The Eskimos have already played both of their CFL pre-season games, but training camp is far from over.
They still have five practices remaining, starting with Sunday’s Fan Day, presented by Carefree RV, at The Brick Field at Commonwealth Stadium.
“I’m looking forward to the next phase of our training camp, installing more things and getting more physical in camp,” head coach Jason Maas said after Friday’s 33-13 loss to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at Investors Group Field. “We’re allowed to do that now that we’ve got the ample time to prepare.”
The Eskimos, who left most of their veteran starters at home Friday, played their first pre-season game seven days after opening training camp and their second game five days later.
Because the schedule was so condensed, the Eskimos held only three padded practices during the first two weeks. Now they’ll have three more in the next five days.
“Just that alone is more like a training camp, what it’s supposed to be like rather than how we have been doing it,” Maas said on the 630 CHED post-game show. “Time is on our side now. We’ve got a full week.
“We’re not going to play another game until two weeks from now. Our guys can go hard, get the reps in that they need, know that it’s a grind, but still know in the back of their mind that they’re going to be prepared and fresh when we come and play here again.”
The Eskimos return to Winnipeg to open the regular season on Thursday, June 14, but with their starters in tow instead of the ‘B team’ lineup of potential backups and newcomers hoping to crack the roster like they fielded Friday.
“We played everyone again tonight,” Maas said. “Obviously, we kept a lot of our vets at home. A lot of these guys you saw playing tonight, particularly on offence, are backups and guys who are vying for jobs and trying to win things. This is the first time that everything has been put on their shoulders and going against the starters from Winnipeg for two quarters. At the end of the day, they competed. The execution wasn’t quite what we wanted, and it was a little bit of everything when that happens.”
Maas also said that it’s “tough” for newcomers to make this Eskimos team.
“We have a lot of vets who are good players, so it’s always going to be tough for a rookie to come in for two weeks and beat one of our vets out,” he pointed out.
“I’d rather see as much as we can of these guys,” Maas continued, “because, at the end of the day, no matter who doesn’t make our team, those are usually the first guys you call back if something goes bad because they know your systems, you feel good about them.
“I’d prefer to see all of them get to know our systems as much as possible because even if we don’t choose them to be on our 46 or 56 (-man rosters), they’re within a (phone) call away from coming back and helping us win. That happened last year to us more than once.
“At the end of the day, we’re going to stick it out with everybody. Let everybody practise. We’ve got three padded practices left where we can choose and decide. With those padded practices, there are more opportunities for guys to step up and we’re also getting ready and prepared to play.”
The Eskimos have to declare their 46-man roster and 10-man practice roster by Saturday, June 9.
Rookie running back Jordan Robinson may have improved his chances of earning a spot on one of those rosters when he gave the Eskimos an early spark with a 98-yard punt return touchdown to open the scoring in Friday’s game.
“The punt return team did a really good job for me,” said Robinson, who also had a 37-yard touchdown run in the first pre-season game. “I really didn’t have to do anything. I just followed the hole, and it was there, so I was out of there.”
It was Edmonton’s first punt-return touchdown since Kendall Lawrence ran 84 yards in the 2014 West Division semifinal against the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
Robinson finished the game with 121 yards on four punt returns and 84 yards on four kickoff returns.
“Jordan Robinson obviously stood out tonight,” Maas said. “The benefit to having him doing that is he is also a running back for us. I was glad to see a guy step up there, so we do have options down the road.”
The Eskimos already know that veteran receiver Jamill Smith, who joined the team last season, is consistently a dangerous kick returner.
Versatile defensive back Nick Taylor, who played in both the secondary and at strong-side linebacker Friday, had a quarterback sack and interception.
“For me, it’s just about being healthy after last year, enduring the injuries I had when I was in Ottawa,” he said. “Just having the chance to come back being fully healthy and being able to run around and be me again full speed. It was just a great opportunity to be out there and giving a full effort and playing hard.”
The 30-year-old Taylor is one of the players hoping to use the next week of practices to continue to impress the coaches.
“There’ll still be some competing going on,” he said.
Rookie quarterback Zach Kline struggled in his first CFL pre-season start while playing behind an offensive line missing three of its key players in right guard Matt O’Donnell, centre Justin Sorensen and left tackle Colin Kelly.
Kline had only three completions on 11 passes for 50 yards while moving the yardsticks just four times (once by a Winnipeg roughing the passer penalty to nullify a quarterback sack), recovering his own fumble, giving up an interception and getting sacked three times.
But Maas pointed out that it wasn’t all Kline’s fault. A receiver bobbled Kline’s first pass and then picked off by a Winnipeg defensive back.
“That was just a play that was out of his hands, but ultimately it gets put on him and the offence,” Maas said. “That kind of stuff was showing how the night was going to go for us. It seemed like we were our own worst enemy, couldn’t get out of our own way.
“They got pressure up front at times, but there were other times when we had a clean pocket and clean window to throw the ball, and it didn’t get completed. We were not as good as we needed to be, obviously, but there’s going to be a lot of teaching on that tape so we can get better.”
The three Eskimos quarterbacks in the game completed just 13 of 26 passes for 101 yards and only 165 yards of offence. Kline was also the leading rusher with four carries for 25 yards and threw the team’s longest pass of 44 yards to six-foot-five wide receiver Torrance Gibson, who left the game with a leg injury late in the first half.
Veteran backup Danny O’Brien completed nine of 14 attempts for 57 yards (his longest gain was 10 yards) while newcomer Eli Jenkins played the last two series and completed his only pass for minus-six yards.
“We did some good things,” O’Brien said, “obviously, not the point total or the outcome that we wanted as a team. Part of that is just the nature of pre-season.
“Not only did we have a bunch of young guys, but then we had several injuries, so you’ve got new guys now playing new spots under the lights for the first time, so there was definitely a little bit of mixing and matching but, overall, they got in there and competed their butts off, which is all you can ask for.”
Shuler led the receivers with four catches but had only 23 yards with a longest gain of eight yards. Rookie receiver Je’Mari Luper chipped in with kickoff returns of 53 and 24 yards while Godfrey Onyeka, Edmonton’s first draft pick in 2018, recovered a Winnipeg fumble created with a hit from middle linebacker Jeremiah Kose. Fellow 2018 draft pick Tanner Green led special teams with three tackles, and veteran middle linebacker Korey Jones led the way with six defensive tackles.
After missing his first field goal attempt Friday, Sean Whyte made three-pointers from 46 and 51 yards.