Cal Football Fall Camp 2026: Day 3
Ramping up beyond shells
Day three of fall camp marked the first glimpse of pads and contact. The fog burnt off early this morning and CMS was flooded with light at 9:40, entering from the North Gate after the now-customary repeat of period 0. Position coaches stalk the aisles in between rows of stretching players, each cutting an excited video, presumably for prospects. NBA Youngboy serves as their auditory backdrop. Special teams drills followed the stretching once again, patterns are more clear now, the feeling of clicking into a routine.
Return drills are broken down to a molecular level. Action is paused at the catch point to check if everyone’s in their spot, and if their body positioning is correct before swarming the ball. Not entirely unrelatedly, the competition at safety is looking as tight as the competition at tight end. It will be a dog fight.
A Chargers scout pow wows with a Cal staffer as offensive and defensive lines break into pods and a group settles into a screen drill. Later, a scout from the Texans and Giants respectively heads out to their next destination going over their findings.
RB room breaks out after this to drill down on pass pro. Running Backs Coach Keith Bhonopha assumes a professorial tone quizzing the guys. “So if it’s a jet sweep, we fan where?” and so on. If the devil is in the details, the truth is in the building blocks. This is the most granular football one might glean from practice but two on twos are right behind you if you’re on the sideline learning the particulars of pass pro, and hard fought reps earn both hoots and hollers.
The atmosphere is only a little chippy, nothing like the tension in last year’s camp, but the competition level is high. Refs look on, commenting on what each player would and wouldn’t have gotten away with, praising a corner who got right up to the edge of a flag without committing a penalty. Trevor Rogers makes a nice one handed catch. Mark Hamper also showed strong hands in some contested scenarios.
A horn sounds, a detached voice yells “PBR block circuits” a few times, and open periods are over. The work continues unabated.