Jun
Lions serch for Wake’s replacement
Courtesy Vancouver Province:
After watching Cam Wake for two CFL seasons, reporters were tripping over themselves, scrambling for the press box thesaurus to find just the right superlatives and reverential adjectives.
Wake defined himself in his first rookie camp when, before practice had even begun, he nonchalantly demonstrated his athleticism by dunking a basketball flat-footed.
Overflowing with childhood joy, Wake vaulted from fourth on the depth chart at training camp to the CFL’s rookie and defensive player of the year by the end of his first season.
Words didn’t do him justice. Numbers fared better. Try 39, the number of sacks Wake recorded in 36 regular-season starts for the Lions before jumping to the Miami Dolphins. It is arguable that the total really wasn’t a true reflection of Wake’s excellence, however, because he was often double and triple-teamed, sacrificing his personal stats for the team welfare. How do you replace a player like that? By committee.
“I don’t want 23 sacks [Wake's league-leading number last season] out of that position,” maintains Lions head coach Wally Buono. “What I want is for this guy [defensive tackle Aaron Hunt], and this guy [nose tackle] and this guy [Brent Johnson] to pick up more sacks. I think we have five good candidates to replace Cam.”
The pledges at rush end this year are Gary Butler, Xavier Mitchell, Kyle Mitchell (no relation), second-year pro Caesar Rayford and fourth-year player Rick Foley, back to claim the job he thought was his two years ago before Wake exploded on the scene.
Butler, from California University in Pennsylvania, would seem to have the longest odds facing him given that he played at Division II Cal U. By contrast, his roommate, Xavier Mitchell, has a more suitable pedigree. Like Wake, who played at Penn State, Mitchell appeared in 47 games over four seasons at Tennessee.
