Reid fights battle of wounded knee

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/09/2011 (5483 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In the end, history will record the highlight of Fred Reid’s 2011 CFL season actually came two days before the regular season even began.

On June 29, Reid and the Bombers announced they agreed to terms on a contract extension. All parties were delighted with the arrangement. For the Bombers, it was a chance to lock down the CFL’s leading rusher in 2010 for the foreseeable future. For Reid, it was a chance to get some security, financial and otherwise.

What no one could have anticipated — not the Bombers and not Reid — was that it would be all downhill from that day as Reid would spend the rest of the 2011 season struggling, mostly in vain, to regain the explosive running style that won him the rushing title last year.

And then, just as he was finally showing glimpses of the old magic, an already trying season came to the worst possible end for Reid in Toronto last weekend when an Argos defender landed on top of his leg and shredded the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee.

“When I went to make my cut up the field, the defensive lineman made a good play on me and stuck his arms out and grabbed me. And I fell awkwardly and he landed on my leg,” Reid said Wednesday afternoon in his first public comments since the Bombers announced Monday the injury had ended his season.

“Things like that happen in this sport. It’s too bad, but it is what it is.”

The final line on Reid in 2011 — 181 carries for 759 yards and four touchdowns.

The total yardage and touchdown numbers weren’t terribly far off Reid’s 2010 pace, when he finished the season with 1,396 yards and six touchdowns. But the real story was in his average yards per carry, just 4.2 yards this season compared with the 6.6-yard average he put up in 2010 and a 5.8- yard career average. Why were the yards so much harder to come by this year? Reid still isn’t sure.

“The defences were most definitely more geared up to face me,” he said. “They knew I had a pretty big year last year and I knew they were going to play extra hard when they came to play me. But that’s no excuse. I still needed to be productive and get my yards and do more to help the team win.

“Of course, we didn’t start out the way I wanted to start out. But I felt like I was progressing. I didn’t have the type of performances I want to have, but I felt like I was going to work every day and trying to get better.”

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A torn ACL is a serious injury at any position, but can be particularly tough to come back from for running backs, who make their living by their ability to cut hard, sharp and fast.

But the Bombers say they want Reid back and he says he’s determined to reward the faith they showed him with that contract extension.

“There’s no question in my mind at all that I can get back into the same shape I was in and maybe even better,” he said “I’m going to work hard at it.”

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca