The NFL lockout prohibits players from working out at team facilities, but it doesn?t preclude players from facilitating team workouts.
One team doing its best to stay sharp and hang together during this uncharted offseason is the Titans. They will conclude their third week of player workouts on Friday.
?I felt like we have a young team and there are a lot of guys who aren?t going to be back next year, so the leadership was sort of voided at this point,? Cortland Finnegan said. ?Someone needed to step up and organize this.?
That someone was Finnegan, a sixth-year cornerback who e-mailed teammates in February to alert them that they had a place to work out in Nashville. The venue is Father Ryan High School, located just off I-65, about 10 minutes from the team?s facility near downtown.
?The reason we picked Father Ryan is, one, if I was going to head it up it had to be someplace Irish because I?m Irish,? Finnegan joked. ?Two, it?s the most centralized school there is from all the surrounding suburbs and outskirts of Nashville.?
The group of participating Titans represents 14 percent of the team?s current 78-man roster, and it encompasses several positions. In addition to Finnegan, regular attendees have been center Eugene Amano, defensive end Dave Ball, defensive back Vincent Fuller, guard Leroy Harris, defensive tackle Jovan Haye, strong safety Chris Hope, cornerback Jason McCourty, linebacker Gerald McRath, tight end Craig Stevens and Rusty Smith, one of only two quarterbacks on the roster. Most of the players live in Nashville year-round.
It?s more challenging for teams to conduct workouts now than it was during the previous two NFL work stoppages?a 24-day players strike in 1987 and a 57-day strike in ?82. Both of those occurred during the regular season.
?We had already gone through training camp, we were already into the season, and we were already in the city together,? said former Redskins quarterback Joe Theismann, who was part of the ?82 strike. ?So getting people together wasn?t a problem.
?I sort of organized our practice sessions, especially on the offensive side. I kept our game plan after the third game. For at least a solid month, I had over 40 guys attending practices.?
The Titans are operating without playbooks, and they can?t have any communication with new head coach Mike Munchak or his assistants. All they can do is run, lift weights and try to replicate the drills they would be doing as part of the team?s offseason program.
They work out from about 9:30 to 11 a.m. on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. There is a lot of running and conditioning work, followed by some position-specific drills. The players do their weight lifting at Father Ryan, Vanderbilt University and a local gym.
Finnegan said players from other teams are invited to join in. On Thursday, Patriots cornerback Devin McCourty, the brother of Jason McCourty, and Patriots safety Brandon Meriweather worked out with the Titans.
?In New England, no one has really put together anything for them yet,? Finnegan said. ?We?ll invite anybody and everybody. They can come to Nashville, shack up wherever they need to, and let?s work together.?
Spirits are high right now, but that enthusiasm may be difficult to sustain the longer the lockout goes on.
?The tough thing is, as it drags on, it just becomes more difficult to stay together,? said Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Fouts, who went through both the ?82 and ?87 strikes.
Titans players know that attendance could dwindle if the lockout is long, but they are pressing on. Finnegan feels a bonding taking place during these workouts, which hopefully will carry over once the offseason gets back to business as usual. Plus, he knows at what stage the players will be once it does.
?We?re ready to go,? Finnegan said. ?We?re in football shape.?
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