The triple threat football ‘weapon’

Most of the extraordinary interest in this training camp has been about arms.

But it’s a pair of legs — the left providing the technical support, the right conducting the big business — which could most affect the ultimate fate of the 2018 Hamilton TigerCats.

Lirim Hajrullahu, the former kicker for the Western Mustangs, Winnipeg Blue Bombers and, of late, the historically reviled Toronto Argonauts, was the Ticats’ only free agent signee who did not play for them last season.

The Ticats made sure they re-landed 10 of their own looming free agents and they also made $145,000 worth of sure that they secured the only Canadian who currently handles all three phases of the kicking game.

All four eastern teams were after him but, oddly, the least aggressive was Toronto. Hamilton, obviously, was at the other end of that pursuit spectrum.

“I felt like I was wanted here,” says Hajrullahu, who grew up just around the corner, in St. Catharines. “Everyone involved in the process wanted me to be a big part of what they were doing. The way they ended the season last year, I’m pretty positive it’s going to trickle over to this season and we’re going to have a good head start.”

The Tiger-Cats haven’t had full ‘National’ content handling punting, place-kicking and kick-

offs since 2012 and 2013, and even that ate up two roster spots: Luca Congi and Australian punter Josh Bartel. In recent years they’ve settled on Internationals, most successfully with a second Justin Medlock term in 2015-16, plus the likes of Brett Maher, Sergio Castillo and Kenny Allen.

Hajrullahu’s presence frees the Ticats to profitably use a Designated Import elsewhere.

“He’s the difference,” June Jones says. “I knew he was good when he was at Toronto but right now he might be kicking better than he did when he was there. He’s the right ratio, which helps us on both on offence and defence. He’s just a weapon.”

His 82.02 career success rate is the fourth-best field goal percentage in CFL history, behind leader Rene Paredes (86.91), Medlock and Sean Whyte.

While his field goal kicking has been his calling card, Hajrullahu — pronounced, he explains, “High-rool-la-who” — says he regards all three phases of the job equally. He’s a consistent punter, and directional kicks well off the punt and from the kickoff tee.

The Ticats absolutely must return to the dominant homefield advantage they once hurled at visitors like a Monty Python insult, and the strong-legged Hajrullahu should be able to help. He went 2-for-4 on Labour Day last year but prior to that had made all seven of his field goals attempts visiting the deceitful drafts of Tim Hortons Field.

He’s put in a lot of time among the changing air currents of the east end, spending 10 years training in Hamilton with legendary kicking guru Ken “Kick Coach” Urquhart. He’s now lending his time back to Urquhart’s programs, teaching at kicking camps in the city and around the region.

And, he began practising outside at Tim Hortons Field in late March. He was even out there one day as snow was being cleared.

He’s spoken to Medlock and other CFLers about working the local gusts, but since signing with the Cats he hasn’t seen too many days of “screaming, screaming wind.” That will likely come later in the year.

Hajrullahu built his strong leg partly on genetics but largely on an enormous work ethic, both of which he inherited from his family. In 1999, when Hajrullahu was eight, his parents fled war-ravaged Kosovo with their son and two daughters to resettle and rebuild in a brand new country.

He played soccer but his leg strength derives mostly from persistently hammering the ball far more often than most of his peers when he was young.

“In university, I’d kick from after school until after you couldn’t see the light anymore, three or four hours,” says Hajrullahu, who, as a rookie, was the Western nominee for the 2014 CFL Special Teams Player of the Year award. “As a young punter and kicker, you have to develop power and muscle memory.”

He’s Exhibit A of that argument: in four years he’s risen from being undrafted to one of the most indispensable parts of the Tiger-Cats roster.