Korey Jones is one of the Eskimos unsung heroes.
The 29-year-old linebacker from Fort Collins, Colo., flies under the radar because he mostly plays on special teams while serving as a backup on defence.
But every once in a while, Jones gets to show off his true value. He started 10 of his 12 games with the Eskimos last season at middle linebacker in place of injured starter J.C. Sherritt and recently started two games at outside linebacker when national players Adam Konar, Christophe Mulumba-Tshimanga and Blair Smith were all injured.
“I have fun being a starter and playing defence and being out there with the guys,” Jones said. “I’ve got my glimpses here and there to step in and do so, but never under the circumstances (i.e. winning a starting job in training camp as opposed to replacing an injured player) that I would truly want them to be under.
“My motto for years now has been, ‘You prepare as a starter because you never know when you will be put in that position,’ ” he continued. “In a business like this, when you do get that opportunity, and you get thrown in there under fire, and there is a drop-off in production or communication or responsibilities in assignments, then they’re not going to trust you to do it again, and they’ll find somebody else to do it.”
With the return of Mulumba and Konar from the injured list this week, Jones will be back in a reserve role again at 7 p.m. Saturday when the Eskimos take on the Montreal Alouettes at The Brick Field at Commonwealth Stadium on Diversity Is Strength Night.
The Eskimos (5-3) are coming off a disappointing loss to the BC Lions last week.
“Playing in the West Division is a tough place to be,” Jones said. “Every game is crucial, especially against Western opponents. To let that game slip through our fingertips like that was disappointing and it’s just unacceptable.”
Jones said the Esks coaching staff presented the players “with a lot of look-in-the-mirror, self-evaluation kind of challenges” during the past week.
The Alouettes (1-7) could be the cure for what ailed the Eskimos last week. Edmonton has a nine-game winning streak against Montreal – the second-longest currently in the CFL in head-to-head competition, exceeded only by the Calgary Stampeders’ 13 consecutive victories over the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. The Als have been struggling overall, with only one victory in their last 19 games dating back to last season.
“First and foremost, I’m blessed and very appreciative and fortunate to still be playing,” Jones said. “I’m very happy and pleased with where I’m at in the organization in Edmonton. There’s no place I would rather play, so I’ve very happy to be here with the group of guys I’m with. Some of my best friends in life are on this team, so it’s fun for me to get to go to work with those guys every day.”
Although Jones was under the impression that the Eskimos would be starting two American linebackers when he returned to Edmonton after one season with the Saskatchewan Roughriders in 2016, the outside linebacker (WIL or weak-side) position has been since designated for national players whenever possible the last two seasons. CFL teams have to start a combination of at least seven Canadian players on offence and/or defence combined at all times, so the ratio move at WIL allows the Esks an option to start four international receivers on offence.
“It’s kind of how it goes, man,” Jones said about his role as a backup player. “It is what it is. I would much rather win a Grey Cup than be a starter if that makes sense. I’d obviously like to contribute to that Grey Cup win and winning games, and I’m able to do that without being a starter. I’m able to do that through special teams and in situations where I do have to step in and play as a starter.”
Jones was a member of the Eskimos last Grey Cup championship team in 2015.
“When the clock hit zero, and we won” is the first thing he remembers about that game. “That was pretty incredible getting to smile and laugh and having your family (father Kim and mother Lynelle) down on the field and hoisting the cup and going into the locker room, and everything was covered in plastic because you know we were about to make a mess in there,” he said. “That was unforgettable.”
Jones started his CFL career with the BC Lions in 2013, playing two games late in the regular season and then a playoff game. Cut by the Lions after training camp in 2014, he attended a tryout with the Eskimos in Vero Beach, Fla., in 2015 and then was invited to the mini-camp in Vero Beach that followed and finally to training camp in Edmonton.
“I just paid out of my own pocket to go down there and take a chance,” he said.
Jones had been impressed by the CFL during his brief time in BC.
“I took the CFL very seriously,” he said. “I remember flying home from Regina, Saskatchewan, in ’13. We had lost to Sask (in the playoffs) and (defensive back) Dante Marsh was sitting next to me on the plane, and we were just talking. He told me, ‘You be as professional as you want to be.’ That’s something that’s always resonated with me and stuck with me to this day.
“Just in my short time there, I was able to see how professional this league is and how serious it is and how serious people take it,” he continued. “It was big-time professional football; there’s no two ways about it.
“I always had that mindset coming into 2015. Once I got to training camp and had made the team, it was very, very apparent how real it could be for us, how talented the team was and how – from Week 1 – it was ingrained in us that we were good enough to win the Grey Cup. It was just a matter of executing it and getting it done.
“I bought in very, very quickly to it.”
Jones had already been to two NFL training camps as an undrafted free agent, spending four months with the Arizona Cardinals in 2013 and earning a late invitation to the Green Bay Packers’ training camp after he was released by BC in ‘14. The Packers called him on a Monday about a tryout on a Wednesday, but warned Jones that “it would be difficult for me to make the roster because they’d have to release somebody to bring me in for camp.”
“Obviously, I wouldn’t turn down a workout, and I wasn’t doing anything else, so I accepted and went out there and did very well in the workout and they released another linebacker who had already been there and brought me into camp,” he said.
“I got more of a chance than a lot of good players get (in the NFL), so I can’t be disappointed in the fact that I didn’t stick,” he said. “I had two more opportunities than a lot of these guys get.”
Thinking that was probably going to be it for his football career, Jones was sitting on his couch flipping through the channels when he saw a football game on ESPN.
“I didn’t know who was playing, and I didn’t recognize the teams. I asked my friend who was over with me, ‘What is this?’ The first person I saw on the camera was my roommate, Ryan White, from the couple of months I had been at Green Bay. He was on the field playing for this XFL team.
“I didn’t understand what was going on. How did he get a call and I didn’t get a call to play in some league, yada, yada, yada? I wasn’t sure what it was. I was just curious about it. Didn’t look into it, though, and the very next day I got a call from one of the league’s organizers asking if I wanted to play on the regional team in Omaha. The Florida (Blacktips) team didn’t play in Florida. They played in other regions. Denver was in the Omaha region, so they asked if I wanted to play on the weekend.
“To be very honest with you, I thought it might be my last time to play football. Football isn’t quite like basketball where you can just go down to the rec centre and play five-on-five competitive ball and get a good little run in. I kind of chalked it up as I was just going to go out there and play some backyard football and just have some fun enjoying playing the game that I love.”
The Fall Experimental Football League (XFL) was a professional minor league that lasted only two seasons (2014-15).
“That was interesting is what that was,” Jones said. “I’m not even sure what stadium it was out there in Omaha, but I played with a bunch of guys I had never met before, and we practised a few times for a couple of days, and we were out there sharing helmets and equipment, and it was pretty rag-tag, but it was an experience.”
He was only supposed to play one game but got invited out to Brooklyn, N.Y., to play another game the following week.
The CFL was a breath of fresh air after that.
Jones grew up playing a lot of different sports but eventually gravitated towards football and basketball.
Jones’ father had played four seasons in the NFL as a running back with the New Orleans Saints from 1976-79. While Korey also played running back in high school, he enjoyed playing defence more.
“My role models growing up were always on the defensive side of the ball,” he said. “I just liked the way they played the game, the attitude they brought to it. I figured in a violent, physical game, and I’d rather be the one hitting people instead of getting hit.”
It took Jones a while to finally settle in at middle linebacker. He was initially a safety in high school before getting shifted to defensive end as a sophomore. He was recruited to Garden City Community College as a linebacker but played safety again his first season before moving to linebacker his second year. At the University of Wyoming, he started out as a defensive end but switched to middle linebacker (MAC) after five games – making quarterback sacks on three consecutive plays at one point.
Jones said he “caught a little flak as the hometown kid going up to the rival” when he chose Wyoming over his father’s alma mater – Colorado State – “but it just felt right to me.”
“I ended up sitting out a year after high school due to some trouble I had,” he said. “When I went to junior college, Colorado State actually placed me at my junior college with the anticipation that I would play for Colorado State when I was done there.”
Jones felt he “meshed better” with the Cowboys players during a visit to Wyoming, but the deciding factor for him was linebacker coach Marty English, who had tried to recruit him out of high school.
“He is just a fantastic human being and a phenomenal coach, and we’re still friends to this day,” Jones said.
How did Kim Jones deal with his son playing for Colorado State’s rival in the Border War?
“He was my biggest fan, so he made an easy transition over there,” said Jones. “He was wearing Brown and Gold pretty often.”
Jones ran 70 yards with his first interception of the season last week at BC before Lions quarterback Travis Lulay tackled him at the 15-yard line.
“I’m kind of sour about that because I really believe I should have scored,” Jones said about what could have been his first interception-return touchdown.
Still, the play set up a 15-yard touchdown catch by Derel Walker in the end zone as the Eskimos jumped out to a 20-10 lead late in the first half.
While Jones was playing WIL at the time, his preferred linebacker position is MAC.
“It’s just a couple of yards over on the field, but the communication is a little bit different,” he said about playing WIL. “You communicate with different people – that boundary (short-side) corner, that boundary half – and the angles are a little bit different. Things get a little bit quicker. Route combos get on you a little quicker. The box angles are a little bit different. Nothing crazy, but it’s just some slight little detail things in there that are a little bit different.”
Teams can also run the ball away from the weak-side linebacker while the middle linebacker can usually “get a little piece” of every play.
“I like playing sideline to sideline,” Jones said.
Line up changes
Besides Mulumba-Tshimanga and Konar, Vidal Hazelton also came off the injured list as a backup to Bryant Mitchell at slotback. Hazelton hasn’t played since the season-opener in Winnipeg.
Rookie running back Shaquille Cooper will make his CFL debut with veteran running back C.J. Gable going on the one-game injured list after not practising all week.
National cornerback Arjen Colquhoun returns to the six-game injured list for a second time this season while linebacker Brandon Pittman was placed on the practice roster along with recently signed national long snapper Tanner Doll and national linebacker Doug Parris. National wide receiver Sam Giguere, international linebacker Jeremiah Kose and international offensive lineman Kelvin Palmer were all released.
Doll, 25, played 22 games with the Ottawa RedBlacks in 2016-17 and four games with the Ti-Cats this season. The St. Albert native who played with the University of Calgary Dinos provides more depth for the Eskimos roster.
“He can snap the ball first and foremost,” Esks head coach Jason Maas said. “With (safety) Neil King down, we don’t really have a backup on our roster other than (offensive lineman David) Beard for our long-snapping situation.
“He’s also played linebacker. With our inability to stay healthy at that position at times, it’s nice to have a guy in-house who can do that. He can also run down the field on special teams and make tackles.
“Being local helps,” Maas added. “It’s great to have guys from around Edmonton to come back and play for us.”
Too many flags
Maas said earlier this week that he “can’t let my emotions get the best of me” in order to set a better example for his football team, which leads the CFL with 84 penalties for 895 yards this season.
“I challenge my team; I challenge myself to say, ‘I need to be better, we need to be better,’ ” Maas said.
Welcome back
Former Eskimos receiver Adarius Bowman returns to The Brick Field at Commonwealth Stadium for the first time since he was released during the off-season. Bowman initially signed with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and was recently traded to the Alouettes.
Maas hopes Eskimos fans will give the 33-year-old Bowman a warm welcome.
“Adarius is going to go down as one of the greatest football players to ever play in Edmonton,” Maas said. “He was an outstanding player, an outstanding person, an outstanding community guy and gave a lot to this organization. Any time a guy like that comes back, it’s special.”
Diversity Is Strength
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, in partnership with the Eskimos and the CFL, will welcome 50 new citizens in a special ceremony in the Quarterback Club at The Brick Field at Commonwealth Stadium at 5 p.m. Saturday. The citizenship ceremony will be the first of three in the CFL in celebration of the league’s Diversity Is Strength campaign.