Pierces grab some attention

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 31/05/2012 (5190 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Doug PIERCE, who you’ve never heard of, made a great catch.

Buck Pierce, who you’ve definitely heard of, made a nice pass.

And a couple dozen other men who won’t be here a couple weeks from now ran around the field at Canad Inns Stadium, desperately trying to do something — anything — to catch the attention of the coaches who will decide whether they get to fulfil lifelong dreams this summer of playing professional football.

Welcome to Day 1 of Winnipeg Blue Bombers rookie training camp.

After what’s seemed like a month of rain, the skies turned blue for the Bombers on Wednesday as they hit the sun-drenched field at a stadium they never expected to see again to kick off the 2012 CFL regular season with the first of three one-day sessions being held this week exclusively for rookies.

Rookies and quarterbacks, to be more precise. And one of those quarterbacks inisted he couldn’t have been happier than to have spent an hour of his afternoon on Wednesday tossing playground passes to nine new sets of hands the Bombers have brought in at receiver this year.

“This is the part of the season I look forward to most, honestly,” said Bombers starting quarterback Buck Pierce.

Training camp? You look forward to training camp most? Isn’t it kind of early to be spinning things, Buck?

After further discussion, what Pierce seemed to be saying is that what he loves most about training camp is the blank slate and boundless opportunity that it suggests.

Oh, and the reporters finally pipe down, too.

“There’s some new blood and there’s a lot of anticipation,” said Pierce. “You have six months where you guys second-guess what we do. And now we have the opportunity to just come out here and play football.

“And rookie camp is always good. It’s new faces, new to the game. You don’t really do a whole lot scheme-wise or anything like that. You just line them up and just say, ‘Try and run by this guy…’ That’s just fun.”

One of the guys doing just that — running by guys — on Wednesday was Pierce’s namesake — receiver Doug Pierce out of a tiny Christian college, Friends University — who authored the highlight of the afternoon, overcoming a street mugging by non-import defensive back Dan West to make a 30-yard catch.

At 6-foot-6 and 215 pounds, Pierce — a 24-year-old from Arp, Texas, who the Bombers signed just last week — strikes a very similar profile to former Bombers wide receiver Greg Carr, who stood 6-foot-5 and had the ability to simply go over the top of the much shorter defensive backs who generally ply the trade in the CFL.

With Carr signing as a free agent with Edmonton over the winter, the Bombers have brought in Pierce and eight other rookies to challenge Jade Etienne to be Carr’s replacement this season.

Intimidating

It’s all been a bit intimidating for Pierce, who’d never been outside the U.S. until he showed up in Winnipeg on Monday and whose CFL experience until he got on the field Wednesday consisted of watching YouTube videos of Carr and the Bombers from last year.

“It’s all new to me,” said Pierce, 24. “It’s nerve-wrecking. I’ve been real nervous, but everyone’s been nice and helping me through everything and trying to make the transition easier.

“It’s tough competition. But I think once I learn the game it will slow down for me.”

And learn the field, too. Nineteen of the 31 rookies in camp this year are Americans and that means even the simplest things every Canadian takes for granted about the CFL can catch them by surprise.

“The only thing that is odd is the goalposts,” said defensive lineman Alex Hall, a Maryland native. He noted how the posts being planted on the goal-line in Canada, instead of at the back of the end zone like it is done in the U.S. today, reminded him of grainy NFL films.

“I don’t want to run into the goalposts, like it’s 1960 or something.”

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca