Bombers Add 3 Canadians

[Floyd]

The point is that Walters really has this tendency to sign/draft guys and then ship them out without real time to look at them... then sign basically the same guys just different names...

Draft Lattanzio dump him and try Butcher... Lattanzio seems to have a place in Ottawa now, I'll believe it when we see Butcher back here...

Decide we're going with Normand instead of Pontbriand... and then bring in Tuck.  Why not just activate Cronk or move Briggs to FB - Tuck is totally average.

Rush looks decen on cover teams so we cut him and then sign 28 year old Tonye-Tonye

Tinker-tinker-tinker... T-Dre Player 'might' make this team better - but ask why a team desperate for OL would cut him?

[Jpan85]

Tuck plays DL too think it was more Corney could not go they would have a replacement.

[James]

Bc is not desperate for OL anymore

[Floyd]

1 hour ago, Jpan85 said:

Tuck plays DL too think it was more Corney could not go they would have a replacement.

Still... why cut Louie Richardson...

Maybe we just notice it more, but this team is always making these rinky-dink moves that don't seem like they make us better.

[Fatty Liver]

Interesting article on T-Dre.

 

T-Dre Player joins Bombers

Posted on Mon, July 4, 2016 at 3:17pm by Scott Taylor in blue bombers, Featured, FOOTBALL, SPORTS with No Comments on T-Dre Player joins Bombers

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The Winnipeg Blue Bombers news release today called him “T-Dre” Player. However, his parents named him Tchissakid Dre Player.

Sure T-Dre is a lot easier and faster to say than Tchissakid, but the Bombers really don’t care. They just hope that the physical gifts of this 6-foot-6, 305-pound lineman with CFL experience in B.C. will help an offensive line that has been suspect for almost a decade.

Yesterday the Bombers announced that Player and National linebacker Herve Tonye-Tonye had been added to the practice roster while National fullback/defensive lineman James Tuck was added to the team’s active roster.

For Player, it’s a chance to come back home. At least, “home” by way of Dallas, Texas, and Natchitoches, Louisiana.

Winnipeg roots

Born in Winnipeg, his mom Corinne Fontaine, is from Sagkeeng First Nation, and in 2014, T-Dre became the first athlete from Sagkeeng to reach the Canadian Football League. Last season, he started 11 games for the Lions. In two seasons, after being drafted out of Northwestern State (Louisiana), 12^th overall by the BC Lions in the 2014 CFL Draft, he has played in 18 CFL games. He joined Winnipeg’s practice roster on Sunday and went to practice in blue and gold for the first time on Monday.

He’s also come a long way since his father, Paul Player, one of the finest basketball players ever to play at the University of Winnipeg, moved the family to suburban Dallas in the hopes of finding better athletic opportunities for his son. These days Paul works for Child Protective Services while Corinne is involved with the Army and Air Force exchange service. They often travel to Manitoba to visit family members so T-Dre is almost home.

Basketball first

T-Dre’s first love was basketball and in a story reminiscent of Brandon’s Izzy Odinije, he played hoops until he was talked into playing high school football in Grade 12. After only one year of high school varsity football – just like Izzy – he was offered a scholarship to Northwestern State in Natchitoches, Louisiana, where he became an all-star O-linemen in the Southland Conference.

“I was born in Winnipeg and moved to the Dallas area when I was about nine,” Player told me not long ago. “It was pretty crazy with all the cultural differences I faced. I had big identity issues when I was young.

“There are not very many native people living down here. It was very difficult in high school because everybody was white, black or Mexican and I was none of the above.”

T-Dre did have four things going for him: he’s whip smart, he’s a great athlete, he’s a big, strong guy and he comes from a great family. His athletic genes have obviously come in handy. At 6-foot-6, 305 pounds, Player combines speed with his size and at 24, is already an imposing CFL lineman.

He also has a unique name, Tchissakid, one that comes from the Ojibwe language, meaning “Sooth sayer,” or “Magic man.”

“When I was still in my mother’s womb, my parents were looking at a sonogram and they said it looked as though I had waved or ‘chopped’ my hand on the screen,” T-Dre explained. “My dad did some research and came up with that name from that experience, because the indigenous sooth sayers or shamans use their hands as a way to emit energy. Say, if someone wanted their fortune told, a soothsayer would use special stones and shake them up in their hands before throwing them onto the table and interpreting the layout. It is unique.”

Academics is the goal

Almost all of Player’s university courses were directed at pre-law and he’s still thinking seriously about eventually getting a law degree. While he’s committed to playing pro football – right now – he says he wouldn’t mind getting his PhD.

An extremely intelligent football player who has progressed quite rapidly as a pro, the only question after he was selected in the CFL Canadian draft, was whether or not he could make the adjustment from a U.S. mid-major to pro football. It has, obviously, not been a problem. And if things work out in Winnipeg, he’ll have a chance to block for a former Lions teammate and another Winnipeg football star, Oak Park high school graduate Andrew Harris.

“Football has been a big part of the journey for me,” Player said during our interview. “But academics was always the goal. Thanks to football, I had a wonderful opportunity to get a very good university education. It’s always been important to me to make the best of my opportunities.”

He certainly has a great opportunity now.

[Tracker]

Well, he cannot be any worse than at least one of the current NI linemen. Somebody that big, smart and athletic has to be able to play the sport and play it well.

[M.O.A.B.]

July 4 Bombers Transactions 

To Active: FB Cronk, REC Haidara & FB/DL Tuck 

To IR : DB Sherman, LB Hurl & LB Gauthier 

 

source: http://www.cfl.ca/transactions/