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Veteran cornerback Walt Harris checked in with his latest Training Camp Diary on Wednesday afternoon, shortly after taking part in the final practice of the 2007 camp. Catch up with the Pro Bowl defender in this journal entry.**
My leg is feeling much better. I was able to come out for the last two practices of camp and work my way back in. The coaches have been very conservative as far as how much I'm doing out there and I'm continuing to get more reps each day leading up to Saturday.
There was a lot of testosterone going on out there on Wednesday during our last practice of training camp. A lot of guys were just ready for camp to be over with, but actually we still had a pretty good practice. I think a lot of guys started out just frustrated and there were two fights. There could have been two more fights actually but guys just let it go. I was like wow, what is going on out here, but that's part of camp.
I just want to let everyone know that the defensive backs won the competition in the Thomas Herrion Talent Show on Tuesday night. There were some good performances, and there were some bad performances, my goodness. The offensive line started out strong and had a nice skit. What I thought was funny was this video that the special teams group made of what they do when the rest of us are in meetings. Basically they were in the pool playing Marco Polo, and it was fairly funny.
It got a little close to the end on the voting. I think it came down to the last coach's vote. The assistant o-line coach gave us a 7. That was crazy, and I think he was trying to set up the line to win since it came down to us and them. It really shouldn't have been as close, but we won in the end.
I thought about doing something, but I ended up just putting in input and coordinating. It was a talent show so we wanted to display the guys who we thought would give us our best chance to win. I can be a comedian though. I can act. I actually grew up wanting to be an actor. I used to do little pranks all the time and I could convince people of stuff. With my brothers and my mom, I always pulled pranks and had them falling for them. I'd watch television all the time and think that I could do that. Eventually I gave up on that, and stuck with football.
Now that camp is over, we get to go home which is nice, but there were some advantages of the hotel. Actually the bed was comfortable to me, and it was an opportunity for me to meditate some just because it was so quiet.
I'm mostly glad just to have my nights off without meetings. I hate those meetings after practice, so now you can just go and have your own time to do what you want to do.
I would have preferred making it through camp without the injury, that was a setback, but I hope that benefits me in the long run because my legs should be fresh. It was a good training camp. I think guys improved a whole lot. We got better. I continue to emphasize the offense even though I'm on defense but it's because I'm very impressed with the way the guys are playing ball. Then when we get Frank back, that's going to be another big plus for us. Overall, we really got better.
I'm looking forward to playing this Saturday against my old team, although it's not as exciting as it used to be since I've been with a few other teams since and most of the guys I played with are gone. It's not even the same Soldier Field, but it is nice to see some of the staff who are still there and that always gives you a warm feeling.
This is the touch-up for us going into the season opener because the starters will definitely play the first half and some into the third quarter. How much I'll play, I don't know, but hopefully they'll let me go the whole first half. That would be a very big plus for me coming off this injury.
We want to do better on third down. I think just being able to play longer, there will be a lot of opportunities where we'll have adverse situations – whether it's a turnover on offense or they are driving the ball on us and we have to make a stop. There will be a lot more opportunities for us to gel as a defense which we need because this is really our last big maintenance game before the opener. Usually in the final game, they don't play the starters very much.
I actually enjoy traveling. I love it because I'm able to get on the plane, relax, listen to my i-Pod, watch a movie, and just be laid back. Once we land, we get to the hotel and have a little break to see the city if you want. I usually hang out in the room and relax or maybe get a massage. The plan for this weekend was to have our group dinner but I think we get in too late, but there is a restaurant I really want to go that I went to last year, The Luxor. It had some good food so I'm looking forward to going back there.
Thanks for reading my Training Camp Diaries, and I'll do one more next week to wrap up how this game went!
