News
August 25, 2012
Chris O’Leary
Edmonton Journal
As he watched Kyries Hebert obliterate Onrea Jones with a block on Thursday night, Fred Stamps relaxed, put his feet up and got ready to re-enter his own world of pain.
Stamps had the previous six days away from contact in practice with his Edmonton Eskimos to let his wounds heal after offering his six-foot, 188-pound frame up as a crash test dummy through the team’s first seven games this year.
On Friday, he picked up his helmet and got back into the routine, prepping for the next car crash – Monday’s Canadian Football League game against the Toronto Argonauts.
“My body feels much better, I’ll tell you that,” he said as he sat in one of the Eskimo gaiters outside of the end zone at Commonwealth Stadium. “I had my legs under me and I felt a little faster today – but I was running against a lot of slow guys on the team,” he said, cracking a smile. “So it was fun.”
Stamps has had his fun on the field this year, but it’s come at a cost. A 1,000-plus-yard receiver the last three seasons, he is missing the attention-drawing abilities that fellow slotback Adarius Bowman provided a year ago, when the duo tied in yardage (1,153) to lead the team in receiving.
Stamps seems to get crunched with a cruel regularity this year.
On his first reception against Montreal last week – a leaping 29-yard grab – he took a hard hit from defensive back Dwight Anderson. Former Eskimo linebacker Rod Davis put a big hit on Stamps in the fourth quarter as well. The hit list runs deep for Stamps. He was hammered on a touchdown-attempt against the BC Lions in Vancouver in Week 4; He took a hard smack in Week 5 in Winnipeg, as well.
“People are going to take hits,” Stamps said. “I run a lot more different routes since (Bowman) is down. I may be taking some of the hits that his big body takes.”
Although Stamps has been on the receiving end of some painful hits this year, he and the rest of the league may have to take a back seat to what Jones, a Hamilton Tiger-Cat wide receiver, went through on Thursday.
Hebert, a Montreal Alouette safety, threw a devastating block at Jones after Jerald Brown intercepted Ti-cats pivot Henry Burris. Jones rolled backward, heels-over-head from the impact.
Stamps knows first-hand what Hebert is capable of.
“I went to school with Kyries,” Stamps said. “I was a freshman (at Louisiana-Lafayette) and he was hitting guys like that in practice.
“We used to get it like that in practice and that’s what you expect, guys like that are going to give you 100 per cent every time. That’s the type of players you have to respect, because those are the type of guys you want in the CFL. If anybody else is going to give you a love tap, the games wouldn’t be fun. (The physicality) is a good thing.”
If the crispness in the air in Edmonton on Friday wasn’t enough of an indication, the midpoint of the Canadian Football League season is nearing. Nine games in, hobbled players become the norm. “I feel like the last three years I’ve been playing with pain,” Stamps said.
“You can play hurt but you can’t play injured, that’s what I like to live by. It’s football, you’re going to hurt. You can’t sit out for every knick and knack you’re going to get.”
Stamps said there was never any doubt in his status for Monday’s game. Eskimo head coach Kavis Reed said that Stamps looked refreshed in practice.
“He made a lot of catches and we tested him on a lot of deep balls, just to be certain the soreness was gone and that he’s ready to play,” he said.
Having praised his player’s toughness over the past year and half he has been with the Eskimos, Reed compared Stamps to the permanently durable Timex watch.
“You throw him around and he keeps on ticking,” he said. “Fred is one of those guys who loves football and will sacrifice his body for his football team. I respect the way he plays this game.”
coleary@ edmontonjournal.com
Twitter.com/olearychris
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