No. 4 QB makes the most of his one CFL play
Quarterback hopeful takes one snap and collaborates on 90-yard touchdown
Zach Kline’s first in-game experience in the CFL was as brief as it is memorable.
The mid-camp addition, who arrived in the fourth and last spot on the Edmonton Eskimos quarterback depth chart in place of the ousted Brett Smith, only came in for one snap in Sunday’s 36-35 preseason loss to the visiting Calgary Stampeders.
But he made the most of it. The six-foot-two, 220-pound Fresno State product took advantage of busted coverage and fired a 40-yard bullet downfield to fellow rookie Duke Williams, who took it the rest of the way for a 90-yard touchdown to tie the score 29-29 with four minutes left in the fourth. Just like they planned, right? “Not exactly, we were going to leave him in for one drive and we knew it was going to come down to the wire and I wanted a more experienced guy in Danny, who’s been in our offence for longer than Kline’s few days,” Maas said of Danny O’Brien, who came back in to steer a nine-play, 69-yard drive that ended with a three-yard touchdown plunge by rookie running back Marion Grice, before gunning for victory on a failed twopoint convert. “Kline’s going to get work next week, no matter what. But I didn’t want to put him in that situation, so I wanted to get him one drive and it just turned out to be one throw and one touchdown.
“Probably a pretty neat experience for him, and obviously got us right back in the ball game.”
You might have thought it won them the game, and not just a preseason one, either, the way Kline celebrated with a full-sprint with his arm in the air, Statue of Liberty style, to hug Williams.
“Oh, yeah. I kind of blacked out there. Really, just, I couldn’t believe it,” Kline said. “First, I thought I overthrew him, and then when I saw him pop open to catch
The coaches are the ones who got me ready, and I’ve been working as hard as I could ever since I got here.
it and then run into the end zone, I was like: ‘This isn’t happening. Unbelievable.’
“I just was so excited. It was insane.”
You will have to excuse the 23-year-old native of Danville, Calif., if he feels a little more at home than someone who only signed on seven days earlier should.
“Coach Maas and coach Carson (Walch, offensive co-ordinator), they made me feel real comfortable and really confident that I can learn this in a short amount of time,” said Kline, who managed to get a sneak preview with the club while attending Eskimos mini-camp in Las Vegas in April.
“Without them, I would be totally
lost. In this short amount of time, those are the best teachers I’ve ever had.”
It’s not the first time Kline’s studied under a head coach who is a former quarterback, and that’s where some familiarity sets in.
“The coach I committed to in college, coach Jeff Tedford, he’s a mentor of mine,” Kline said of the former CFL quarterback, who played for the same Fresno State Bulldogs program he now head coaches. “I personally gravitate towards those types of coaches because they know what they’re doing, they’ve been behind the centre and they’ve seen the live bullets. There’s definitely a trust in there, it’s pretty easy to learn when you have coaches like that.”
So chalk up his initial success to the ones currently holding the chalk.
“The coaches are the ones who got me ready, and I’ve been working as hard as I could ever since I got here, staying up late and trusting the guys around me and trusting the coaches,” Kline said. “That’s the first thing I learned when I got here: The playbook is going to be hard and it’s up to you to see how hard you want to work.
“That’s one thing I know I can control, is how hard I work. Everything after that is out of my control. I’m going to keep listening to the coaches and hopefully keep throwing 90-yard touchdowns. It was a fun way to start a CFL career, that’s for sure.”