August 3rd-- Rules changes and Lightning strikes

WR David Patten was released from the hospital.. he is back home with his family and is expected to rejoin the team tomorrow.. He will not practice however and will not participate in the scrimmage with Baltimore..

CB Carlos Rogers had back spasms this morning and was held out of both practices, he is expected to be fine..

TE Christian Fauria was held out of the morning practice, he did participate in the shortened evening practice.. This was a veterans day off..

Rookie DL Manaia Brown strained his groin, did not practice and won’t play this weekend.. TE Calen Powell did not practice again thanks to a quad injury..

DT Chris Pino has a stomach virus and was held out of both practices, he has a virus, but the team says it is not at all correlated to the Patten virus..

The night practice was cut short after one hour due to lightning in the area.. The team may add some extra work tomorrow but have no plans to add an extra practice to make up for the time.. They have one practice tomorrow and then it’s off to the scrimmage Saturday..

Rookie TE Buck Ortega was the subject of some hazing after the night practice was cut off.. he was tied to a tree with tape and had what appeared to be shaving cream all over him..

An NFL ref crew was at the Park today to give the team and media and update on the major rules changes heading into the season.. The down by contact rule has been altered.. You can now replay a call of down by contact if a fumble occurred.. If it is obvious on replay that the player lost the ball before he was down and it was obvious that the defending team recovered, a turnover will be given to them and the ball will be placed at the spot of recovery.. If a scrum ensues and it is not obvious he got the ball after the play was whistled dead, then the offense will retain possession and you will lose a challenge..

Safety is a big issue again this year.. You cannot hit a QB below the knees, if you do so, you will be penalized 15 yards for roughing the passer.. If you are blocked to the ground or blocked into the QB and just grab the QB’s legs and he goes down, this is not a penalty.. If the QB is running or out of the pocket, this rule does not apply…
Horse collar tackles have been clarified to include pulling down a runner or receiver using the back of his jersey, last year you had to grab the back of the shoulder pads to be penalized for this..
You can not overload one side of the field on onside kicks anymore.. You must have at least 4 players on each side of the kicker now..
You cannot line up directly over a snapper on field goal attempts, you have to line up on the opposite side of the snapper’s shoulder pads now..

Instant replay has been trimmed to 60 seconds from 90 for review once the ref reaches the viewing station..

Taunting is a foul now, if you get up in someone’s face and start barking at them you will be penalized.. They are trying to stop players from getting to the point where one guy reacts and then gets penalized for pushing an opponent.. Any altercation of this sort in pregame can be penalized and be subject to ejection..
End zone celebrations are also going to be curtailed again.. You cannot do anything choreographed with teammates, you can do a solo celebration if you stay on your feet.. Thus Chad Johnson’s river dance is OK, by Steve Smith’s snow angels are no longer.. You cannot use the football or anything as a prop to celebrate and if any solo celebration does not end quickly, you will be penalized..

Points of emphasis are holding.. Grabbing and restricting a defender, hooking and altering a defender’s angle is now holding.. If you tackle a defender or pull him to the ground, that is holding..

Center false starts will be watched closely, no more of the center’s pointing out defenders or wagging their fingers.. rocking movement of the center, moving the ball forward before the snap, abrupt movement of the center’s head will also be considered a false start..

We had a very minor scuffle at practice between draft pick Kedric Golston and OL Tyson Walter and DE Joe Sykes.. No punches, just a little pushing..

LB Marcus Washington is excited about an offseason where he did not have to undergo any kind of surgery, he had a cyst removed from his tailbone each of the previous two offseasons.. He says he likes what he sees from this defense but is not doing any kind of bravado in terms of expectations this year..

Mark Brunnell addressed the durability question saying he feels greatand it bothers him that a number of people (including me) are questioning if he can hold up.. He says if something happens and he gets injured, it won’t have anything to do with his history.. He understands the necessity to have a valuable back-up, but for any starting quarterback..
On the stealing of plays that led to some big moments particularly with Santana Moss, he said “there is no plagiarism in this league.” Everyone does it, but he admitted they did steal some thoughts from others that worked out for them..
As it turns out, bragadocious is actually a word in the Englsih language.. I apologize for having a crappy vocabulary..

One practice highlight, Brunnell hits Antawn Randle-El who makes a great leaping catch during 11-11 drills in the morning session..

OK men..