Rust for players firing it up again
Five Ticats starting against the Argos hadn’t played a regular-season game in a year
We’re not going to make excuses — there really are none — for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats because this is a fairly common CFL issue, but there was a lot of culture shock jolting the team in its season opener.
Mainly, a lot of guys who were playing their first real football game in more than a year.
Which is why Hamilton safety Courtney Stephen said after the loss in Toronto, “It’s going to take time to develop our chemistry on defence.”
A significant number of Ticat starters — four on defence, one on offence — in the 32-15 whipping by the Argos did not suit up for a single regular-season football game during 2016.
They’re all “International” players, as is usually the case because of the schedule south of the border. Generally, Americans who come to the CFL have exhausted their chances of making an NFL team but not before giving it a number of shots. A number of shots.
They might get cut partway through a training camp, or play the exhibition games then get released on the eve of Labour Day weekend when the regular season starts. But they’re heartened just enough to wait around through the fall hoping for another NFL chance when roster players start to get injured. Remember, the minimum wage on even an NFL practice roster is $115,000, US.
NFL teams themselves are also prone to providing a little false encouragement to keep players idling in the U.S. marketplace, rather than heading north.
Ultimately, their chances don’t materialize and a huge number of players end up with a year of rust caking their game-day joints.
Some are wise enough to see the writing on the wall before others in similar situations do and migrate to a CFL team, especially during the one-month stretch when the practice roster expands. That at least buys them some acclimatization time to the CFL and gets their daily work noticed by prospective employers.
Neither Ticats’ starting cornerbacks on Opening Day, Justin Rogers and Richard Leonard, played a ‘real’ game last year. Leonard was signed by Houston as an undrafted free agent but released in mid-August, and Rogers, who did play for Buffalo five years ago, went on injury reserve with Washington in September 2015, and didn’t play another game until last Sunday.
Defensive tackle Davon Coleman played two games for Dallas in 2015, was released in September, went to Chicago’s practice roster for the rest of the season then spent 2016 trying to hook on with Tampa Bay, then the New York Giants, was released in both places and didn’t suit up for a regular season game.
The fourth defender who didn’t play last year was Will Hill, who’d still be in the NFL if it weren’t for his suspension for marijuana use. Hill didn’t look rusty blocking a pair of Argo field goal attempts on Sunday.
On offence, right tackle Jordan Swindle was undrafted out of Kentucky last year, signed in May with St. Louis, but was released at the NFL cut-down deadline before Opening Day. Prior to Sunday, he hadn’t played a nonexhibition game since his Kentucky Wildcats lost the TaxSlayer Bowl on New Year’s Eve 2015 and, well, it showed.
Additionally, starting wide receiver Brian Tyms played only two games last year, both with the Ticats, after not playing a regularseason game in 2015.
And three players on the 10-man practice roster — Damar Aultman, Jason Neill, Jalen Saunders — didn’t play a regular season game last year. Projected starting corner Keon Lyn, relegated to the one-game injury list, did play six indoor games last season but none outdoors.
The Argonauts themselves had two starters who didn’t really play last year: offensive tackle Brandon Washington (who tried out with Hamilton first) and defensive end Victor Butler, who was credited with three pressures against Zach Collaros Sunday. Kick returner Chandler Worthy was also inactive, game-wise, last season.
That makes a lot of missed time on one field, although most players mentioned got some intense practice with NFL teams during their hiatus from meaningful games.
But practice isn’t the same as playing a real game, as many of them found out Sunday.