The first mini camps for the XFL kicked off league-wide last week. Saturday, the Houston Roughnecks (as well as a few other teams) opened up their mini camps up to the fans and media.
The weather in Houston was perfect, and the stadium looked great as always. The team placed red bleacher seats on all of the available seats in the stadium. It was great to see that there were a lot more unavailable seats than marked available. The turnout was great as well. Season ticket holders were also given field access to watch the practice and partake in a Q&A with Team President Brian Michael Cooper, Sam Schwartzstein, OC Chris Miller, DC Ted Cottrell, DE Kony Ealy and RB Andre Williams.
You can take a look at the full roster for the mini camp below:
This is the first time that Roughnecks fans were able to see their team on the field. At center we had the offense running drills, with both PJ Walker and Connor Cook evenly splitting reps. Both QBs looked great and they weren’t scared to air the ball out. Overall the offense looked tight, the defense looked strong and the coaches seemed amped. This didn’t look like a team that has only practiced for a week, this looked like a group of guys that are ready to fight.
During the Q&A, it was also said that while the league is in town next month for training camp there will be a few scrimmages and practices opened to the public. The training camp is essentially replacing a traditional pre-season, but it seems that if you’re in the greater Houston area you may be able to see a game before Feb 8th.
The coaches and Schwartzstein also touched on the rule changes during the event. Defensive Coordinator, Ted Cottrell told the fans to ask as many questions on the rules, because he feels that the changes are going to be something that the fans will be very excited by. They spoke about the 25 second clock, the overtime, kickoff and also mentioned that receivers may only need one foot inbound for a reception. Overall, the idea is to make a good-quality fast-paced game that fans will recognize as a traditional football game.
Mini camps wrap-up across the league this Wednesday and it’s rumored the rule book is coming this week as well. The XFL sure is taking their momentum into 2020 with all of the recent announcements. We’ll have footage from the mini camp this Friday on ‘This Week in the XFL‘, so make sure to tune in.
