As most of you all know, I despise training camp storylines. From the silly cliches about being in the best shape of their lives…to just the non-stop hype about "attacking"…to trying to be made to care about who will be the Bills 5th CB…to whether or not Naaman Roosevelt will make the team..Just all of it can go in a Ziploc bag filled with dog shit to be set on fire, and then thrown against the door of my ex-girlfriend's house.
However, sometimes..just sometimes, I try to visualize why some people may actually enjoy it. And by doing that, I have to go into the archives of my brain to a time in my life where I may have enjoyed it.
Growing up, I was a huge sports card and memorabilia collector. Football, baseball, hockey and basketball. You name the sport, I had a card or autograph dedicated to it. Of course, I had zero idea what the hell I was doing. I kept collecting Pro Set NFL cards, which have zero value to this day, and I would throw all of my cards in boxes or where space allowed them (Closet floor).
I'd even buy an autographed item on the Home Shopping Network (What am I? A fucken Grandma?). They used to have a sports memorabilia show on Thursday nights and I'd order stuff using my mom's credit card (Which I told her I'd pay her back, but I only did half). I had a Frank Thomas autograph rookie card, a Emmit Smith autographed mini-football, and a Ken Griffey Jr. baseball. Yes, completely random autographed items from players that I'm indifferent about while paying a small fortune for.
However, there was one time that I didn't have to pay anything for an autograph. That was during a 1993 open practice at Ralph Wilson Stadium. This was during a time when OTAs and training camps weren't over-dramatized or over-covered by fans and media. Marv Levy used to have like one OTA before training camp started and this was it.
I was 13 years old and my older sister and I sat like 10 rows up. I don't remember much about the practice except that they did some deep passing drills that made the crowd "ooh" and "aah". However, I was there for one thing..and that was to get an autograph. I brought a football with me and the plan was to get as many signatures as possible.
So, after practice, the players all walked around the wall between the field and the seats and fans pilled in like a mosh pit to try and get their autographs (Side note: If you are over 30 and are trying to get autographs while pushing against kids at a guardrail, you deserved to get punched in the nuts). I was probably in the 2nd row at that point and had my football and sharpie in hand.
Slowly but surely, I started getting autographs on this football and let's just say these signatures were going to be worth less than a Leonard Smith Rookie card..
Mike Devlin
Gale Gilbert
Matt Rodgers
Brad Lamb
Keith Goganious
Yes..These weren't exactly Thomas Jefferson like signatures on The Constitution that I was getting. However, there was finally a light at the end of the tunnel…Jim Kelly made his way to my section and all of a sudden, I felt like I was in a tunnel as I had people pilled all over me like cars in a junkyard. Everyone wanted to get his signature. Pushing, shoving and shouts of Kelly's name engulfed the section.
Now Kelly couldn't obviously sit there and sign every autograph as he had to get to a bar, I'm assuming. He worked the crowd like Bruce Wayne worked that party in Batman Begins..quickly and painless as possible.
Finally, he reached my section and maybe it was my green puppy dog eyes or that he preferred autographing footballs instead of photos, but he took my football and autographed it. He may have just done three autographs for the Hundred or so folks in that steampede…And while people were disappointed, I was thrilled. It was an awesome score for me. I still have that football somewhere in my parent's house and it is probably worth nothing because the other scrubs on that football pretty much killed the value. But at that point, I didn't care. I had just scored Jim Kelly's autograph and I was thrilled.
That memory lane of mine may be a gateway to why training camp can be awesome. When you watch through the eyes of a kid, the meaningless passing drills are viewed as Super Bowl winning passes. Being so close to the action and seeing guys you idolize makes it special. When I see all those photos of players giving autographs to kids and you see how excited they are, it gives me slight pause to NOT go off about training camp storylines (Almost).
To me, the biggest storyline for training camp is the fun for the kids and those autograph seekers who aren't looking to make a buck, but looking to make a nice memory. A lot of people act like the only reason people show up at training camp is because the team is great in selling hope and fans just want to believe.
Maybe that's true, but I think for kids who are in their teens and don't know or let the losing history wash over them, are there because they want to see football and get an autograph.
That story in itself is worth going to training camp.
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