NASHVILLE – The Titans wrapped up a two-day minicamp on Wednesday.
Now, the team isn't scheduled to be back on the field until late July, when training camp begins.
Before the final practice of the offseason program, coach Robert Saleh smiled when asked about what's on the horizon.
"I'll be taking a lot of naps on the beach hopefully with the kids, if they let me," Saleh said with a smile, "and golfing."
The reality is football will probably never leave his mind, not with what's coming up.
It also needs to stay on the minds of the players, Saleh said, because the next 40 days – until camp begins – are critical.
"These next 40 days are critical," Saleh said. "And I feel like so many players lose their season before it ever starts because of the way they handle these next 40 (days). It's not a vacation. They've got to get ready to play ball. We kind of trick it by pretending the four-day acclimation period will help them kind of give them a runway to get into the season – there is no runaway. When you get here, we've got to go and if you're not prepared to play, you're going to get hurt and that's league-wide. We can put bubble wrap on these guys and delay the inevitable which leads to injury week 1 through 5 during the season. But the important thing is that our players attack the heck out of the next 40 days, get here ready to play and have an amazing training camp."
The Titans are scheduled to report for training camp in Nashville the last week of July.
Because of the acclimation period, the team won't practice in pads until the first week of August. The Titans will scrimmage at Nissan Stadium a week-and-a-half into camp, Saleh said on Wednesday.
After that, the Titans will open the preseason on August 13 at the San Francisco 49ers, after holding a joint practice with the 49ers earlier that week in California.
There's a lot to do to get ready.
The preparation shouldn't stop now, even if practices do.
"It's all conditioning level," Saleh said. "Our strength group put together a great program for them over the next 40 days to get them ready for that first day of practice. And then from there, the acclimation and the buildup will continue to rise. But a lot of the soft tissue injuries come in because they're not prepared for the load that they're going to get hit with. And I get it. You're going to go out, you're going to enjoy your vacation, you're going to go to the beach, you're going to have some drinks and all that stuff. But you've got to be mindful about what you're doing to your body and how you're preparing yourself to play, because one injury, you set yourself back two weeks."
"Take our situation and our schedule. A week and a half into camp, we're having a scrimmage in the stadium. Two weeks from report day, we are in San Francisco practicing and we're playing a game, so you've got two weeks. A four-day acclamation period is not covering that. So you've got to be able to prepare in a way that has you ready from day one. And so, like I said, we've got a great program that we've put together for the guys to follow and they're always welcome to do more than what's being asked."
