There’s a lot of talk leading up to Sunday’s Grey Cup game about the dominant running back in the CFL, and how the ground game will be a key factor when the Toronto Argonauts face the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in Vancouver.
It’s easy to get lost in the hype. The Bombers’ Brady Oliveira has been exceptionally good, leading the league with 1,353 rushing yards. He has good hands out of the backfield and is a fantastic combination of speed, quickness, and power.
What’s been lost in much of the lead-up to game is that Toronto has a pretty good running back of its own.
Ka’Deem Carey joined Oliveira and William Stanback as the only CFL backs to crack the 1,000-yard rushing mark. Carey finished with 1,060, but he did it with 48 fewer carries than his Winnipeg counterpart.
Is he fired up about the chance to face the West Division’s nominee for Most Outstanding Player and Most Outstanding Canadian?
“Of course,” he admitted to Argonauts.ca. “I love playing against great backs, great defences. When you get this opportunity, you just lick your chops. You find anything for motivation and this is a great one to use.”
Fans of “old school” running attacks will enjoy watching both players on Sunday. Carey runs hard, exploding into the smallest of gaps, and he’s never afraid to initiate contact. He’s also in possession of a good set of hands out of the backfield and is a devastating blocker.
He’s joined in the backfield by Deonta McMahon and Dan Adeboboye as the Argos “three-headed monster,” which has reduced the number of carries for the 32-yard old leader of that pack.
The load management has left him fresh for the post-season, and the Argos have left no doubt who the main man of the trio is. Against Ottawa in the Eastern Semi-Final, Carey had 9 of the Argos 10 carries, adding 12 of the team’s 13 against the Alouettes in the Eastern Final. The only carry he didn’t get was while he was on the bench, catching his breath after a 49-yard run two plays earlier. He’d finish with 92 yards, the major contributor to the team’s 135-yard day.
Appropriately, Carey’s love affair with the Argos was sealed on Valentine’s Day this year, the day he inked a free-agent deal after four seasons in Calgary.
What were the reasons he opted to sign in Toronto?
“Everything,” he said matter of factly. “When you look around, it was the perfect match for me. They had the best offensive line, the best QB, they spread everything around to make my job easier. Their defence was hungry. They had a hungry coach. When I got on the phone with Coach Dinwiddie, he made it very comfortable. He just said we’re going to run the ball, we’re going to keep you healthy, we’re going to get your back. It was just as sweet and short as that. That’s all I wanted to hear, and it just made me excited that I could be that missing piece to finish the job.”
It will be interesting to see how the Bombers defence attacks the Argos on Sunday. One theory is that they add an additional player to the box to help defend Carey and the running game, in the process challenging Nick Arbuckle to beat them through the air.
Carey is confident Arbuckle, who will start at quarterback for the injured Chad Kelly, can get them to the top of the mountain.
“Nick brings everything to us,” said the University of Arizona’s all-time leading rusher. “The way he can carry this team, the way he can motivate each person, he just slings it with fire. He gets everybody involved in the game. He’s my soldier, I ain’t going to lie. I’m going to help him along the way; running, blocking for him, and we’re going to work together to get the job done as a team and he’s going to lead us.”
At 32-years-old Carey’s body has been through a lot. A two-time consensus All-American with the Wildcats, he played three seasons with the Chicago Bears before heading north to Calgary, where he was twice named the Stampeders Most Outstanding Player, leading the CFL in rushing in 2022.
He knows he’s closer to the end of his career than the beginning and acknowledges that makes this game mean even more.
“It makes it that much more exciting, that’s for sure,” he said. “The last time I was here was in my rookie year I was 26, so time flies. So, while I’m here I’m going to take advantage of these moments, and that’s what I try to tell my young running backs or the young people on this team, that when you get here it’s time to capitalize, and it would be cool that as an Argo you could get two of the last three (Grey Cups).”
The championship two years ago was won in freezing conditions in Regina, where each outdoor practice that week was held in temperatures that dipped below -30 C with the wind chill. Carey had a smile on his face when reminded of those conditions, and that he’ll be playing indoors on Sunday.
“All the chips are just lining up” he said, now sporting a giant smile. “If I had to pick a championship game to play in, I think I chose the right one.”