CAPACCIO: Five Non-Bills NFL Storylines as Camps Open

Here are five non-Bills storylines I’ll be really interested in and paying attention to as training camps around the league open this week. As each camp unfolds, new stories and interests will develop. But as camps open and before teams actually hit the field for a preseason game, here are five places I’ll be looking towards with interest and why:

St. Vincent College; Latrobe, PA

Pittsburgh Steelers Camp

Will there be enough room for both these egos in one small Pennsylvania town?

Fire and Ice.

Oil and water.

Kim Kardashian and many ex-boyfriends.

None of these things go together very well. Will the big personalities and egos of Steelers QB Ben Roethlisberger and new Offensive Coordinator Todd Haley collide early in camp? Big Ben already expressed his confusion over what Haley wants to do on offense. Then he didn’t. But he kind of still did. He even compared Haley’s offseason prep classes to Rosetta Stone. Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin hired Haley to get back to running the football the way the organization has so well so often. But Roethlisberger has thrived and loved playing in the offense of former OC Bruce Arians (now in Indy). With receivers like Mike Wallace and Antonio Brown, he'll no doubt want to continue to take advantage of his talented wide receivers. On top of that, Big Ben and Arians were very close. As far as Haley, he is notoriously tough to get along with. He’s had public blow-ups with Kurt Warner, Anquan Boldin, and Terrell Owens. He didn’t have a pretty exit from Kansas City. If Haley and Big Ben aren’t on the same page when camp opens, it could get ugly quickly. If they are, the Steelers may be on their way back to the top of the AFC.

SUNY Cortland; Cortland, NY

New York Jets

Team implosion or offensive explosion?

Breaking News: The Jets traded for Tim Tebow and he’s bringing a circus with him to training camp. Of course, unless you’ve been living on Mars since March, you already knew that. But that doesn’t make it any less true. This situation is going to unfold throughout the season. But as soon as camp opens, so does the drama and questions that will be there throughout. Especially if Mark Sanchez doesn’t get off to a good start or Santonio Holmes decides to tell the whole country how much better off his team would be with Tebow as its QB. Hey, it’s always a possibility with Santonio. Either the new-look Rex Ryan will finally pay the price for playing mix-and-match with all those personalities and telling the world how great he and his team are with nothing to show for it, or he’ll finally get to cash all those checks his mouth wrote the last couple of seasons. Whichever it is, we should get an indication of which way this thing is going to go down early on in camp. (Note: Mike Tannenbaum is the Jets GM. My wife, who is from Germany, just told me “Tannenbaum” means “Christmas Tree” in German. I have no idea of the relevance of that to any of this, but I just thought I’d share it with you)

Nova Southeastern University; Davie, Florida

Miami Dolphins

Can the Dolphins avoid Swimming With The Fishes?

Let’s recap the Miami Dolphins last seven months or so for a moment, shall we? They fired their coach, Tony Sparano, before the season even ended. They hired former Packers offensive coordinator Joe Philbin for the position. A man with an impressive resume, but also one with no head coaching experience at any level. They then pursued quarterback Peyton Manning, who said he wasn't interested in taking his talents to south beach and instead landed in Denver. Then, they looked at Packers backup Matt Flynn as their QB of the future, but he wound up in Seattle, despite the fact that his old Packers coach, Philbin, was now in Miami. They traded arguably their best offensive player for a pair of third-round draft picks. Finally, they selected Ryan Tannehill in the first round of the draft and depending on who you read or listen to, he's either going to have every chance to compete as the starter or isn't even in the running. Sound like a fun offseason filled with a lot of promise to you? Me, neither. Hey, who knows? Maybe Tannehill will have a great rookie year when it’s all said and done and put his team in position to compete for a wild card. But as camp begins, there are no more reasons to believe that’s the case than to believe they’ll be in position to pick in the top-5 of next April’s draft.

Luca Brasi Sleeps With The Fishes!

Saints practice facility; Metairie, LA

New Orleans Saints

Is it 1987 again in New Orleans?

At this point, with all the players, coaches, and front office personnel that have been suspended by the NFL over Bountygate, I’m starting to think the Saints may have to field replacements like every team team did back in 1987 during the strike. It’s going to be really, really interesting to see how the organization handles the situation off the field, how the players handle it on the field, and how the fans deal with what transpired. People are angry in New Orleans. They feel their team was punished unjustly. They won’t have their head coach and sideline leader, Sean Payton, for an entire season. But you know who they will have? Their on-field leader and brand spanking new 100-Million-Dollar-Man, Drew Brees. And that may be all they really need to get through this and still be contenders in the NFC.

Hey, kids! This is what we did in 1987! We were crazy, weren't we?!

Redskins Park; Ashburn, VA and Anderson University; Anderson, IN

Washington Redskins and Indianapolis Colts

JaMarcus Russell Avenue? Peyton Manning Drive? Which will Luck and RG3 travel?

Yes, I’m putting two stories here and counting them as one. You know why? Because they’ll always be linked. But will they be linked like Tiger and Phil? Like Jack and Arnold? Or instead like Manning and Ryan Leaf? I like both these guys and think they’re both headed for very nice NFL careers. But just as important as how talented they are is the situations they are put in, the people they are surrounded by personally, and the people who handle them professionally. Just one of those factors can often be the thin line between a Hall of Fame career with multiple Super Bowl rings versus one we’re watching a documentary on thirty years later about “what might have been?” Whether Luck’s or Griffin’s paths lead to Canton or future “Where are They Now” columns we’ll all see them take their baby steps this week.

Those are five storylines I'll be following and interested in as camps open around the league this week. What are some of yours? Please share them or add your comments to mine in the spaces below.

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