Janarion Grant scooped up the ball on one hop at the eight-yard line, planted his left foot into the frozen turf at Mosaic Stadium and then did what the Winnipeg Blue Bombers ace kick returner has done so often in his young Canadian Football League career: He made magic by zigging, zagging and then rocketing through the Toronto Argonauts kick-cover unit for a Grey Cup record 102-yard punt return touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter – a score which put the Blue Bombers up 23-14 and seemingly put them into position to win a third straight championship.
JANARION GRANT OPENS THE 4TH QUARTER WITH A BANG! 💣
102-yard punt return touchdown!
#GreyCup109 pic.twitter.com/kTieFL7HJp
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) November 21, 2022
That moment should have gone down in Blue Bombers folklore, especially as it came one week after Grant had done the exact same thing in the Western Final as he sliced through the B.C. Lions for a 97-yard TD as part of another huge play from the special teams.
Except, as we all well know, Grant’s heroics not only didn’t become part of this franchise’s storied legacy of championship game plays, it was also ultimately overshadowed by breakdowns on defence at inopportune times in the final 14 minutes, an offence that struggled to find a rhythm and a kicking game that was all over the map.
And it could be said what happened immediately after the Grant TD – Marc Lieggho’s ensuing convert attempt was wide, keeping a potential 10-point lead at nine as the Toronto Argonauts rallied for a 24-23 win – essentially serves a snapshot of the Blue Bombers special teams work in 2022. In summation, there was so much good occasionally punctuated by disappointment.
All of this will make the Blue Bombers kicking game one of the most compelling storylines to track as training camp opens next week and a good place to begin with the first instalment in our annual Positional Preview series.
UPDATE: The kicking game storyline became even more compelling with the news Thursday the Blue Bombers had scooped up veteran Sergio Castillo, not long after he had been released by the Edmonton Elks.
This will be Castillo’s third stint with the club as he began his CFL career with Winnipeg in 2015 and was then acquired in a trade with the B.C. Lions in October of 2021.
He has a CFL career field-goal percentage of 85.5 and, as many Blue Bombers fans recall, was a perfect 5-of-5 for the club in the 108th Grey Cup victory over the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in 2021. Castillo was good on 37-of-44 last year (84.1 percent) with the Elks.
Back to Liegghio…
Working in his first full season as the Blue Bombers kicker last year, connected on 32 of his 39 field goal attempts for an 82.1 percentage – seventh amongst the nine place kickers in the CFL. He was fifth in punting average (46.9) and fourth in kickoff distance (63.9 yards) and his 91.8 convert completion percentage ranked eighth.
There were some superb streaks inside his season – he didn’t miss a field goal in the first four games and was 12-for-12 over a stretch of seven games from late August into October, including a 55-game winner in a Labour Day Classic win in Saskatchewan – but also some obvious inconsistencies. Those included a 32-yard field goal attempt on the last play in regulation and then a miss in overtime in a loss to Montreal that ended a 9-0 start to the season, going just 4-of-9 in two games at B.C. Place and then connecting on four of five field goal attempts in the playoffs, but also missing half of his six converts in the postseason.
Even before bringing back Castillo, Lieghhio was already going to be facing considerable challenges to his job as the placekicker and punter. The club will have two other placekickers in camp in imports Chandler Staton and Mark Orozco – Chandler is an Appalachian State product who had a look last year from the Green Bay Packers while Oroczo is from Grambling State and most recently was playing arena ball – along with two punters in Canadian Chris MacLean, a U-Sports All-Canadian last year with the Calgary Dinos and American Devin Anctil, who holds the Kansas State career punting average at 44.8.
And just to even further muddy the picture, the Blue Bombers then added two more punters in the Global Draft on Tuesday in Jamieson Sheahan, an Aussie who was a Second-Team All-Pac 12 last year at Cal and 36-year-old Bermuda product Karl Schmitz, who has had NFL looks from Tampa, Denver and Carolina Panthers.
Mike Benson is back to handle the long-snapping chores and with the dangerous Grant handling the returning, the Blue Bombers have two of the best in the biz at their respective positions.
Castillo’s arrival now brings more competition and a sense of stability to the placekicking position heading into camp.
THE SPECIALISTS
The Returnees:
Placekicker/punter: Marc Liegghio*
Long-snapper: Mike Benson*
Punt returns: Janarion Grant
Kickoff returns: Janarion Grant
The New Faces
Placekicker: Sergio Castillo (returning for third stint with the team), Chandler Staton, Marc Orozco
Punter: Devin Anctil, Chris MacLean*
Returner: Various candidates to be determined during camp
*Indicates: Canadian
Keep an eye on: K Marc Orozco
He had a solid career at Grambling State, where he connected on 78.6 per cent of his field goals before starring in the National Arena League. He is apparently capable of handling all three kicking chores, just as Liegghio did last year.
That is what will now be the intriguing story within the placekicking battle in camp – will the club lean to having just one kicker handle all three chores, or use two spots to get the best placekicker and punter on the roster?
Did you know?
The Blue Bombers have been the least-penalized team on specials over in each of the last three years. They were first in 2019 with 30 infractions on special teams; first in 2021 with 19 and first last season with just 14 – 20 fewer than the next lowest teams (Hamilton, Montreal and Saskatchewan were all at 34).
Notable Number: 7
Janarion Grant has seven kick-return touchdowns in just 33 games with the Blue Bombers dating back to 2019 and is already the franchise’s all-time kick return touchdown leader, with seven and counting. That includes six punt returns and one on a kickoff.
His total is nine all-time, if his punt return touchdowns in the Western Final and Grey Cup from last year are included.
The Blue Bombers open rookie camp on May 10th with the Sio main training camp following on May 14th. This is the first installment of our annual positional-preview series leading up to the first day.
