NFL training camps were faced with multiple challenges in 2020 but with camps starting to wrap up the question is how well did they go? The Kansas City Chiefs will be transitioning away from the training camp schedule to a regular daily practice schedule after completing their final practice on Saturday.
“Today’s kind of really the last official day of training camp for us, we’ll start regular practices here next week as far as the schedule goes,” Chiefs HC Andy Reid said. “So, I thought it went smoothly. We had a good plan for it, and we were able to get the stuff in that we needed on both sides of the ball and special teams, so I came out of it feeling pretty good. We’re relatively healthy and we’ll be ready to go.”
A lot of people working together were necessary to pull off training camp all across the league. Protocols and safety measures were put in place in order to keep players, coaches, and personnel safe. Reid praised the collaborative effort that it took from everyone to make training camp go without a hitch.
“Well, there was some responsibility that took place with the players taking care of themselves and the coaches taking care of themselves, just physically with the virus surrounding the different areas,” Reid said. “So, we were able to work our way through it and I thought we got things accomplished. And the guys stayed focused on the job at hand. So, I was proud of it and proud of the guys for the way all of us handled it.
“The organization, the plan that they had—Rick Burkholder, Mark Donovan, Mitch Reynolds and Kirsten (Krug) was involved with it—these people gave up their summers to make sure that we could pull this off safely—Rocco (Mazzella), who’s in charge of our facility here and his crew. It’s important though that we don’t pull the pedal off the gas here, that we continue on in all the directions that have been presented this camp and that we continue to focus on all the things we need to do, not only to play the Texans but also going forward, obviously with the racial situations.”
With training camp now in the rearview mirror, the emphasis for Kansas City moves to the regular season, defending their Lombardi Trophy and pursuing a brand new one. Like training camp, the upcoming season will be unconventional in many ways. It too will require a collaborative effort so that the team may successfully and safely navigate the various challenges they face.
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