JACKSONVILLE — The voice of Urban Meyer’s chief of staff, Fernando Lovo, booms over the speakers surrounding the practice fields off the parking lots abutting TIAA Bank Field.
With the start of this particular period—the period—all 90 guys on the roster are doing . Some linemen are hitting bags, others are holding them. Some backs are holding balls, others are slapping at them. And there’s a movement and tempo to the whole thing that’s unmistakable and clearly intentional. As Lovo’s voice gives way to blaring music, no one’s standing around. Everyone’s moving. And moving urgently.
It used to be that running things this way in the NFL was newsworthy. When Chip Kelly hauled gigantic speaker towers out to practice in 2013, reporters tweeted playlists. When Jim Harbaugh split his team into two in 2011, to maximize time in a post-lockout training camp, it was considered an innovative way of adapting college time constraints to NFL efficiency. When Pete Carroll brought names to days of the week (), it was first seen as hokey, and later considered central to how he built the Seahawks.
And in that way, one point Meyer made to me when we got together after Jaguars practice on this day, Monday Aug. 16, was proven. The lines between college and pro football have, indeed, been blurred, and that should ease Meyer’s transition.
Everyone plays music at practice now. Everyone maximizes reps. Everyone steals ideas.
“The college game and NFL game, in my opinion, it’s never been closer,” Meyer said. “The college player has changed. The NFL scheme has changed. You think about the two of those things, NFL scheme used to be dramatically different than college. And the college player used to be much different—the young kid. Those aren’t young kids anymore. Now, a lot of them are gonna start getting paid, the empowerment that’s gone on in college football, the mindset of a college athlete, especially when you get to the players I was fortunate to have, it’s all about the NFL, make no mistake about it.
“The two worlds have probably never been closer. There are differences, but they’ve never been closer.”
Which is to say that, on one hand, the NFL that Meyer’s entering this year is closer to what he’s used to than it’s ever been before. Yet, on another, camp here is so distinctly Meyer’s from the minute you walk into it—recognizable to anyone who followed his rise through the college ranks, from Bowling Green and Utah to Florida and Ohio State—that you could probably pull up three- and four-year-old tape from Columbus and not tell the difference.
The upshot, then, is twofold. One, Meyer sure looks ready for the NFL. And two, the rest of us get to see if the ways of one of the most successful coaches in the century-and-a-half history of college football will fly in the pros. What happens next, either way, like Lovo’s voice booming over those speakers, won’t be subtle.
