Tuesday, July 20, 2004
Training Camp...
Eagles 2004 training camp starts Tuesday, July 27th at Lehigh in Bethlehem (the 30th for veterans). For me it will be the real beginning of the 2004 season: the first time teams start to come together and plan and prepare for the season. I’m looking forward to it and you can count on a real upswing on activity here at the Bird Blog because I’ll be done with the bar exam on the 28th.
What do I think about Eagles camp being at Lehigh? I’m sure it is a terrific campus (a friend of my fiancée and I went there for college and loved it), but I miss the fact that the Birds don’t train in West Chester (my mother’s alma mater) anymore. I know the area well: the West Chester football field was about ten minutes from my parents home in Downingtown, which is where I grew up. It is a nice field, very green and surrounded by trees and mostly quiet. (I imagine that the burst of development in Chester County over the last decade probably spurred the team’s movement north.) My father took me to see the Eagles practices a few times. I remember it all really well because it was exciting stuff for a twelve year-old kid: I remember walking around with my father and then seeing Randall Cunningham come walking out from the locker room to start practice. I gaped in stunned amazement: Randall Cunningham in the flesh! It was so different, seeing these guys on TV and then actually meeting them in person. As I recall, I was too stunned to move, too nervous to shake hands with him. As a boy you idolize athletes when you grow up, so to actually see your heroes up front in person is a startling thing.
It was an amazing experience and one that I recommend to any dads (or moms) out there reading to do for your kids: take them to see their heroes just once in the flesh.
If there are any Steelers readers or people who will be in Latrobe, PA in August, I recommend checking out the Stillers camp at St. Vincent College. In addition to being my fiancée’s alma mater, it is a really terrific college nestled into the rolling hills of Westmoreland County. Peter King wrote that it was his favorite NFL training camp because it is so picturesque. I can vouch for the fact that it is a very nice and pleasant campus.
(I almost did a double-take last year when King then proceeded to write in his column on CNNSI.com about his lunch visit to Joio’s Pizza in Latrobe. Joio’s is my fiancée’s favorite place in the world to get pizza. Every time we go to the greater Greensburg area we stop there. I do highly recommend it: it is the most interesting and distinctive pizza I have ever had.)
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What do I think about Eagles camp being at Lehigh? I’m sure it is a terrific campus (a friend of my fiancée and I went there for college and loved it), but I miss the fact that the Birds don’t train in West Chester (my mother’s alma mater) anymore. I know the area well: the West Chester football field was about ten minutes from my parents home in Downingtown, which is where I grew up. It is a nice field, very green and surrounded by trees and mostly quiet. (I imagine that the burst of development in Chester County over the last decade probably spurred the team’s movement north.) My father took me to see the Eagles practices a few times. I remember it all really well because it was exciting stuff for a twelve year-old kid: I remember walking around with my father and then seeing Randall Cunningham come walking out from the locker room to start practice. I gaped in stunned amazement: Randall Cunningham in the flesh! It was so different, seeing these guys on TV and then actually meeting them in person. As I recall, I was too stunned to move, too nervous to shake hands with him. As a boy you idolize athletes when you grow up, so to actually see your heroes up front in person is a startling thing.
It was an amazing experience and one that I recommend to any dads (or moms) out there reading to do for your kids: take them to see their heroes just once in the flesh.
If there are any Steelers readers or people who will be in Latrobe, PA in August, I recommend checking out the Stillers camp at St. Vincent College. In addition to being my fiancée’s alma mater, it is a really terrific college nestled into the rolling hills of Westmoreland County. Peter King wrote that it was his favorite NFL training camp because it is so picturesque. I can vouch for the fact that it is a very nice and pleasant campus.
(I almost did a double-take last year when King then proceeded to write in his column on CNNSI.com about his lunch visit to Joio’s Pizza in Latrobe. Joio’s is my fiancée’s favorite place in the world to get pizza. Every time we go to the greater Greensburg area we stop there. I do highly recommend it: it is the most interesting and distinctive pizza I have ever had.)
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