TRYING TO FILL DRESSLER's SHOES

Roughriders slotback Weston Dressler was on crutches while watching practice Tuesday. He sprained his ankle and fractured his fibula in Saturday's game against the Toronto Argonauts.
Photograph by: Karen Brownlee, Leader-Post

REGINA — The Saskatchewan Roughriders’ offence will feature more motion by receivers in the coming weeks.

It has less to do with newly designed plays than with the sprained ankle and fractured fibula suffered Saturday by slotback Weston Dressler. With Dressler out of the lineup, the Roughriders are expected to move a raft of receivers through his spot.

“In our formations, we’re really, really multiple so it’ll just be a tweaking of how we call formations to get other people to play in that spot,” head coach Ken Miller said Tuesday at Mosaic Stadium. “It won’t be a big musical chairs kind of thing (or) different from how we’ve been approaching our offence.”

“You’ll notice different formations to put different people in who can utilize their strengths,” added offensive co-ordinator Paul LaPolice. “You’ll see (wideout) Gerran Walker at times playing the slot when we may do a speed sweep or something. Some of the things that he does carry into Weston’s speed. Then you can have maybe a Jason Clermont as somebody who can go over the middle and catch a football.”

Rob Bagg also is expected to get some time in Dressler’s spot during Saturday’s game against the host Calgary Stampeders — provided he recovers from the back spasms which ended his Tuesday workout early. LaPolice and Miller said they expected Bagg would be fine.

After Bagg’s departure Tuesday, the starting receivers were Walker and Johnny Quinn outside and Clermont, Andy Fantuz and Chris Getzlaf inside. Chris Jones, Adam Nicolson and Jason Armstead also may be involved.

“It’s going to be evaluated from day to day,” LaPolice said of the mixing and matching at the various positions. “(It’s) more seeing how Chris Jones, Adam Nicolson, Jason Armstead and Johnny Quinn play at the field spot.”

LaPolice noted Armstead will have an increased role as a receiver in the future, but the coaches “just feel he can’t be a full-time starter and still be as productive as he’s been on special teams.”

Nicolson has been on the roster in six of the past seven games, but he doesn’t have a catch this season. Jones played in the Roughriders’ first three regular-season games, catching four passes for 22 yards. Quinn, who hasn’t played since Aug. 7, had four receptions for 83 yards over his four games on the roster.

“I have to make sure there’s no dropoff,” Quinn said. “I have to catch the ball well, be where I need to be, be where Darian (Durant) expects me to be and, when the ball is in Wes Cates’ hands or Stu Foord’s, make sure I’m blocking well for them.

“I just have to make sure I do what I need to do in all aspects of the game.”
The current group of receivers would expect nothing less. The starters also aren’t worried about having to get used to different faces in the receiving corps.

“When you go through practice, you have guys take reps as backups, so it shouldn’t be that much of an adjustment,” said Fantuz, who may face more double coverage in Dressler’s absence.

“(There may be) a little bit of different timing on certain plays, but we’re just going to have to work through it this week and for the next few weeks and just get better and better as we go. Guys have been in the position to play all year and now they get their chance. It’ll be fun to see what happens.”

It’s happened previously, too. In recent seasons, players have been forced to step in due to injuries to starters on offence like Fantuz, D.J Flick, Belton Johnson and Gene Makowsky.

“For the past couple years, we’ve been going through tough injuries and the thing our organization does is we keep talent up and down the board,” Durant said. “We have guys that are ready to step in, ready to play, and I’m confident in everybody we put out there.”

ihamilton@leaderpost.canwest.com