Norman centre of attention with B.C. Lions
VANCOUVER — “It’s quiet ... a little too quiet” is a television trope as old as the medium itself.
The setting is ominous as our heroes ready themselves for the gunshots/arrows/spears/missiles we know the enemy will surely rain on them at any moment.
In the camp of the B.C. Lions, the studied wariness is based on the status of centre Angus Reid, whose back problems have lingered through training camp and into the week of practice leading to Friday’s Canadian Football League regular-season opener against the Calgary Stampeders.
The backward, underhand, between the legs hand-off to the quarterback seems to be the most elementary play in football, but it’s not.
Centres are charged with reading the defence, calling out the blocking schemes and adjusting to any difference in cadence by the quarterback, who can use a non-rhythmic count to confuse the opposition but can also confuse his own team.
Only then does the centre engage the beast lurking across the line of scrimmage. It’s more complicated than a Jon Gruden explanation. There’s a lot of opportunities to screw up and, indeed, centres only seem to get noticed when they do. All that is except Reid, a walking quote machine who is impossible not to notice even when he’s in a state of inactivity.
Observers at Lions’ training camp in Kamloops not only knew something was amiss when second-year player Matt Norman started taking snaps with the first-team offence, but in the demeanour of Reid, who fell strangely quiet, if not exactly mute, as befits an individual with something on his mind besides football and his next chow-down. Pain has a way of making people seem distracted, and Reid was dealing with those issues right up until the end of camp.
“It scared me,” Reid told listeners Monday, on his weekly segment on Team 1040 radio. “I’m turning 37 this year, just when everything starts falling apart. I’m human. I don’t want to be looked on as ‘that guy with the bad back.’ The organization has been so good. They’ve dealt with back issues before. ‘If you have this type of injury, take care of it, so you’ll be good to go.’ You don’t want to become a Bad Back Guy — because they can replace you.”
In a practical sense, the transition has already begun, with Norman taking a big step to his left from his normal guard position to tackle a new world from an upside down perspective.
“As much as Matt improved from Week 1 to Week 3 of camp, I think he’s in a really good place now, as far as the progression has gone,” said quarterback Travis Lulay.
Coaches, players, fans have trouble letting go of a security blanket. Reid has completed so many blind, underhanded exchanges to the quarterback or between-the-legs 15-yard passes to kickers without error over the years that people live in fear on the unknown — just as Norman lives in fear of a bad snap leading to a busted play.
Norman is so new to the position that it’s too early to tell if there’s any chemistry developing between himself and Lulay. Chemistry can wait, Norman admits.
For now, he’s just trying to get a grip on the situation. Literally. Norman is experimenting by cutting out the fingers on his glove so he has more “feel” and control of the movement of the football.
“To be completely honest with you, the first couple of days, Travis would tell me if the snap was high, low or whatever,” Norman said. “Every once in a while, if it’s raining outside, they can be a little high. Recently, however, we’ve had no issues, as far as I know.”
Norman might struggle for a while longer, Lulay suggested, but he’s prepared to live with that. Norman demonstrated his mettle last year when, as a callow rookie, he started in the season opener at right guard and got schooled against Winnipeg. Because of injuries to veterans, he was forced to play the following week against Hamilton. No problem. Thereafter, his progress was judged not game-to-game but quarter-to-quarter.
“It’s a necessary evil for anybody,” Lulay said. “Mistakes are part of the process of growth. Once you get over the pride of making a mistake and use the experience to say ‘This is where I can get better,’ that’s when a guy learns and grows. That’s one thing we learned about Matt last year, playing as a rookie.’’