Courtesy Regina Leader Post:

John Chick’s arrival in Regina one year ago was an unheralded, low-key event, kind of befitting his personality.

He didn’t even make the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ opening day roster, but before their season ended he played 13 games, started nine (and three more in the playoffs), was voted the team’s outstanding rookie, had five sacks and 23 tackles, returned a fumble 70 yards for a touchdown, played at dangerously high RPMs, impressed his coaches because, as a diabetic, he wore an insulin pump during games, and contributed three sacks, a forced fumble and a quarterback sack in Saskatchewan’s Grey Cup victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.

Whew!

Is it going to be easy to sneak him on to the field this year?

“Probably not,” said Chick, who moves into that high-profile, rush-end spot for the first time tonight in a preseason game at Mosaic Stadium against the B.C. Lions (7 p.m., CKRM Radio).

“With Fred (Perry) being a big name and being gone, maybe the other teams will be keying on me a little bit now. I have to get better every day. That’s kind of our motto. It was our motto as last year went along and it continues this year.”

The Roughriders are moving Chick from the short side of the field to the wide side, where all the CFL’s best pass-rushing defensive ends line up. The Riders can do that because Fred Perry, Saskatchewan’s leading sacker the past two seasons, was traded in February to the Edmonton Eskimos.

“John has the ability, the quickness, the speed, to do things that Fred did,” said Riders defensive line coach Ron Estay. “(Pass-rushing linebacker Kitwana Jones) can do that, too, but we have to see how much he can take. We can alternate them, play him and John there, if we want.

“When you’ve got to cover the whole field and you’ve got a quarterback who can run, playing the wide side of the field is a real challenge. Just like other teams did with Fred, they’re going to know he’s a good player, so they will be thinking about him. He’ll have to make himself better every game.”

Off the field, Chick is a slow-motion, soft-spoken, aw-shucks kind of guy who originally drove to Regina from his home in Gillette, Wyo. A 6-foot-3, 250-pound product of Utah State, Chick tried out for the NFL’s Houston Texans in 2006 and lasted for three preseason games before being waived.

“I have goals,” said Chick. “Big goals. But they’re not number goals.”

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