Bomber rookie in battle of the booters

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/11/2014 (3985 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For a moment in the second Bombers game of the season, Lirim Hajrullahu heard the buzz of almost 28,000 fans above him and felt the nerves flutter in his gut.

It was the last play of the first half on that July night. The Bombers were fighting to get back in the game, after the visiting Ottawa Redblacks had gone up 21-7 in just the first quarter. In the season opener, Hajrullahu hadn’t been tapped to do too much — just an eight-yard field goal, nothing major — but now the Bombers’ rookie kicker was staring down 47 yards between the ball and the uprights.

He fired off the kick. Made it. And looking back on it, maybe that was the moment Hajrullahu came into his own.

“After that, it was back to my old routine,” Hajrullahu said on the phone from his home in St. Catherine’s, Ont. “Once we made that, it was kind of… now I’m comfortable. It takes time to build trust in my holder, my snapper, and build the flow I need to go through my mechanics and make a field goal. Once we got to that point, now I could relax and do what I needed to do.”

That’s exactly what he did — and by the time 18 games were done, the entire league had taken note.

Thursday morning, Bombers head coach Mike O’Shea called Hajrullahu to share the good news: the kicker had been awarded the title of 2014 West Division Most Outstanding Special Teams Player, as voted on by CFL media and head coaches. This also means his name will stand against Toronto Argonauts kicker Swayze Waters, the East Division winner, for the honour of top special teams athlete in the entire league.

It’s stiff competition. Waters had a brilliant season, hitting 90.4 per cent of his field-goal attempts — Hajrullahu finished at 87 per cent — and betting odds might favour the Argonaut player’s name being called when the CFL awards are handed out in Vancouver on Nov. 27.

Whatever happens, it won’t take away from what Hajrullaju did, or the story of how an undrafted kid from Western marched his leg into Blue Bombers camp almost unknown, and marched back out a rising star.

It didn’t take long for fans to notice. He didn’t miss a field-goal attempt until the fourth game, then swiftly resumed making kicks at a rate former Bomber kicking great Troy Westwood joked was “at a percentage that I was kicking the extra point.”

In that second game of the season against Ottawa, Hajrullahu teed up three and made them all. He went 3-for-3 in the next game, too. But it wasn’t until July 25 that Bombers fans really saw what he could do.

Hajrullahu was sterling in B.C. that night, making all five of his field-goal attempts. The longest of those was a 51-yard hoof. By season’s end, only Waters and Hamilton kicker Jason Medlock could boast they’d made one from a longer distance.

“I knew I had the confidence to make it,” Hajrullahu said. “It helped me get over that bump. Sometimes the 50s are a little harder to get, so it kind of built motivation in myself and the team that I can extend the distance.”

By then, fans were buzzing about the up ‘n’ coming kicker. They flooded Hajrullahu’s Twitter account with well wishes; a couple weeks later, the Free Press’ Bartley Kives unveiled a parody music video, Hallelujah Hajrullahu, to add to the hype.

“That was awesome,” Hajrullahu said. “A lot of my coaches from university still joke about that.”

It was around that time Westwood started to take closer note.

“He was blasting his kickoffs and it was just real evident at that point in time,” Westwood said. “Right away I just noticed his technique. It’s very tight, but yet free-flowing. He’s got a real nice swing about him, then he can pound it too.”

‘When you’re able to punt and kick, you’re more involved in the game. You get the feel, especially when it gets cold and windy. You can feel the conditions. Being able to get out there and punt lets you use that as kind of a gauge for the kicking throughout’

— Lirim Hajrullahu

Most of all, Westwood saw a composure in Hajrullahu that felt sort of… familiar. The Bombers have a history of beloved franchise kickers, stretching back to Bob Cameron and Trevor Kennerd. Could this one be the next?

“He has a real unwavering temperament,” Westwood said. “I just think, when you combine that with his technique, which looks exceptionally sound, and his life experience… he’s got a certain calmness to him, and I think he’s going to have a fantastic career.”

It will take work, of course — starting with the punts. During pre-season, Hajrullahu made no secret his dream was to handle all three kicking jobs. After Mike Renaud hurt his hamstring in July, the rookie got his wish. He’d only punted a couple of seasons in university, and perhaps the inexperience showed: his 43.8-yard average was the third-lowest in the league, though the differences aren’t vast.

Hajrullahu will get a chance to do all three jobs again next season. But he’ll have to prove he should.

“I’m definitely going to be looking to improve in (the punting),” Hajrullahu said. “When you’re able to punt and kick, you’re more involved in the game. You get the feel, especially when it gets cold and windy. You can feel the conditions. Being able to get out there and punt lets you use that as kind of a gauge for the kicking throughout.”

He’ll have plenty of time to practise his punting this winter. Hajrullahu finished his master’s degree during the Bombers’ bye week, so now he’s staring at the first off-season he can remember with not a whole lot going on. He will train at a facility in Stoney Creek, Ont., about a 20-minute drive from his home. Other than that, he mused, he might take a part-time job — just for something to do.

Oh, and he’ll be in Vancouver for the CFL awards presentation, of course. Though he’s pumped for that individual honour, he’d rather he was getting ready for the Grey Cup game.

“I’d trade all this just to be in the playoffs this week,” Hajrullahu said. “I’ll be working extremely hard, and knowing what I need to do to compete. I’m on the right track, and I don’t want to be sent home this year around this time. I want to be playing.”

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca

Melissa Martin
Reporter-at-large

Melissa Martin reports and opines for the Winnipeg Free Press.

Every piece of reporting Melissa produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.