Jackson: “Oh my god. You’re driving your girlfriend’s mom’s car.”
Bernard: “It’s like a van. Automatic doors. Fully loaded. AC. It’s got the little, you know, gear shifter.”
An incredulous Jackson: “You’re the first running back drafted.”
Bernard: “So I can’t drive that?”
The scene takes place at an area restaurant the night before training camp, and the jovial nature quickly turns serious as Jackson addresses Bernard and fellow rookie Rex Burkhead.
“You got drafted where you got drafted, and all of us know the draft don’t mean nothing now,” he says. “This is a competition. The best men are going to be the guys this organization keeps. What you guys are about to embark on, is different than anything than you’ve ever dealt with. You’ve got to bring your ‘A’ game. These are a bunch of grown men who are going to fight to keep their jobs, and your job is to take their job.”
Jackson then turns to whole table and says “I told the young guys, people think training camp is a feel-good session. It’s not. It’s a grind. It’s a grind to make the football team, it’s a grind to be one guy on a team, to have an opportunity to wear them stripes for the Bengals. At the end of the day, we all know everybody won’t be sitting at this table.”
It’s some ominous foreshadowing for the final act, where Cincinnati native Larry Black breaks his leg and his dislocates his ankle on the practice field. The rest of the team immediately moves 20 yards over to continue with practice while the medical personnel work on Black. And as they do, the gravity of the situation crushes him.
A few minutes later he is in the training room balling his eyes out as he calls his dad to tell him what’s happened.
Head athletic trainer Paul Sparling offers words that are more matter-of-fact than comforting, telling Black, “You’re going to be fine, eventually. Just not for awhile. One step at a time.”
It’s the kind of scene that illustrates why Hard Knocks is such compelling television and why it has won multiple Emmys.
Jackson received the most air time among the coaches, as later in the show he was featured for his endless energy and knack for chatting up and messing with the defensive players during practice.
Among the players, Bernard was featured prominently. There is another scene that shows him driving his girlfriend’s mom’s Honda Odyssey, and one where he checks out his new apartment at the Banks.
He also has some funny exchanges with offensive coordinator Jay Gruden.
Andy Dalton, James Harrison and Tyler Eifert also were featured.
Ah-Ha Moment
Unlike injuries that happen during games and get shown over and over again from all angles, training camp injuries usually are seen only by team personnel. But Hard Knocks viewers got a glimpse of exactly what happened when Andrew Hawkins went down with an ankle injury Aug. 1. The slow-motion video shows cornerback Brandon Ghee, who was trailing the play, leaping and landing on Hawkins’ left ankle.
F-Bomb Counter
The show captures the uncensored, unfiltered nature of life in the NFL, so there is going to be profanity. Defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer drops the first F-bomb four minutes into the show.
I counted 13 versions of the F word in all, and Zimmer led the way with four of them. Hue Jackson had three, one of which came in footage from the mid-2000s when he was the wide receivers coach and was taking the late Chris Henry to task for something he did wrong in a game.
Funniest Exchange
The one between offensive coordinator Jay Gruden and James Harrison, where Gruden is warning Harrison to keep his hands off wide receiver A.J. Green.
Gruden, pointing to A.J. Green: “We don’t touch the merchandise ever.”
Harrison: “The merchandise is going to going to get touched. If the merchandise comes this way, he’s going to get touched. I like touching merchandise.”
Motivating Messages
We see head coach Marvin Lewis, offensive coordinator Jay Gruden and defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer talking to the team at the start of camp.
Zimmer: “Good isn’t good enough. This season for us is about the pursuit of excellence.”
Gruden: “First year here, we whispered about going to the Super Bowl. Yeah, right. Second year it was on a T-shirt. This year it’s expected. We’ve got all the talent we need in this room. We’ve got a great staff. No reason why we can’t make it happen.”
Lewis: “I can’t tell you who’s going to be a part of the 53 because unfortunately injuries happen and we’re going to have to overcome them. And guys who don’t think they have a real clear chance are going to. You’re going to. You’re going to make this football team, and you’re going to make this football team better. It doesn’t matter how you got here, it’s what you do once you’re here.
Rare Air
Even Mike Brown, who only talks on camera once a year at the pre-camp luncheon, had a good line when talking about Pro Bowl defensive tackle Geno Atkins.
“He’s not tall. He walks like a duck. You wouldn’t pick him out of a line up to be an NFL defensive tackle, and yet we think he’s the best one.”
Interesting Insight
In an exchange between head trainer Paul Sparling and Marvin Jones after the wide receiver took a blow to the head while diving for a ball, it was interesting to see how a player has to be repeatedly convinced his day is over in the best interest of his health and well being.
And this was just a training camp practice Jones was arguing to return to. Imagine the scenarios across the league on game days.
What We Learned
* Marvin Lewis is a Duck Dynasty fan
* Adam Jones apparently thinks magic fairies fill his car’s gas tank over night.
* Players with four years of experience or more get rooms to themselves at training camp.
* Camp curfew is 11 p.m.
* Mike Zimmer watches Pro Football Talk during down time.
* Andre Smith loves drag racing.
* Andy Dalton wears a rubber wedding wing on the field, and gets chided for it repeatedly.
* Vontaze Burfict is in serious need of a golf coach.
* Taylor Mays has put way too much thought into which super powers would best suit him.
* And while we already knew this one, it was further driven home just how much James Harrison hates Hard Knocks. During a short sequence of less than two minutes, Harrison is seen flipping off the cameras, running away from them, shutting doors in their face as they tail him, and turning his back while being interviewed. In one instance he even climbs in a stranger’s car to get away from the cameras as they follow him crossing the street after practice.
Sneek Peek
Based on the previews of next week’s show, we can expect Orson Charles, who is being converted from tight end to fullback, cornerback Terence Newman and rookie undrafted free agent Jayson DiManche to be featured, along with plenty of footage from the joint practices and preseason opener in Atlanta.
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