A postcard home from training camp

Jason Beauchamp

Sunday, Aug. 16, 2009 | 8:38 p.m.

Just being here creates some team comradery, guys getting close and just creating an atmosphere where we can focus on what's important and not to have the distractions of Las Vegas and being at home.

We've got to eventually go back with that and deal with the reality of what's in Las Vegas, but for now, we're away from it all, and this is just the team and football.

I guess the highlight of being off-campus has been, so far, the Saturday scrimmage. Everyone loves the scrimmage. I think a lot of guys proved themselves and moved themselves up the depth charts. Threes became twos, some twos became ones. It's just great tape for the coaches to watch and everyone to enjoy.

Then we had some free time that night, so everyone got close.

Last night, safety Chris Jones made a new Rebels beat that we always come out to. The last one — the 'I'm a Rebel' song — a couple of us just came up with it. Sometimes I just come up with the choruses and he'll come up with the beat. It just comes together.

I came up with a couple of words and decided that this would be the new beat that we'd come out to. Everyone wanted to hear it, so we probably had about 15 to 20 guys in a room, just crowded, listening to Chris Jones's new beat he made, just getting excited about the year and what we'll do this season.

He has just an ear for music. In his free time, he's always on his computer working on new songs. That's what he does, and I just enjoy being a part of it.

I would say the best thing about this town would be the weather and mountains and setting. It reminds me of San Diego — reminds me of home.

I've met some different people who have been really friendly. I've interacted with some locals, and that's been my highlight outside of football.

One thing I'd like to see be accomplished on defense before we leave to come home is just, I mean, we're communicating now, but it'd be great to see one or two people just become leaders. Guys who, you know, what they say goes.

There's a couple people out there who, when they say something, whether it be about the coverage or what we're doing, you're not going to argue with it. We need to develop that among the twos, because the twos haven't developed that leader yet within them to where if there's a couple of indecisions about something, he's just gonna say 'Hey, this is how we're gonna do it, and everything will work out right.'

From a team standpoint, I'm just continuing to get closer with everyone so we can bring it back to Vegas, because there's no reason that we should do these team comradery things if we go back to Las Vegas, it's just failed. We've got to continue it once we bet back to Vegas.

Speaking of which, talk to you again when we get back to town and before our Sept. 5 opener against Sacramento State.