Training camp this year will look very different for all 32 teams across the league due to the restrictions put in place amid the coronavirus pandemic. Teams have already begun trimming their rosters from the usual 90 players to only 80, while practices have been pushed back compared to their usual start times in years past.
For the Rams, they have yet to take the field or even hold any team meetings at the facility after last week was used to get players tested for COVID-19 and acclimated to the protocols that come with entering the building at Cal Lutheran.
Camp was originally supposed to start on July 28, but the Rams have pushed back that date a bit and won’t practice fully for a couple of weeks. Sean McVay laid out the plan on a conference call with reporters Sunday, explaining how the Rams will ramp up in the near future.
“We have August 3rd through the 7th for those first five days, we will be off, and then we will finish it up on the 9th, 10th, and 11th. Then we will actually give our guys off on the 12th as well. So, you’re talking about the 13th is really the first opportunity, and that’s when that ‘ramp-up’ phase starts,” he said. “We’ll be limited in a Phase 2-type of setting, where they still can’t go against one another. So for us, August 17th is really going to represent the first true practice where guys are going against one another outside of a walk-thru setting. Then we’ll do a great job with Reggie (Scott) and his group, and (strength coach) Justin Lovett, and our strength staff of making sure we get the right physical assessment so we’re not pushing guys too early.”
The Rams won’t have a preseason to work through or any practices against other teams, but they do plan to scrimmage a few times at SoFi Stadium to give backups and reserves fighting for roster spots the chance to showcase their abilities as they would have in the preseason.
Just don’t expect to see the starters participating much (if at all) in those scrimmages.
“I think with some of those guys that would typically be playing a lot of the reps in preseason games, we’ll look in to maybe tackling and playing some full-speed football,” McVay said. We still want to be mindful of the guys we’re really counting on to be core starters on September 13 against the Cowboys.”
[vertical-gallery id=636082]