The Pittsburgh Steelers three-day mandatory minicamp gets underway on Tuesday and after the Thursday practice concludes, the team will be off and until the start of training camp.
Unlike the three weeks worth of OTA practices that the team finished last week, these forthcoming practices are not voluntary in nature and thus players can be fined if they do not attend. After having excellent attendance for their OTA practices, no Steelers player is expected to miss any of the practices this week outside of the few that are suffering from injuries.
The CBA states that the practices this week can’t include live contact, but 7-on-7, 9-on-7, and 11-on-11 drills are allowed. As we saw about a week ago in a video released by linebacker Vince Williams, these practices are pretty spirited nonetheless and probably more physical than you would think that they would be.
According to the NFLPA, the Steelers can now have players for a total of 10 hours a day as opposed to the six that they had them during the OTA practices. Additionally, the team can now hold two daily practices as opposed to one with each of those sessions being limited to three-and-a-half hours. The second of those two practices can also only be a walk-through.
It appears as though the Steelers are in fine shape from an injury standpoint as they enter their mandatory minicamp and we can only hope things remain that way throughout the week. As it stands right now, it doesn’t seems as though any player will need to start training camp on the PUP list.
The Steelers will officially kick off their 2015 training camp on Saturday, July 25, at Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, Pa.
