“I’m not an idiot!” said Jon Gruden, when asked if he pays much attention to GPS tracking of his players which shows how much distance each player travels in a given day.
“We’re practicing in the Mojave desert here,” he continued. “We’re practicing at seven in the morning, so we do gather all kinds of information. We have some of the best trainers and doctors here that you can imagine, so we’re going to be real careful and real smart.”
Even at 7:30 am, the sun here in Las Vegas is brutal. Often times the temp hits triple digits during practice. Just standing on the side is unpleasant. I can’t imagine having to run around in it in pads and a helmet for two hours.
Still, you assume the staff here keeps tabs on these guys to make sure none of them fall out or worse.
Apparently last Tuesday, the team had hit a bit of a wall. The offense was clearly struggling. There were four interceptions, spread around to three of the team’s four quarterbacks, and a few fumbles as well.
So, come Wednesday morning, Gruden made a late audible and pulled the plug on having them out on the field again. So late, in fact, that the players all had their pads on and we in the media were already on the sideline before being sent back to the media work room. Gruden explains why.
“We have some guys that are low on gas and we needed to do some things to get their legs back,” said Gruden. “Hydrate them properly. Even coaches are getting IV’s. Some of you guys look like you could use an IV (laughs). It’s HOT, man. Hydration is a big part of it. And our conditioning, we had a great practice today, a lot of energy, I liked it, we took the coaches off the field. And sometimes a change in the schedule is good for us.”
Gruden did want to emphasize, however, that, though they weren’t out on the field, the team was still working, saying “There was no day off” and noting that all the coaches were still here and “we turned it up in the strength and conditioning room.”
