With mini-camp less than a week away, teammates and coaches are preparing for the arrival of Albert Haynesworth. Quotes were plentiful at mini-camp today. We'll start with coach Shanahan, via CSN Washington:
“He’ll definitely have a lot of catching up to do,” Shanahan said. “There will be a lot of work for him to come in and learn the system. We have three days to try and catch him up. Hopefully he’ll be in shape.”
And how will Shanahan make an evaluation of Haynesworth’s physical condition without a full-contact practice?
“You get a good feel if he’s in shape or not,” Shanahan said. “We’ll see to that.”
So if you feel the ground in the greater Washington D.C. metro area shaking some time next week, that's just Shanahan working Albert back into shape.
Phillip Daniels, your thoughts?
“We’ll move forward,” defensive end Phillip Daniels said. “If he’s here and he’s working, he’s helping us. Until they tell us different, he’s one of us and it’ll be good to have him back.
“He needs to be here because that playbook is a lot to learn and I’ve told him that. It isn’t hard, but it’s a lot of stuff.”
It seems like his teammates would prefer that he is there this week, but that they will be ready to bring him into the field when he does show up.
Finally, what do you think, Deangelo Hall?
“He’ll be completely bought in,” Hall said. “It won’t be any half [trying] on the football field. You may not like some things going on in the front office but at the end of the day, it has nothing to do with football. It’s 11 on 11, my 53 against yours and we’re going to war. … Anybody who’s been on this field knows we’re building something special. You’re either going to get on the bandwagon or you won’t be here.”
The message here is that the Redskins seem like they won't be putting up with any of the problems that marred Albert's first year in Washington. They are no longer in awe of the $100 million man; they now expect him to just be one of the guys. We'll see if that's the case when he shows up at camp next week.