Slotback battle continues for Stampeders receivers
Coach Dickenson wants players to show him who deserves a spot
His debut took a lot longer than he originally anticipated, but these days, Bakari Grant is finally feeling like a contributing member of the Calgary Stampeders.
After drawing the short straw the first two weeks and being relegated to healthy inactive status behind Kamar Jorden, the off-season freeagent acquisition from the Hamilton Tiger-Cats finally made his mark.
It was exactly the type of impact the Stampeders were envisioning when they scooped him up back in February, too.
Late in the fourth quarter of the eventual 26-26 draw against the Redblacks in Ottawa, Grant produced a huge 46-yard reception that set his team up inside the 20yard line.
Two plays later, Jerome Messam had scored the game-tying touchdown and the Stamps had new life.
That’s sort of how Grant felt when he was able to finally able to get his hands on a few footballs in a game situation.
“It felt comfortable,” said Grant, who finished with five catches for 89 yards. “It felt like I was at home. Back where I was supposed to be.”
The 29-year-old veteran of six CFL seasons has been around long enough to understand how to deal with the mental side of not being in the starting lineup.
“I’m a veteran and I know how the game goes,” Grant said. “They took me on the road and I was on the sideline giving as much advice as I could for the guys around me, and I knew my opportunity would present itself.
“When I was injured before in Hamilton, I had to deal with the emotional side of not playing and still being at the game, so that wasn’t new. I think it helped because every play we ran on offence in the first two weeks, I mentally ran that rep in the game.”
Despite the solid performance, the Grant-Jorden battle continues, and head coach Dave Dickenson isn’t ready to run with one guy at the boundary slotback spot.
“We certainly haven’t given that job to anybody,” Dickenson said. “I do believe that Kamar Jorden was showing great improvement in physicality, as well, and played a good game against Winnipeg. We’ve opened that job up to competition and I’m hoping that both guys stayed locked into the game plan. I’m also hoping to get both guys on the roster at some point. Two good players and they’re making our decision tough.”
That aforementioned veteran savvy also provides Grant with the knowledge of how to stay on the field.
“Perform,” the Oakland, Calif., product said. “Come out and work every day. One of my biggest things is I yell out, ‘Work day,’ every day and that just means get better today, whether it’s one per cent, two per cent, 10 per cent, whatever. Just get better and prepare like a madman.”
The back-and-forth competition has been yo-yo like when it comes to Grant and Jorden.
“They were pretty much equal in catches, targets, big plays, same amount of errors, so it was pretty good across the board,” receivers coach Pete Costanza said of the practice numbers the team has charted over the past six weeks.
“(Grant) never lost focus, he was never a distraction, he just kept working hard, trying to get better and get on the field. When he had his opportunity to make plays, he did a really good job at it.”
When the Stamps head into Investors Group Field to face the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Thursday (6:30 p.m., TSN, News Talk 770), they’ll be without the services of wideout Joe West due to an ankle injury.
It’ll provide an opportunity for either second-year man Greg Wilson or rookie DaVaris Daniels to thrust their name into the conversation for targets from quarterback Bo Levi Mitchell.
“Right now, DaVaris Daniels and Greg Wilson are fighting it out,” Dickenson said. “We want them to compete and show us who’s better and we’ll just make that decision after Day 3.”
The Stampeders receiving corps are currently a case of Marquay McDaniel and then everyone else.
Every other receiver is still jockeying for their place in the go-to guy pecking order.
“There’s a lot of things that happen in the course of an 18-game season,” Costanza said. “You’ve got injuries and somebody else gets a chance to play and they play well, and then you’ve got hard decisions to make.
“I don’t know how it’ll shake out, but I do know whoever’s on the field, they’re going to play well. Guys are still proving what they can do. In our business it’s, ‘What have you done and are you playing winning football?’ ”