IMPRESSED with what Jason Armstead has brought -- finally -- to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers' kick-return game? An 84-yard punt return TD last week to put an exclamation point on what has been a key improvement to special teams and the Bombers overall?
Easy, man, says the five-year CFL veteran. Successful kickoff and punt returns are where patience and vision meet, he says. And he's got plenty of both.
The Bombers’ Jason Armstead (22) returns a punt for a touchdown in the second half of last week’s home victory over the Edmonton Eskimos.
Armstead, who recently turned 29, had his best game as a Blue Bomber in last Friday's 30-23 win over the Edmonton Eskimos and was named the CFL's special teams player of the week. On Thursday, he was named runner-up as special teams player of the month.
Armstead's not big -- the media guide listing at 5-foot-10 is generous -- but he wears a size-18 smile. And he comes by his kick-return talents naturally from back home in Pascagoula, Miss., as an eight-year-old catching passes from his dad and uncles in his backyard.
Returning kicks, however, is his trademark and gives him his biggest kick of all.
"It's something I gained a love for," Armstead said Thursday, although he's also had big numbers as a receiver with Ottawa, Saskatchewan, Hamilton and Montreal in the past. "I love doing it. They always tend to put the smaller guys to take up that duty and I was able to make plays.
Some players are good punt returners, some are good kick returners. Not many, he says, are good at both. He is. "It's one of those deals where it really didn't matter because I played baseball and I figured if I could catch a small white ball, I could catch a pigskin.
"I just gained a knack for it, the flight of the ball."
But it helps to know what to do after you catch that ball. And that's where patience and timing and vision and speed and split-second decision-making and communication and a whole bunch of other factors come into play.
"It's pretty much on the go," Armstead said. It's creative and reactionary -- freelancing, but within a structure. "Football is a strange thing. It's almost like the game of life -- if you see things before they happen... it's vision.
"I start off my play by securing the ball first. I may get a glance at the first guy down and pretty much make him miss. Next, my vision sets from west to east, back east to west, and seeing what's available for me.
"In the CFL, the field is so big so there's a lot of alleys," he added. "You can't cover the entire field, that's my opinion. You're going to leave holes and that's what leaves room for the vision to kick in. I'm not going to give away my recipe but it's pretty much predetermined where I'm going.
"So it's my chance to use that to my advantage and to use my vision to set up the play, set up the blocks. Be patient and it's going to open up."
chris.cariou@freepress.mb.ca
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