Farmer over the next few weeks. I thought we were going to be good on the DL this year, but it is comforting to hope that we might have quality depth as well
4. The same can be said about what we are seeing from the DB's. Because of the injuries to Gonzo and Davis we are getting good looks at guys who would be camp bodies and some are showing flashes of perhaps making the roster or PS
5. Like all of us, I am REALLY looking forward to Friday. I really hope Vrabel doesn't wimp out and lets Maye play a half. A young kid like him NEEDS the live reps to read defenses, get a feel for a full speed rush and get bumped around a bit. I don't want Maye's first hit to come in a regular season game.
6. What a lot of people forget is that OL play is NOT 5 guys each having one on one battles. It, like ALL of football play is a COORDINATED venture. This one on one drills they do are helpful. but are slanted toward the defense. When done right (and I'm talking about pass protection) it gets harder for defenses to succeed because it gets crowded for the when the OL works as a unit. Probably too early to have a hard and fast #1 unit but I'm hoping we will by the end of next week.
Last year AMONG the myriads of issues the OL had, IIRC they didn't play the same starting OL 2 games in a row until about half way thru the season. It takes a LOT of reps for OL units to develop that "continuity" even a month or two isn't going to cut it, but every snap brings them closer to that point and we can't start too early.
6. Still kind of irritates me that they got 2 days off this past weekend and will likely get two days off next week. I don't know why exactly, it just seems like TC doesn't seem the grueling, bonding endeavor it used to be. Do they even run the hill anymore? What ARE they doing for cardio-vascular these days? I haven't seen any reporting on this.