O’Shea big on the ‘old school’ stuff as Bombers open preseason schedule next week

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 05/06/2015 (4078 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Mike O’Shea is big on grit and determination and the ‘old school’ stuff that matters to football coaches all over the planet.

And so while he tries to be understanding and patient, the growing list of walking wounded at Winnipeg Blue Bombers camp has to be equal parts concerning and annoying – especially with the club opening its preseason schedule next Tuesday in Toronto against the Argonauts.

Not practising Friday due to a variety of ailments were offensive linemen Patrick Neufeld, Marc Dile and Stanley Bryant, defensive lineman Zach Anderson, receivers Nick Moore, Rory Kohlert, Julian Feoli-Gudino, Addison Richards and Justin Veltung, safety Maurice Leggett, running back Bradley Randle, defensive back Bruce Johnson, linebackers Justin Warden, Graig Newman and Dan West.

Now, every team suffers through a swack of injuries early in camp, but with the preseason tilt just a few days away – and the regular season opening in just over three weeks – the Bombers need every rep of every day to make their evaluations.

And so it was with that backdrop that O’Shea was asked following practice Friday if those who were healthy and participating were helping themselves by grinding it out every day.

“I like toughness, obviously. I like guys who gut it out. That’s important to me,” said O’Shea. “When you’re down in numbers it also means they are forced to take more reps, so what you have to do as a coaching staff is drop the numbers in terms of your practice reps and you have to be able to pick them up at some point later. it’s just a bit of a balancing act. Sometimes what happens when you get injuries at certain positions it can wear the guy out a little bit in front of him.

“We’ll have to keep that in mind and manage it properly before the game so they can show their best stuff come Toronto.”

O’Shea said the Bombers will dress 54 players in Toronto and that while his plan for the five quarterbacks on the depth chart has been set, the pivots had yet to be told of the rotation. The roster will be a mix of veterans and rookies, but likely will be dominated by some of the fresh faces.

“You just look through the roster and look where some guys are nicked up… it’s going to play out differently in certain areas,” said O’Shea. “There in itself, is a challenge. If you want to get a good look at some tailbacks then you’ve need to keep productive on the O-line. So you can’t just put all the young guys in all at once. Or you have to take that into account.

“We’ll bring 54 guys and they’ll be ready to play, they’ll know what they’re supposed to do and they’ll play hard.”

The Bombers did make one addition on Friday, signing import linebacker Tony Burnett. A 6-1, 205-pound product of USC, Burnett was signed by the San Diego Chargers after going undrafted in 2013. While with the Trojans, Burnett played a number of positions, including cornerback, linebacker and safety.

ed.tait@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPEdTait