The countdown is over. NFL training camp has arrived.
Every team is 0-0 so there's hope in each city that this season ends with a championship parade.
Bryce Young and the defending NFC South champion Carolina Panthers report Wednesday. So do the Arizona Cardinals, led by rookie head coach Mike LaFleur.
The teams will meet in the Hall of Fame Game that kicks off the preseason on Aug. 6.
The reigning Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots open camp on Friday. They’ll face off in a Super Bowl rematch that opens the regular season on Sept. 9.
Many teams have plenty of questions to answer before Week 1. It’s a long road to Los Angeles, which hosts Super Bowl 61 on Feb. 14. Valentine’s Day will be the latest date the game will have been played.
That just means more football.
Ten teams have new coaches. Some have new quarterbacks. A few superstars have changed teams.
The Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers report to camp on Saturday, making it six teams in before the end of this week. The NFC West rivals will play the first regular-season game in Australia on Sept. 10. The remaining 26 teams are due in next Tuesday.
John Harbaugh joined the New York Giants after he was fired by Baltimore following 18 seasons. He has Jaxson Dart and some talented players to build around.
Two-time AP NFL Coach of the Year Kevin Stefanski took over in Atlanta after six seasons in Cleveland. He inherits a team that has plenty of playmakers on offense, including All-Pro running back Bijan Robinson, wide receiver Drake London and tight end Kyle Pitts. They have to figure whether Tua Tagovailoa or Michael Penix Jr. will be the quarterback.
Robert Saleh is the new man in charge in Tennessee. The Titans are coming off consecutive 3-14 seasons but Saleh already has a franchise QB in Cam Ward and he brought in Brian Daboll to develop him and run the offense.
Mike McCarthy and Aaron Rodgers are reunited in Pittsburgh. They won a Super Bowl together in Green Bay and aim to get the Steelers at least their first playoff win since January 2017.
The other six new head coaches are first-timers. LaFleur has a tough task in Arizona. Klint Kubiak helped Sam Darnold win a Super Bowl in Seattle and hopes to rebuild the Las Vegas Raiders. Jeff Hafley went from running Green Bay’s defense to leading the Miami Dolphins. Joe Brady replaced Sean McDermott in Buffalo after the Bills kept falling short in the playoffs.
Todd Monken replaced Stefanski in Cleveland and Jesse Minter is Baltimore’s new coach.
Tagovailoa has a chance to revive his career with Stefanski in Atlanta after a disappointing end in Miami. Kyler Murray left Arizona for Minnesota, where the Vikings hope he can stay healthy and regain his Pro Bowl form.
Kirk Cousins is the stopgap for the Raiders, who drafted Fernando Mendoza with the No. 1 overall pick. Malik Willis parlayed three solid starts in two seasons with the Packers into a $67.5 million contract with the Dolphins that includes $45 million fully guaranteed.
Geno Smith returned to the Jets. Justin Fields is the new backup for Patrick Mahomes in Kansas City. Kenny Pickett is Carolina’s new No. 2, veteran Andy Dalton joined Philadelphia to play behind Jalen Hurts and Gardner Minshew went to the Cardinals.
Tagovailoa and Penix will compete in Atlanta. Cousins is expected to start in Las Vegas but Mendoza could end up starting sooner than later. Murray has to beat out J.J. McCarthy, who was the Vikings’ first-round pick in 2024.
The most interesting battle will be for the Browns’ starting job. Deshaun Watson is back after missing 2025 to compete with Shedeur Sanders.
Will Baker Mayfield get a contract extension from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers? Mayfield is in the final season of a three-year, $100 million deal. He's expected to get around $55 million per season and another three-year deal makes sense.
Will Aaron Donald come out of retirement to join two-time AP NFL Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett in Los Angeles? The Rams acquired the five-time All-Pro from the Browns and bolstered their secondary by adding cornerbacks Trent McDuffie and Jaylen Watson. Donald, a three-time Defensive Player of the Year, is 35 and hasn't played since retiring after the 2023 season.
More teams choose to use practices against other opponents to prepare their quarterbacks and key starters for the regular season instead of preseason games.
Only the Lions, Chiefs, Broncos and Steelers are not participating in any joint sessions.
Teams can carry a maximum of 90 players throughout training camp and for all of their preseason games. Rosters must be trimmed to 53 by 6 p.m. EDT on Aug. 30.
AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
FILE - Arizona Cardinals head coach Mike LaFleur speaks during a press conference at the NFL football scouting combine in Indianapolis, Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2026. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File)
FILE - Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young passes during the team's NFL football practice in Charlotte, N.C., Tuesday, June 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Nell Redmond, File)
CAIRO (AP) — A declared blockade of Saudi Arabia by Yemen's Houthi rebels has the potential to widen the Iran war and further disrupt global oil supplies and international trade.
The rebels say they have closed the Bab el-Mandeb Strait to Saudi-linked shipping in retaliation for the kingdom’s blockade on Yemen and a recent attack on the international airport in Yemen's rebel-held capital, Sanaa. The Houthis claim to have forced six ships to reroute on Tuesday, but there was no independent confirmation.
Bab el-Mandeb, at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, is a vital shipping chokepoint, connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Arabia. Around 12% of the world’s trade, including a fourth of global container traffic, passes through the narrows, moving between Europe and Asia via Egypt’s Suez Canal.
The strait has become even more vital for Saudi oil exports since the disruption of the Strait of Hormuz during the Iran war has severely limited shipping out of the Persian Gulf.
The Houthis say they will only stop vessels connected to Saudi Arabia or going in and out of its Red Sea ports. But during a similar blockade announced against Israel over the war in Gaza, the rebels attacked many vessels with little or no connection to that conflict.
The threat alone could keep international shippers from using the route.
The Houthis don’t control the part of Yemen’s coastline along Bab el-Mandeb — that’s in the hands of its opponents in the country’s civil war. But they hold territory less than 100 kilometers (60 miles) away.
Three Houthi officials told the AP on Tuesday that the group has planned for months how to disrupt shipping in the strait. Those plans include the use of naval mines, explosive-laden boats, drones and helicopters to allow fighters to board ships, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to media.
They said vessels would first be warned not to cross designated boundaries in the strait. If ships ignore the warnings, the Houthis would resort to military action.
In the Strait of Hormuz, Iran has shown that even sporadic attacks on ships can be enough to effectively close a critical waterway, by driving up risks and insurance premiums.
“If Bab el-Mandeb comes under pressure at the same time as shipping in the Gulf, you have disruption around two of the world’s most important maritime routes at once,” Clionadh Raleigh, the founder of ACLED, a conflict monitoring service, said Tuesday.
More than 7 million barrels of petroleum a day transited Bab el-Mandeb in June, compared to around 4 million before the Iran war, Allison Minor, the director of the Atlantic Council’s Project for Middle East Integration, wrote in an analysis published Monday.
Saudi Arabia has been recently exporting some 4 million barrels of oil a day through its Red Sea port of Yanbu, blunting the impact of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which has still rattled economies around the world.
Saudi Arabia could still get crude to market without using Bab el-Mandeb, by shipping up to 2.5 million barrels a day across the Red Sea to Egypt, whose SUMED pipeline can carry it to the Mediterranean. It could also ship 1 million barrels a day through the Suez Canal.
International shippers could also reroute, as they did at the height of the war in Gaza. But that means going the long way around the Cape of Good Hope off South Africa, adding one or two weeks to voyages — and raising costs.
The Houthis attacked over 100 vessels at the height of the war in Gaza, before a punishing U.S. and Israeli air campaign put an end to the attacks in early 2025.
U.S. President Donald Trump brushed off the latest threat.
“So far, it hasn’t happened,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. “I think that if there is something like that, we’ll just have to take care of business.”
The Houthis also run the risk of reigniting the war with Saudi Arabia and its allies in Yemen, where major fighting ended with a truce in 2022. Saudi Arabia’s military says it will keep Bab el-Mandeb open.
“All Houthi threats against transiting vessels will be dealt with swiftly and firmly, as such threats are a blatant violation of international law and fall under acts of maritime piracy,” said Maj. Gen. Turki al-Malki, a Saudi military spokesperson.
Yemen’s civil war began in 2014 when the rebels seized the capital, Sanaa, and much of northern Yemen, forcing the government into exile. Saudi Arabia has led an international coalition fighting the rebels and also imposed an air and sea blockade on Houthi-held parts of Yemen, which had eased in recent years.
The Houthis say Saudi Arabia struck the airport in Sanaa earlier this month in an attempt to stop a flight carrying Houthi leaders back from Iran, where they had attended the funeral of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The plane landed safely at another airport.
The Houthis then launched missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia’s Abha International Airport in the most significant confrontation in years.
The Houthis say closing Bab el-Mandeb to Saudi traffic aims to break the coalition’s blockade.
Ahmed Nagi, a senior Yemen analyst at the International Crisis Group, said the blockade also benefits the Houthis' ally, Iran, at a time when the U.S. has resumed daily airstrikes.
″From Iran’s perspective, opening additional pressure points across the region gives it more leverage,” Nagi said. “The Houthis provide Tehran with influence over one of the world’s most important maritime chokepoints.”
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Al-Haj reported from Aden, Yemen. Associated Press writer Collin Binkley in Washington contributed.
Fireworks burst as Houthi supporters rally against the Saudi-led coalition in Sanaa, Yemen, Monday, July 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)
Fireworks burst as Houthi supporters rally against the Saudi-led coalition in Sanaa, Yemen, Monday, July 20, 2026. Placards in Arabic read: "God is great, Death to America, Death to Israel, A curse on the Jews and Victory to Islam" and "boycott American and Israeli goods". (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)
