The sun broke through the overcast sky precisely at 9 a.m., as if decreed by the gods of football.
And why not? Joe Gibbs is back and everything is supposed to be sunny side up for the Washington Redskins this season.
Certainly the fans think that. The first one arrived at 5:45 a.m. Thousands more, 5,000 by the team's estimate, had come by the end of the day. And they came for one reason: to see Joe Gibbs direct his first Redskins training camp since 1992.
"I got here about 6:15, and the parking lot was full," Redskins offensive line coach Joe Bugel said. "They were catching footballs. It was game day. Then I really started getting nervous. Is this really game day?"
It might as well have been, considering all the jangled nerves that were in evidence Friday night.
"It was a long night, not very much sleep was going on," Bugel said. "We wanted the night to go by fast so we could get out here. I got up about 4:30, did some pushups in the hall and said, 'Let's go, let's throw some passes with the fans in the parking lot.'"
The Redskins' quarterbacks did not have as much fun as those fans. Yesterday, the defense was ahead of the offense.
The practice was not without its light moments. Once, Redskins quarterback Patrick Ramsey looked at his receiver and saw him covered by Don Breaux, the 63-year-old offensive coordinator. Breaux wasn't attempting to revive he playing career. He was just attempting to give the offense a defensive "look."
"If they can't read us, we're really in trouble," Gibbs said, laughing. "I don't think the coaches move at the same speed [as the players].
"We had good effort in the drills, and the rest was pretty rough. That's reason why I say you can't tell a lot about a football team until you put pads on and start hitting somebody."
Through it all, Gibbs maintained his typical calm pose. Nothing bothered him. He never raised his voice. He'll make his points behind closed doors.
That was not the case for defensive coordinator Gregg Williams. He began practice by putting his players through a quick 25 or so "up-downs," a drill where the players run in place, slam themselves to the ground, hop up and do it over and over again.
After that, Williams delivered a short, strong speech about attitude and effort. He expects both to be unwavering, through every practice and every game.
"He's intense," Gibbs said. "Those defensive coaches usually are like that."
Redskins linebacker LaVar Arrington is trying to live up to Williams' expectations. Yesterday, Arrington exhorted his teammates to increase their intensity during a drill on the blocking sled. And as the players ran from that drill to a nearby practice field, Arrington said, "If you don't love it now, you're in the wrong place."
"You come out here to get better," Arrington said after the afternoon practice. "You don't come out here to waste time."
Gibbs is seriously interested in finding out if he's in the right place now. He was the Redskins' coach from 1981 through 1992 and won 140 regular-season and playoff games, including three Super Bowls. He took an 11-year break for health and family-related reasons and established his NASCAR team, Joe Gibbs Racing, as one of the best organizations on the Nextel Cup circuit.
In 1981, Gibbs walked onto the field at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pa., to conduct his first training camp practice as a head coach.
"I can't remember'81," Gibbs said, laughing again. "There are a lot of the same emotions you're nervous, apprehensive anybody would have the first time you try something. I think I have the same feeling this time I did the first time I came."
Yesterday's beginning wasn't all that different than it was 23 years ago. Gibbs hopes everything else goes just as well as it did the first time around.
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