There were individual drills and full team drills when the New Orleans Saints and New England Patriots gathered Wednesday at the Saints’ training camp in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, to begin a set of joint practices. There were passing drills and special teams drills. There was music during part of the practice. There was just about everything typical to NFL training camps nowadays with one notable exception: There were no fisticuffs.

Rage has become all the rage at training camps. Players from Houston and Washington brawled during a joint practice. So, too, did St. Louis Rams and Dallas Cowboys players.

Linebacker IK Enemkpali now plays for the Buffalo Bills. He started training camp with the New York Jets, then was released after breaking quarterback Geno Smith’s jaw with a punch. Photos by The Associated Press

Outside linebacker Jo-Lonn Dunbar of the St. Louis Rams, right, yells at Dallas Cowboys fullback Tyler Clutts after they had a skirmish during a joint workout this week in California. Training-camp fights have become prevalent this season.

Quarterback Cam Newton got into a scuffle with a teammate during a Carolina Panthers’ practice. New York Jets quarterback Geno Smith had his jaw broken by a punch thrown by then-teammate IK Enemkpali. The fights have become so prevalent and have generated so much attention in recent weeks that Saints and Patriots players were asked after Wednesday’s practice why calmer heads had prevailed in their case.

“I get it,” Saints veteran offensive tackle Zach Strief said. “You’re in camp. You’re hot. You’re frustrated and especially these late, dual practices where you’re kind of getting to the end of it. But look, if you’ve got two sides that understand what they’re doing and understand that being professional means you’re not out there to hurt guys – you’re there to get better – then you can have a practice like that.”

Said Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski: “We just want to come out as a team and get the most that we can out of this, and get the most football knowledge we can get and the most football competition we can get. That’s all we’re looking for, nothing more, friendly competition and play to the whistle.”

That clearly hasn’t been the approach for all teams. The melee between the Texans and Washington was broadcast on live television by ESPN, which happened to be on the air at the time from Washington’s camp and made for must-see TV on the HBO series “Hard Knocks,” which is following the Texans.

“We’re all competitors,” Texans cornerback Kareem Jackson said. “Sometimes that comes out and it shows out on the field.”

Why so many fights? Part of it is the nature of a violent sport played by tough, don’t-back-down guys. For as long as there have been training camps, there have been training camp fights.

“You definitely don’t want to have a soft football team,” Texans linebacker Brian Cushing said. “I definitely don’t think we have that. It’s a very competitive sport. You’ve got to come out every day and prove yourself.”

Coaches also have become increasingly enamored, it seems, with joint practices as a tool to evaluate players and ready for the season. But that seems to increase the likelihood of fights escalating when teammates join in against players from a different team.

“After two days, you kind of get sick of each other. … It happens a lot around the league,” Cushing said.

Texans wide receiver Cecil Shorts said of the fight with Washington: “It just happened. When two teams have been practicing for a while against each other, tempers (flare) the last day. You want to end on a good note. We kind of figured something was gonna happen. We were prepared for it. We did a good job staying together. Nobody got hurt. It’s over with. Let’s move on.”

Saints Coach Sean Payton this week cited the fights being shown over and over on TV. Washington cornerback DeAngelo Hall pointed to another reason. It’s an era in which players have become accustomed to being fined by the league for everything from illegal hits during games to uniform violations. Many have adjusted their behavior. But as Hall said, there are no fines from the NFL for practice-field scuffles.

“It’s training camp,” Hall said. “Everybody knows it’s training camp. It’s not game situations. So it’s kind of like you know you can get away with a little more. There’s not gonna be fines issued and suspensions through the NFL. This is practice. I think a lot of guys are smart enough to understand that.”

Practice-field fights are quickly forgotten by players, according to Hall.

“There’s no hard feelings,” he said. “We walked off the field shoulder to shoulder with them guys. But in between the lines, man, it’s a battle and may the best man win. That’s kind of how I look at it. I don’t hold grudges. …It happens. They’ve got their guy’s back. We’ve got our guy’s back.”

In the case of the Saints and Patriots, players knew that practice-field fights wouldn’t be tolerated by Payton and Patriots Coach Bill Belichick, fellow members of the Bill Parcells coaching tree.

“I think there’s a level of professionalism in the relationship between Sean and Bill Belichick,” Saints quarterback Drew Brees said. “Just the idea that both of us come out here with the same purpose, and that is to get our teams better.

“So there’s an understanding that while maybe while there’s a lot of jawing and other stuff going on when other teams tend to do this – and we’ve been involved in those, too, when we’ve practiced with other teams – I think there’s an understanding with these guys that we know the objective. It’s gonna be competitive. It’s gonna be fast. But at the end of the day we’re here to get better, to take care of one another to a certain point and make sure that we walk away healthy.”

The joint practices aren’t going away. If anything, they could become more commonplace, particularly if the NFL eventually shortens the preseason, perhaps in conjunction with expanding the playoff field.

Those joint practices, Brees said, should be about football.

“We had a chance to practice today with the defending world champions,” he said Wednesday. “I know that that’s gonna get us better. And I think that they had the same mentality going against us.”

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