Courtesy Vancouver Sun:

Wally Buono was singing the praises of his starting quarterback for Sunday’s West Division final, mentioning the various ways that Jarious Jackson can beat a team, with his arm, his legs and “his courage.”

It’s agreed that every B.C. Lion is reading from the same song sheet, and Jackson is the choirmaster. Still, it won’t take many discordant notes from Jackson for Buono to quickly change his tune.

“We have three very capable quarterbacks who are capable of stepping up,” the head coach says. “It’s not as if we’re going to put all our eggs in one basket. We’re not going to have a long leash or a short leash. We’re going to be fair. If the quarterback doesn’t do his job, or he does too much freelancing, then he’s going to get pulled.”

Jackson may be one upwardly mobile quarterback, springing from third-stringer to crunch-time starter over the course of half a season, but if balls start flying off his right hand as if marinated in butter, at the slightest whiff of urgency, there’s little question that Buono will make a move. What other CFL team, after all, has a quarterback with Dave Dickenson’s credentials standing in reserve?

“I believe the decision is right to start Jarious,” Dickenson said Thursday. “Jarious is playing well. He’s certainly throwing the ball well. He’s certainly taken his game to a new level over the past six or seven weeks. But, in the playoffs, you do have a greater sense of urgency [to change things up]. That’s just the way it is.”

You don’t have to be a neurologist to understand the mixed feelings rattling around in Dickenson’s brain. He is usually the central character in the big games — the controversial starter over most outstanding player Casey Printers in the 2004 Grey Cup, the game MVP of the franchise’s fifth championship last year in Winnipeg, the ridiculous 73-per-cent passer who threw three touchdown passes in a breezy 45-18 win over Saskatchewan in last year’s West Division final.

He was the major player signing in 2003 that represented the rebirth of the franchise, the beginning of a new era of high standards, four first-place pennants and burgeoning attendance. More than 50,000 fans will be in the seats for Sunday’s game, a goodly number who embraced the Lions and the CFL again when Dickenson was signed to displace Damon Allen as the team’s marquee player.

“He brought credibility and leadership,” president Bob Ackles re-stated Thursday, while watching the Lions prep at BC Place. “At the end of my first season [Ackles was hired for his second go-round with the Lions in April, 2002], I knew we had to make changes, even though we’d had a decent year. People just weren’t going to accept Damon Allen as their starting quarterback for another year.”

Now that question is being turned on Dickenson, with his hefty salary, history of concussions, the signing of Buck Pierce to a long-term deal, Jackson’s emergence and even the under-the-radar recruitment of Gino Guidugli.

“It [Sunday] could be my last game,” Dickenson admits. “And it’s not just because we could be eliminated. There are other issues, contractual issues. There’s no guarantee [he'll be back]. You’d like to go out the right way. The tough thing is, very few guys do go out on top. I had the option last year if I wanted to. But I still feel as if I’ve got more football in me. This is what I like.”

Although this could be a very poignant and reflective time in his career, in his life, Dickenson won’t allow himself to wallow in nostalgia. He wants his head space in the now. The future, however, is only a few tomorrows away, and closing rapidly.

Dickenson knows full well the decision to end his time in B.C. won’t be of his choosing. But if he yearns to play beyond 2007, would he consider moving on?

“I don’t want to answer that now,” he says. “You’d better be in the moment. Or else you’ll be on vacation before you know it.”

Playing a little team politics, Buono says there’ll be no designated No. 3 quarterback for Sunday’s game. Dickenson and Pierce, formerly No. 1 and 1A, are now No. 2 and 2a, the coach proclaims, though you could label the quarterback carousel a different way: Jackson (Rising), Pierce (Holding), Dickenson (Fading).

“I feel fortunate and thankful I’m back in the mix,” says Dickenson, whose latest troubles began when he was concussed July 13 in Regina after a hit from the Roughriders’ Fred Perry. “But you don’t really appreciate the season we’ve had [a franchise-record 14 wins] if you don’t play. I understand how team dynamics work, and it’s been a good dynamic this year. I am where I am because I haven’t played enough football. Even last year, I played the better part of 12 or 13 games before my concussion [Sept. 16 vs. Montreal]. That’s three months of football. This year, if you stack my whole year together, it’s about three weeks. I don’t feel as quick and strong as I have in the past, because I took so much time off.”

From the sounds of it, he won’t have to clear out space for many more game balls in his trophy case.

The again, he’s ready to make the case, with the game and the ball in his hand, that he’s still Dave Dickenson.

But there is no way, today, to know if serendipity will shine on him again.