June 21, 2017

Passing the Torch: Can Harris continue Ottawa’s success?

Johany Jutras/CFL.ca


The pre-season rarely paints an identical picture to anything we will see in the regular season but if Ottawa looks remotely similar to the performance they put on in pre-season Week A against Hamilton, the REDBLACKS will be a tough team to play against this year.



There is an old saying that goes if you are what you have and you lose what you have, what are you?

Down the stretch of a Grey Cup Championship 2016 season the Ottawa REDBLACKS were Henry Burris, and now they don’t have him so the question crossing many CFL fans minds is what are the reigning Grey Cup Champions?

The team was of course way more than just Henry, even he would tell you that, but he played an integral role in solidifying the most important position on the field and one game in particular showed the value of a veteran quarterback like Burris.

For the first time in his career, Trevor Harris will head into a season as the bonfide starting quarterback (Photo: Johany Jutras/CFL.ca)

In the East Division Final, national running back Kienan LaFrance was undoubtedly the star. The young Manitoba Bisons product was dressed for special teams purposes but due to an early injury became the work horse on his way 157 yards on 25 carries. Burris (26) had 15 less pass attempts in the snow than Edmonton’s Mike Reilly (41) but Burris knew exactly how to manage the situation.

Watching Burris that afternoon was an absolute pleasure. He knew when to be aggressive and throw a pinpoint deep breaking in route between linebackers or when to play it safe, throwing the ball away living to play another snowy down.

Weather aside, that kind of situational understanding and huddle leadership is what propelled Ottawa to their historic Grey Cup and now that burden falls on the shoulders of Trevor Harris.

Harris is more than capable of leading an offence and putting up awe inspiring statistics on his best days. The criticism through his first five years in the CFL is that come money time after Labour Day Harris has faded in both productivity and effectiveness.

The numbers seem to back that vibe as he has trended backwards in several categories, most notably yards as the regular season creeps towards the postseason.

It’s unfair to factor in the final four regular season games of 2016 when Harris registered no statistics due to Burris re-assuming his starting role, but when you don’t the trend is similar to 2015.

Harris will likely answer questions about Burris and his late season production numerous many times this summer until he can prove to Ottawa football fans that neither are an issue.

The challenge of replacing a QB as well liked – by the end – as Henry Burris is part fact and part fiction. The fact is that every quarterback stepping in for a well liked veteran is aware of the fans perspective. The fiction is that anytime the new starter has a poor or lacklustre game it was cause by that awareness.

It’s unfair to to criticize Trevor Harris for the inevitable blemishes that will come in 2017 because Burris had plenty of his own in 2016, but all we remember is how the book ended, not how it made us feel in the middle of reading it.

In 2017, Harris will be looking to pick up where Burris left off in 2016 (Photo: Johany Jutras/CFL.ca)

Add that to a long list of challenges facing Harris this season and you get a quarterback with everything to prove in his first full season of truly being ‘the guy’.

I believe Trevor Harris has the ability to become a true franchise quarterback. If we benched, traded or generally forgot about every young quarterback who has struggled to complete the grind of an 18-week regular season, we would have no quarterbacks at all. It takes time and if one day Harris ends his career in the same way Henry Burris did last year, we will have long forgotten the late season struggles of years gone by.

Ottawa was aggressive in free agency replacing Ernest Jackson who headed East to Montreal with a couple of former Argos in Kenny Shaw and Diontae Spencer. They re-signed middle linebacker Taylor Reed and defensive back Jerrell Gavins to solidify a defensive core familiar to coordinator Mark Nelson and added Khalil Bass from Winnipeg to add some pop to the linebacking corps.

The pre-season rarely paints an identical picture to anything we will see in the regular season but if Ottawa looks remotely similar to the performance they put on in pre-season Week A against Hamilton, the REDBLACKS will be a tough team to play against this year.

Toronto and Montreal are in transition, but with a veteran quarterback of their own in Montreal and a battle-tested bench boss in Toronto, both teams could compete quicker than the consensus suggests. Factor those teams into an East Division where Hamilton and Ottawa have played each other so closely the last two seasons and you get an East that is both there for the taking and a sizable challenge.

All that’s left now is to play some football and find out who is for real. Over to you Trevor Harris.