LAST, NOT LEAST
Longest draft day not always a path to shortest career for Mr. Irrelevants
If D.J. Lalama and Colton Hunchak were strapping it up last Friday night in Calgary as scheduled, not many Canadian Football League fans would see it as a clash of Misters Irrelevant.
Montreal quarterback Vernon Adams Jr. and his Calgary counterpart Bo Levi Mitchell would have been the drawing card.
But Lalama and Hunchak do stand out, as living proof that you can outrun your draft number, even if it’s the last one called. Lalama, a Montreal linebacker, was the 70th and final pick in 2016, taken by Edmonton. Hunchak, a wide receiver, went to the Stampeders in 2019 with the 73rd and final selection.
“If anything it kind of proved that I hadn’t done enough or shown enough,” said Lalama, who figured he’d be gone in the third or fourth round. “So I have to continue to prove myself. Five years later, I don’t want to say I’ve had the last laugh, but I have been fortunate to be put in good positions. Obviously, a five-year career for a guy drafted with the last pick, not a lot of people would have bet on that.”
Predicting longevity based on draft position is something of a mug’s game given the vagaries of a contact sport with roster quotas for Canadians and Americans. Information provided by the CFL’s head statistician Steve Daniel offer a telling snapshot from the 2008 draft. No. 1 pick Dylan Barker played just 35 games, second pick Dmitri Tsoumpas played 88; both careers cut short by injury.
The final two selections that year, Pierre-Luc Labbe and Luc Brodeur-Jourdain, combined for 272 games played. Not so irrelevant after all. The label of Mr. Irrelevant originated in the National Football League in 1976, and Kelvin Kirk became the first athlete to wear it. He was drafted 487th overall by Pittsburgh. After being released by the Steelers, he carved out an impressive seven-year career as a receiver and returner with Toronto, Calgary, Saskatchewan and Ottawa. He retired after the 1983 season, worked as an artist for the Ottawa Citizen and died from a heart attack at the age of 49 in 2003, while playing pickup hoops.
Using 1976 as a starting point, there have been 44 Misters Irrelevant in the CFL. Twelve have combined to play 335 games through the 2019 season; most never made it past training camp. Here’s a sampling of their experiences:
RB RICK PAULITSCH 54th by Edmonton in 1982
Primarily a blocking back, Paulitsch played three CFL games and carried the ball exactly one time as a professional. He still remembers it vividly.
After being cut by the Eskimos in 1982, he spent 1983 with the Bombers under head coach Cal Murphy. Winnipeg was in Vancouver for a tilt against the Lions.
“Somebody shuttled the play in and I think it was supposed to go to Willard Reaves or Sean Kehoe, one of the fast guys. You could see on the sidelines Murphy was going crazy because the way we were lined up, I was in the spot to take the counter play. Anyways, I got the ball, followed Bobby Thompson, got 15 yards and came out, and Murphy started laughing.”
In 1984 he was on the move to B.C. and then Ottawa, used mostly on special teams. He came back to Edmonton and jumped into teaching and coaching, and is now the principal at Ross Shepard High School, where he has been for 32 years.
“It’s like anything else. I wish I could have quit on my terms. But at the same time I got to play. I achieved my goal.”
LB Mike koLadich 64th by Ottawa in 1990
“I made $176 and they asked for the track suit back.”
That’s the Coles Notes version of Koladich’s training camp experience with the Rough Riders. He lasted three days and never actually got onto the field.
“I would have liked to have gotten on the field, just to show them. My issue was I wasn’t strong. I was a 230pound guy who could cover a lot of ground. Solid tackler. But I didn’t test well enough for strength.”
He went back to Western for two more seasons.
“I had to go back in ‘90 to finish up a couple of courses and then I went back and paid tuition in ’91 to play football. I never saw the classroom.”
After his eligibility ran out, he took advantage of an international exchange program to wind up in The Netherlands as a player coach for the Zwijndrecht Razorbacks and Delft Dragons. Three more years were spent traveling in Europe, Africa, Australia and Southeast Asia.
“Ran out of money in Bangkok and got my passport stolen. Thought it might be time to come home.”
After years in sales, he now works as a change management consultant in Toronto.
“I work for a bunch of companies that can’t afford a full-time sales management team. If I make a resume it looks like (crap) because it looks like I’ve worked for 75 different companies over a five-year period.”
QB Scott MitcheLL 49th by Winnipeg in 1994
Mitchell went through a pocketful of quarters on his draft day.
“I had been told by a couple teams that they would take me in the fifth or sixth round, so I was optimistic about getting drafted. It’s scary to admit, but this was before the proliferation of the internet so it was not easy to acquire information. The easiest way to find out what was happening was to call the Toronto Sun newsroom.”
He was in Quebec City, quaffing beers and repeatedly calling the Sun from a payphone.
“I was disappointed after the fifth round. I was disappointed after the sixth round. I was very happy to get drafted in the seventh round, be it the last pick or not. The term (Mr. Irrelevant) was there, for sure. I think of it as a term of endearment.”
Injuries conspired to end his playing career. He is now the CEO of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
“It took a long time to get playing out of my system. I remember having dreams about going back and playing years later. The truth of the matter is I felt I had a chance to play but to have your career ended by injury is a double-edged sword. It’s disappointing, but at the same time it lets you pretend you were a lot better than you were and your future was a lot brighter than it probably was.
“All things probably worked out the way it should have. I had a fantastic college experience, both in the states and in Canada and I certainly enjoyed my time trying out for the Bombers when I was there a couple times. No regrets.”
K/P ED BECKER
53rd by Montreal in 2003
While his brother monitored the draft online, Becker spent the day working on a City of Vancouver road-marking crew. When the four teams that had expressed interest in him made their final picks, he was contemplating life as a free agent.
“Then my brother phones me back three minutes later and says, ‘how’s your French?’ I was so happy. It was surreal to actually be drafted. When I got home that night there was a phone call from Jim Popp welcoming me to the team. They sent the contract. It was one of the great highlights of my life.”
He thought his chances were good, after Terry Baker retired. The Als brought in Burke Dales, Charles Hebert and Dan Giancola, as well as Becker.
“I thought, OK, it’s wide open, I’m a draft pick, it’s a great situation for me.”
It was, until the B.C. Lions cut Matt Kellett, Matthews brought him to Montreal’s camp and released everybody else.
Becker went back to Vancouver, worked out with legendary Als kicker Don Sweet, and attended a Lions free agent camp the next year but lost the job to Duncan O’Mahony. About that time he also began pursuing a full-time job as a firefighter in Surrey. He heard one last time from the Ticats, who wanted to fly him in for a tryout, but he was deep into the interview process with the fire department and decided to hang up his cleats, though he still competes in a flag football league and has played in two World Police and Fire Games.
“It’s been an amazing (firefighting) career. It’s still a team atmosphere, it’s exciting. I have a pension. I don’t really have to worry about guys coming in and taking my job.”
OL GREIG LONGCHAMPS 50th by Edmonton in 2006
Well before Longchamps retired from the game in 2008, he knew coaching would be his life’s work.
“I knew I wanted to coach, even when I was playing with the University of Montreal, I used to run a camp every summer for kids from peewee to varsity, different kids with different skill sets. It was nice to be out there and teach the game, to give back.”
He has coached junior kids and for the last five years has been the head coach of a high school in Lachine. He’s aiming for a job in the pros.
“As high as I can go. I’m doing this for real. I enjoy it as much as when I was playing, maybe even more.”
He played in two pre-season games with the Eskimos in 2006 before being cut, went to camp with the Alouettes the following year and was released before the end of camp. Not quite done with the game, he tried to catch on with the Florida Firecats of AFL2, an arena football league. He practised for half a season, never got into a game, and decided he was done.
LB D.J. LALAMA 70th by Edmonton in 2016
Draft day was uncomfortably long, but Lalama turned his disappointment at not being selected in the third or fourth round into motivation.
“During the time of the draft, I was around family and people I was close with. As the draft is almost finished, you’re kind of sitting there starting to sweat, like, what the heck happened? It was the unknown.
“As soon as Edmonton called, that unknown turned into a chip or a boulder on my shoulder. And it’s not about proving other people wrong, it’s about proving myself right.”
He was immediately excited by the opportunity to attend the Eskimos camp.
“If you’re going last overall, it typically means you’re going to the Grey Cup champs. When I was going to Edmonton, forget about what round, what number, it was these guys have just won a Grey Cup, I just watched them win the Grey Cup in Winnipeg. I was at that game, and now you’re going to the best franchise in the CFL. That’s what got me excited.”