SOME SAY THEY'RE THROWING DUCKS IN CANADA, OR MAYBE TORONTO

by Neate Sager, Out Of Left Field

NFL washouts and former college stars don't die ... they just run fade routes at Canadian Football League camps.

They migrate north each spring, players who have name quality due to having played for a college that plays in a huge bowl game every year or being a former first-round NFL draft choice. Each spring, those of us who drank the Canadian football Kool-Aid at an early age -- it's a superior game, just with lesser players, I swear! -- secretly root for them to fall flat on their faces.

True, the NFL has more fans. Sure, its teams play in front of crowds of 80,000 instead of 30,000 and its players are paid a lot more money to risk life and limb while playing a shorter schedule. (It's 18 games up here.) But, but ... the Canadian game has only three downs. It has unlimited motion, no fair catch on punts and it revived Doug Flutie's career.

You see where the resentment comes from. Anywho, this spring grades out as exceptional for seeing U.S. players fail to hack it up here in the alien north. As outlined above, there's a major attitude adjustment when you go from the big time to the Triple-A league, and some players can't change their thinking.

Chris Leak, the former Florida Gators QB who won a national championship in 2006, nearly set some kind of record for the fastest flameout. He was signed by the Hamilton Tiger-Cats last Tuesday ... and was released by the end of the week. The postings on the ticats.ca message board, however accurate, paint a picture of a guy who thought the CFL was beneath him. Leak has been picked up by the Montréal Alouettes, though. That puts him in direct competition for a job with a former Florida State QB, Adrian McPherson.

Here's a few others from the rogues' gallery:
DAVID BOSTON, Toronto Argonauts

In 2006, Some people reacted to the Argos' signing of that spliff smoker Ricky Williams like someone had tossed kittens off the CN Tower. There hasn't been a peep about the Argos signing Boston, the former Pro Bowl wideout who's failed a steroid test, been arrested for reckless driving and pleaded no-contest to domestic violence. The Tampa Bay Bucs basically paid him to go away last year, giving him an injury settlement. Granted, those are the kind of antisocial acts athletes are supposed to commit, so maybe no one was able to feign being shocked and appalled.

Boston hasn't been cleared to practise due to an injured foot. It sort of makes you wonder why the Argos, who have added former Patriots wide receiver Bethel Johnson, even bothered giving him a tryout. (No doubt Boston fans are rooting for Johnson, since it strengthens the case that Tom Brady won a Super Bowl with a CFL receiving corps.)

PETER WARRICK & ADRIAN McPHERSON, Montréal Alouettes
Warrick, the one-time fourth overall NFL draft choice, has been let go by Montréal. He was in the Alouettes camp long enough to whinge to the media about not winning the Heisman Trophy back in 1999, as if anyone still gives a damn.

Meantime, McPherson seems to be keeping a low profile in Canada's most self-important city (some would say that's Toronto, but Toronto is actually important). Staying out of the news isn't such a bad thing for a man who was booted from Florida State stealing a blank cheque and who also had his leg run over by a mascot driving a golf cart when he was with the Saints in 2005. He has a big arm and speed, so it's fun to imagine what he might do on the larger Canadian field, so at this point you almost have to root for him.

TYRONE CALICO, Calgary Stampeders
Calico, a former Tennessee Titans, is a perfect fit with the Stamps, who give off the same vibe as the Cincinnati Bengals. The team hasn't necessarily brought in a bunch of miscreants; their entire roster could be as sober as a judge. The Stampeders just come off as a team where the inmates run the asylum, which was only exacerbated over the past couple seasons when the coach was Tom Higgins, football's answer to Ned Flanders.

Also, there's a lot of ways to act out in Calgary (if you go there for the Stampede in July, the hotels will gladly hold your wedding ring for safekeeping). No one really takes the Stampeders organization seriously, so it's not like getting stupid off the field is going to cost the team a shot at a championship. Calico's a pretty impressive package -- big and fast, he should be a prototype slotback. It looks like he might last in the CFL, long enough to help the Stampeders look impressive on paper -- again.