See Jesse run? Only if CFL changes its ways
Lumsden up against league preference for U.S.-born backs Carrying ball a job rarely entrusted to homegrown players
The temptation, of course, will be to rush the Jesse Lumsden story.
Don’t tell us about the Mac grad covering kicks, blocking on punt returns, filling up water bottles for veterans and generally paying his dues as a pro football player. We want to see him run. We want to see not just whether a record- breaking Canadian university running back can be a prominent, Russ Jackson-like homegrown star carrying the football, but whether he’ll ever get the chance to try to be that player.
History tells us he won’t get that opportunity. Outstanding Canadian university runners from Mark Nohra to Eric Lapointe, and even as far back as Jesse’s father, Neil, have arrived on the CFL scene and found themselves accommodated as quality football players but not ones entrusted to lug the mail as feature backs.
For decades, that job has been reserved for U. S.- trained, Americanborn backs, and don’t expect it to change anytime soon. Lapointe, nearly as prolific in his university career as was Lumsden, has been productive when handed the pigskin in Montreal but has watched as one import back after another, from Mike Pringle to Lawrence Phillips to Autry Denson to Robert Edwards, was promoted and used ahead of him.
In Hamilton, of course, Troy Davis is established as the Cats’ top runner, and nobody sees Lumsden as a challenger to Davis in the near future. Interestingly, a similar story is unfolding at the same time in Edmonton, where Toronto native Dahrran Diedrick has signed with the Eskimos after three years of trying to crack NFL rosters.
Diedrick started for four years at the University of Nebraska, regarded by most football people more highly than any Canadian school, yet the Esks are making it clear he isn’t seen as the answer to a running game that has been among the worst in the league this season.
“( Diedrick) is a quality Canadian, no question about that,” Eskimos head coach Danny Maciocca told the Edmonton Sun. “ He’s a good football player. But to see him as the answer to our running game problem, that’s not the case. That would be misleading people.”
If Lumsden is to be different, it will be because of his talent, but it will also likely be because Hamilton head coach Greg Marshall, Lumsden’s coach for a time at McMaster, will allow him to break some barriers along the way.
Marshall took the gamble last season of dumping import middle linebacker Jason Lamar and replacing him with young Canadian Agustin Barrenechea. That said, he also has another former Mac running back, Kojo Aidoo, on the Tiger- Cat roster, a player who preceded Lumsden as that school’s feature back and was the country’s outstanding university player in 2000.
This season with Hamilton, Aidoo has three carries for 13 yards, perhaps a sombre indication for Lumsden as to what he can expect.
“ The CFL is a passing game,” Marshall said yesterday. “Nobody, no matter who they are, is going to get the ball to carry 35 times a game. Our game, for running backs, is a lot about what you are doing when you don’t have the ball in your hands.”
Davis proved that against the Argos on Labour Day when he levelled the much larger Jonathan Brown with a spectacular block while pass protecting for Danny McManus, and Marshall hopes the former NCAA rushing champion will mentor Lumsden when he arrives in camp next week. Much of Lumsden’s future, of course, is up to Lumsden. He must stay healthy, something that’s been a problem for him in recent seasons and won’t be easy while doing grunt work on special teams in the near future. He also needs to have the correct mental approach to his new job, which means getting over the disappointment of being cut by the Seattle Seahawks and not looking past the Ticats to getting another shot down south.
“ A lot of our players go through that,” said Marshall. “ We have guys who played in the NFL for three, four years and come here. Not only is their dream gone, they’re used to making a lot more money and often they are leaving young families behind to come to Canada.
“ I’m pretty sure Jesse can put those things behind him. Besides, we’ve got lots of guys on our team with hopes of going to the NFL one day.” For now, Lumsden’s NFL dreams are on hold. He’s a CFLer starting next week, and most of us who love the northern brand of football hope one day to watch him run.