Player’s POV: Casey Rabach and Jon Jansen Amuse Themselves

Time spent on a plane is boring. It doesn’t matter if you’re flying with a random cross-section of humanity or with a professional football team, being trapped in a large metal cylinder thousands of feet above the ground is going to limit your entertainment options.

In the back with the staff, people tend to watch the in-flight movies, zone out to music on their headsets, or try to get some work done. Up with the players, from what I’ve seen, things are pretty much the same. Most guys completely swathe themselves in blankets and sleep, they listen to their music, or they watch movies on portable DVD players.

That’s most guys. Casey Rabach and Jon Jansen also have other ways to entertain themselves, as they demonstrate on camera here on the flight to Dallas. (For those of you wondering why Ethan Albright seemed grouchy boarding the buses to the plane, this video may provide some illumination. It’s possible that he knew what was awaiting him on the flight.)

(Also, I’m experimenting with different types of encoding for video. Let me know if this one looks any better or worse than the previous few.)

Another One That Missed the Car Show

Walking through the parking lot this afternoon, I got a chance to see another player’s vehicle that wasn’t at the car show on Sunday.

Jon Jansen and Casey Rabach made their way back to the building for afternoon practice in one of the team golf carts. This isn’t Rabach’s speediest onsite vehicle — after yesterday’s practice, he commandeered one of the John Deere’s used by the equipment and grounds crews and took it for a spin around the practice fields.

Comparing the golf cart to the Deere, he acknowledges, “It’s got less horsepower and doesn’t handle as well, but it’s all about saving the legs during camp. I like parking it next to this V12.”

How the Other Half Lives (For a Few Weeks or So)

Because the players were off last night and mostly out on the town, I was allowed to head on over to the NCC, where they stay during training camp. Coach Zorn had requested that the players be left alone at their lodgings, and the night out was chosen with the proviso that I not disturb any players who had chosen to stay behind.

It’s a conference center, not quite a hotel and not quite a dorm, and — approaching it alone — my first thought was that it was very quiet, and my second that it was sort of unsettling. That was before I saw the rooms, at which point the word “large” left the description.