With files from BCLions.com
Jonathon Jennings is the punch in the arm the Lions needed.
The 23-year-old was a powerful energy boost on Saturday night, making big plays with his legs and his arm and doing what most quarterbacks can only dream of – making something happen when nothing seems possible.
His offensive teammates like Emmanuel Arceneaux and Andrew Harris felt the energy all night, while defensive back Ryan Phillips was one of the lucky ones who got to watch it.
“My guy’s like a video game,” said Phillips. “He’s like a create-a-player sometimes.”
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Phillips has seen every type of quarterback possible in his 11-year career with the Lions, catching the tail-end of Casey Printers’ BC career and then watching the emergence of the likes of Buck Pierce, Travis Lulay and current Eskimos star pivot Mike Reilly after that.
Something about Jennings, Phillips said, is unique.
“He makes plays, and that’s the thing about it – but he stays poised,” Phillips noted following the Lions’ 46-20 win over the Riders. “Even though he’s young and everybody wants to say ‘he’s the young guy, he might make some young mistakes’ – at the end of the day he’s always poised, he’s always looking down field.
“He’s going through his progressions, he’s not out there just kind of sporadic or anything like that.”
Statistically, Jennings’ second career CFL start is among the best ever. For a 23-year-old the numbers are out of this world – and yet they could’ve been so much more.
Jennings finished his night with 364 passing yards on 19-of-25 passing with four touchdowns and zero interceptions, but most of his passing yards came in the first half and the first possession of the second half. He exited the first half with 266 passing yards, then threw an 82-yard touchdown pass to Arceneaux on the second half’s opening play.
Jennings added to his big night with a receiving touchdown late in the fourth quarter, when Austin Collie took the end-around and fired to the end zone for him on the gadget play. With the win, the Lions moved into sole possession of third in the West and more importantly a playoff spot, ahead of the Montreal Alouettes.
Just as importantly, the Lions are starting to feel like they have their franchise quarterback of the future.
“It’s a tribute to how he plays and what his attributes are,” said running back Harris. “His legs and his arm, you can’t really compare it to anyone else – he’s basically like a young Casey Printers I would compare him to.
“He makes plays when most quarterbacks you’d count them out, and he extends plays,” added Harris. “He stands in the pocket and he throws darts, and a couple of passes there he floated them over the defender so he has that touch. He has a lot of skill and he’s going to get better.”
For Jennings it was just doing a job. He got his first taste of regular season playing time in a loss to the Stamps two weeks ago when John Beck went down with an injury. Jennings made that game close but struggled to finish drives, while two late Calgary touchdowns put the game on ice.
Last week he made his first career start and showed well, going on the road to face the league’s leading defence in the Edmonton Eskimos, guiding the Lions to a 23-7 lead in the third quarter. But for the second straight week, Jennings struggled to get points on the board later in the game.
The Eskimos scored 22 unanswered points to win the game. Entering this week, Jennings said he told his teammates that if they help him out, he’d return the favour. On Saturday vs. Saskatchewan everyone was firing on all cylinders.
“We’ve been talking all week and you know, I’m always telling those guys, ‘go out there and help me out and I’ll try to help you out’,” said Jennings. “They went out there and did a great job for me and it’s exciting.
“I think they’re excited, we’re out there making plays and receivers are having fun,” he added. “But there’s still work to be done. We’re just going to take it day by day and continue to work.”
There’s no doubt Jennings had all the answers on Saturday, and his future on Canada’s west coast is a bright one. But what about the Lions’ situation moving forward?
Travis Lulay is returning to health and is the veteran leader of the Lions’ offence, and a quarterback controversy in BC was hardly envisioned a month ago when Johnson was the third man on the team depth chart.
Yet with the team jumping into a playoff spot and the games getting bigger, how can the Lions ignore Jennings’ recent production? On Saturday Johnson was the most exciting player in the building.
“When you can make big plays like that, everybody gets excited obviously,” said Head Coach Jeff Tedford. “I thought Jonathon played a really good game. He didn’t turn the football over, he handled the blitz very well, got rid of the football, didn’t take sacks.
“It was a very good outing for him and the team has a lot of respect for him the way he comes to work every day and prepares.”
The next step, of course, will be consistency. Jennings is far from the first quarterback to flash brilliance in his first two starts, and he won’t be the last. Many quarterbacks falter after their first few starts, especially as opponents have more film to work with and defences catch on.
Consistency, meanwhile, also often eludes young quarterbacks.
“Two starts are two starts,” added Tedford. “You’ve got to give him credit, whether he has 12 starts or two: The way he played tonight was pretty impressive and now it’s about consistency.
“It’s about doing it each and every week,” Tedford continued. “Like I said, he’s a very poised, confident young man but a very humbling young man.
“I think Coach Cortez did a great job preparing him for what’s going on, he had most of the answers for what they were doing and he wasn’t rattled whatsoever.”
The Lions’ next game will be their biggest, a home date next Saturday with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. The Bombers are a game back of BC for the third and final playoff spot in the West, and that game will hold the key to the Lions’ path to the playoffs.
BC will take time to enjoy Saturday’s win, but it won’t be long.
“There’s no doubt about it, it’s definitely going to be a crucial game,” said Phillips of the looming clash with Winnipeg. “They’re trying to get where we are right now, they’re trying to switch spots with us and we’re all fighting for a playoff spot right now so we’ve got to go out there and take care of business.
“We have to beat the teams we’re supposed to beat and right now you get a fair opportunity every single time you go out. We have to make sure we have an outing similar to this.”
Every successful season has a turning point, so have the Lions found theirs in their 23-year-old rookie pivot? Time will tell, but so far so good.
Jonathon Jennings the future? Right now he’s the present.
Another Rookie in the Record Books
Well, his first career start at home will certainly be one to remember for Lions rookie pivot Jonathon Jennings and interestingly, it comes in the same week as the league’s most veteran quarterback Henry Burris rewrote the record books with an amazing performance of his own. For Jennings however, the numbers are somewhat historic from a club perspective. In Saturday’s 46-20 win over Saskatchewan, he became the 19th pivot in Lions history to throw for four TD’s in one game, the fourth to do it in just his first season and just the second QB to do it as early as his second career start.
The other Leos to ring-up four passing majors in their first season were Jerry Gustafson in 1956, followed two seasons later by Al Dorow in 1958 and some guy named Doug Flutie rang-up four in 1990. The talented Casey Printers is the only other Lion to have done it by his second-ever start, but it came in his second season as a pro in BC. Just nine players in modern CFL history (1950-2015) have accomplished such a feat so early in their careers (second career start) and none capped off their performance with a touchdown reception as Jennings did on Saturday afternoon.
Welcome to the history books Jonathon.