Figuratively speaking there’s a help wanted sign hanging outside the Saskatchewan Roughriders football operations offices.
When the Green and White announced their final cuts on Sunday afternoon, the big story wasn’t so much who was gone but what was left. After releasing 20 players and adding another 10 to his practice roster, head coach and general manager Chris Jones still had some roster spots to work with as the team had fewer than 46 players on the active roster.
In a smart move, Jones decided to try and find some help elsewhere rather than keeping some players he didn’t like as much just for the sake of filling out the roster. That decision means a busy bye-week for Jones and company as they work to fill out the roster ahead of their opener next Thursday against Toronto.
3DownNation’s Justin Dunk has already reported three additions to the roster in former B.C. Lions’ defensive lineman Ese Mrabure-Ajufo and offensive lineman Dillon Guy along with former Argos defensive back Shane Herbert. Jones met with the media on Monday but would only confirm that he’s held discussions with the pair of former Lions. At this point, Jones is in no rush to officially announce any of his moves since he doesn’t have to with the Riders having the week off.
Jones isn’t only looking to boost the team’s Canadian content but he needs to find another quarterback as well. Among the players let go on Sunday was quarterback Brett Smith, with Phillip Sims placed on the six-game injured (stashed) list. That leaves the Riders with just Darian Durant and B.J. Coleman on the active roster. According to Jones, they will have another quarterback signing to announce when they begin practice next week. At the end of the day, Smith was released because he couldn’t sit back and go through his reads before taking off. Smith’s improvisation on the field has been an issue since he joined the team last season, this year, Jones wasn’t willing to put up with it.
While the Riders only have two active quarterbacks, in another roster quirk, they currently have three kickers on the depth chart. Jones confirmed that Quinn Van Gylswyk will remain with the team instead of heading back to UBC for another season. Veterans Tyler Crapigna and Josh Bartel remain on the roster as well. Over the coming week, Jones will have to figure something out as it doesn’t make much sense to dress three kickers in a game. Van Gylswyk starting the season on the practice roster seems to make the most sense as he can fill in for either Crapigna or Bartel should they get injured.
Even though Jones reportedly scouted some 3,000 players over the offseason, this kind of roster juggling shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. Some of the players in camp Jones inherited from the previous regime, while others obviously didn’t perform with the lights on. Now, he needs to try and shift gears on the fly to give his team some much-needed depth to get through the season.
When rebuilding a 3-15 team, you need to pull out all of the stops, even if that raises some eyebrows around the league. So far, Jones is doing just that.
