2018 Houston Texans Rookie Minicamp Starts This Week

In a few days, the Texans’ 2018 NFL Draft class plays football for the Texans for the first time...kind of, sort of. The greenest NFL players out there will be running plays and working on technique in shorts and helmets with masking tape stuck to the front, last name stenciled in big black Sharpie. At rookie minicamp, the players will do all the things NFL coaches love to do. Practice, learn the playbook, and get indoctrinated into the Texans’ culture (and climate).

The Texans’ 2018 rookie minicamp will begin on Thursday with classroom discussions and chalk talk. On Friday, the rookies will take the field and play football (or at least drills).

This is what Bill O’Brien had to say to the Chronicle about this weekend’s event.

“It’s a great opportunity for us to get these guys on the grass for the first time. We’ve seen a lot of them on tape. We’ve interviewed them, but now we get to see them run around, which is really good.”

“A lot of it is mental. We start in the classroom. They have to have their assignments down, and then we practice.”

It was 90 degrees today. Rookies are in town. Real football is no longer an impossibility. It’s now a distant reality.