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Organized Team Activities (OTAs) begin today for the 2012 Indianapolis Colts. Established veterans, drafted rookies, veteran free agents, and free agent rookies can all meet and practice with the coaching staff at West 56th Street facilities in Indianapolis. In many years past, it was training camp where offensive and defensive coordinators would meet with players to install and drill the systems they planned to deploy in the coming season.
Today, that work gets done during OTAs.
Today's practices are closed to the media. However, if you follow Colts rookie TE Coby Fleener's Twitter account, the Colts might have started their OTA work a tad early:
Had a good day at OTA 1. Lots of learning to do still. Good thing I have @dallen83 and all these other great guys to learn it with. #grind
— Coby Fleener (@CobyFleener) May 14, 2012
The tag on that tweet was yesterday. "OTA 1" was scheduled to begin today, and last I checked the new collective bargaining agreement is pretty strict about what players and coaches can do in offseason camps and OTAs. The agreement reduced the number of OTA practices down to ten, and only ten. According to the official schedule for OTAs that I got from the NFL, the Colts have the following dates listed for OTAs:
- May 15-17
- May 22-24
- June 4-7
Count'm up, and that's ten. Add in what Fleeners calls "OTA 1" and that's eleven. Eleven is a no-no.
Now, it's possible Fleener mistweeted something, or maybe I'm reading his words wrong. However, "OTA 1" looks to me like a "the first day of OTAs." Personally, I'm happy guys like Fleener and fellow rookie Dwayne Allen are in town doing (what seems to be) extra work. I'd feel better about it though if I knew it to be completely within the rules.