Last year, the Cowboys helped reintroduce the Rams to California by inviting them to Oxnard for training camp practices. This year, with the Rams officially back in California (making the travel costs for joint practices a lot cheaper), the two teams won’t be getting together.
Apparently because last year’s get-together got altogether out of hand.
“We have done those practices for a long time and we have had a lot of success with them where things haven’t escalated into fights,” Cowboys coach Jason Garrett recently said, via Clarence E. Hill Jr. of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “It’s just been a really good competitive environment that has been beneficial for both teams,” Garrett said of joint practices. “We haven’t made any commitments with them. We will look at the training camp schedule and see if that works for them or another team.”
The last part may seem like Garrett leaving the door open to practice with the Rams. But Garrett apparently isn’t interested in doing so until the Rams adopt a different attitude toward practicing with another team.
“[Y]ou have to have a similar approach as an organization,” Garrett said. “We want to get the same thing out of this. We are not interested in fighting. We are interested in making these couple of days we are together productive. If we can find a team that we have shared valued with, it can be a productive time for your team.”
That appears to be a delicate way of Garrett saying he has a problem with the way Jeff Fisher runs his team.
Meanwhile, the return of the Rams to L.A. makes the ongoing presence of the Cowboys in Southern California during training camp more than a little delicate. As the Rams try to retake L.A., they surely don’t want any other teams hanging around the region — even if that team is owned by a guy who was instrumental in helping Stan Kroenke grease the skids back in the direction of Skid Row.