The Saints March In … to Hamilton
Delvin Breaux is coming back to town, but it won’t be to help the Hamilton Tiger-Cats’ secondary.
Breaux, who made the CFL allstar team at cornerback playing for the Ticats in 2014, is part of a group of visiting New Orleans Saints players and off-field personnel who will be at St. Thomas More Catholic Secondary School on Saturday.
They’ll be in Hamilton as a combined initiative of the Saints, NFL Canada, NFL Play 60 and the Hamilton Mighty Football Factory, which is a grassroots NFL flag league, one of the largest in Ontario.
The HMFF, a coed league for players 4 to 17 years of age, was started by Gianfranco Mele and Jaime Mota in 2010 — the year the Saints won the Super Bowl — and has grown from 120 players in its first year to nearly 1,000 players this season.
From 10 a.m. until noon Saturday, Saints players will lead Grade 7 and 8 HMFF players through a draft combine and skills drill session. From noon until 2 p.m., other HMFF players and their families will have a chance to meet the entire entourage.
Breaux, who broke his neck while playing high school football in New Orleans and was forced to miss his entire college playing career (he went to LSU), played for the Tiger-Cats in 2013 and 2014 and became one of the league’s top cornerbacks, attracting NFL attention.
He made the Saints in 2015 and had an impressive debut NFL season — Saints fans voted him team MVP — but in the first game of 2016 he broke his fibula. He missed six games with that injury, then suffered a shoulder injury in the 14th week of the season that put him out for the rest of the year. He has played in organized team activities this spring and should be ready for the 2017 NFL season.
Joining Breaux in Hamilton will be running back Mark Ingram, a Pro Bowler who won the Heisman Trophy while at Alabama, defensive end Cameron Jordan who’s been named to the Pro Bowl twice, and former receiver/returner Michael Lewis who is now a team ambassador for the Saints.
The Saintsation Cheerleaders and Gumbo the Mascot will also be part of the Saints’ delegation.
The group will also bring the Vince Lombardi Trophy which the Saints won in 2010.