The Non-Stories of NFL Training Camp

Ryan Tannehill was not so great!

Johnny Manziel is drinking a beer!

Peyton Manning is dancing!

Whoop-dee-doo. Holy shit, do I hate training camp.

It's that laggard-assed time of year when every non-story becomes a story, when the NFL claws and scratches its way back to the main stage of the American sporting landscape. It's a tease. A tease of great things to come, sure. But still a tease.

Training camp is the NFL calendar's over-the-pants hand job. It's worthless, less than worthless. The fact that the Cleveland Browns were wearing pads and almost—almost—tackling one another to the ground counts as news. The Seattle Seahawks are tweeting photos of players just standing around. In Houston, new Texans head coach Bill O'Brien is making his guys run laps for mental errors and running back Arian Foster gave reporters the same answer over and over again. Nothing is happening, but in a far more aggressive way than nothing happens in the offseason.

Meaty storylines are scarce, so everyone jumps on the scraps that are available. The New York Giants are apparently gaga over the system of short routes and screen passes being installed by offensive coordinator Ben McAdoo, though any change would be welcome after a 7-9 season that saw Eli Manning turn the ball over 30 times. The New England Patriots sneakily picked up running back Tyler Gaffney off waivers from the Carolina Panthers—who were trying to get him onto the injured reserve list—thus violating an unwritten rule and reminding everyone that Bill Belichick does not care what you think.

Optimism runs rampant, like chicken pox in a kindergarten classroom. Everybody "looks good." Someone who makes one great play in practice is going to be the next NFL superstar, guaranteed. The players who aren't looking awesome are getting hurt: Dallas Cowboys linebacker Sean Lee tore his ACL and now he'll spend the season in blue jeans, or whatever his choice of pant happens to be. Buffalo Bills linebacker Kiko Alonso will be out to start the season, leaving a gaping hole in a young defense that needs all the help it can get.

Some guys are taking advantage of their fleeting moments in the spotlight. In Detroit, much-ballyhooed defensive end Ziggy Ansah, considered a project player when he was drafted fifth overall last April, is watching his first-team reps to George Johnson, a "camp body" who was pulled out of Minnesota's trash heap in free agency. As Ansah recovers from shoulder surgery, Johnson is showing off some speed from the edge, thanks to a renewed commitment to conditioning that saw him lose 20 pounds in the offseason. Rookie quarterback Teddy Bridgewater, grabbed by the Minnesota Vikings at the tail end of the first round of the draft, could actually start under center come Week 1—though that's more a sign of the Vikings' desperation than the Louisville product's talent.

But these training camp narratives are just that—narratives. Training camp stories are the synthetic version of the fix that NFL fans are looking for. They need actual games, real football, when all of the possibilities will collapse into a reality and all the speculation over which teams will actually be good will end. Still, there's a hint of football in the air. I played the game in high school, and even now, several years later, I can almost smell the return to the field. Guys are putting on jerseys and helmets. Roster spots are being decided. We're almost there. Almost.

Man, I love training camp.