TORONTO \u2014 After rallying the Toronto Argonauts to victory last week, Jarret Doege is expected to get his first start with the CFL club Friday night.<\/p>\n
Doege took the majority of starting reps Tuesday as Toronto (5-8) practised for the first time since its 31-30 home win over the Edmonton Elks on Saturday afternoon. The Argos host the Montreal Alouettes (6-7) in an important East Division matchup at BMO Field.<\/p>\n
Doege replaced injured starter Nick Arbuckle to engineer the Argos\u2019 winning drive, which was capped by Lirim Hajrullahu\u2019s 48-yard field goal with no time left. Arbuckle (calf) attended Tuesday\u2019s practice but didn\u2019t participate as Dinwiddie said the \u201924 Grey Cup MVP — who\u2019s started all of the club\u2019s games this season — will miss two-to-three weeks.<\/p>\n
Also not practising was Chad Kelly, the CFL\u2019s 2023 outstanding player who\u2019s on the six-game injured list still recovering from the fractured tibia and fibula he suffered in last year\u2019s East Division final versus Montreal. Toronto could pull Kelly from the six-game list, which would allow him to practise and show if he\u2019s ready to return to the field.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe could,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cAnd if we felt like that was the right route we\u2019d obviously make that decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie has been consistent in saying Kelly would resume playing once he was healthy enough to protect himself on the field. That\u2019s generally been interpreted as Kelly having the mobility to either move outside the pocket or effectively run upfield.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just right now I want to make sure when we put him out there he\u2019s ready to go,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cThe concern for me is he hasn\u2019t played a lot of football in a long time \u2026 there\u2019s a lot of things that go into it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trouble is, Toronto can\u2019t get Kelly ready to play if he\u2019s not practising.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the tough part, right,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cRight now it\u2019s mental reps in the meeting room, him getting his work (done) physically on his own.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie said while the hope is for Kelly to return this year, there\u2019s also the possibility that he won\u2019t.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s always hope for it (return),\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cHe wants to play, we want to get him out there as well, it\u2019s just not there yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wouldn\u2019t rule that (Kelly not returning in \u201925) out. That\u2019s kind of where we\u2019re at right now, just taking it day by day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie wouldn\u2019t divulge what he and the Argos must see from Kelly before a return under centre this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t have a lot of answers when it comes to that,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s more of an in-house thing for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie expects more clarity on Toronto\u2019s quarterback situation following Wednesday\u2019s practice.<\/p>\n
The six-foot-one, 210-pound Doege guided Toronto on an eight-play, 40-yard march against Edmonton that set up Hajrullahu\u2019s game-winning boot. The former Elk completed three-of-six passes for 35 yards in his first regular-season action with the Argos.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been here all year but he only got about four days of training camp so he missed those valuable reps younger quarterbacks get,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cOnce we get into the season, the majority of snaps go to your starter.<\/p>\n
\u201cMentally he\u2019s sharp, he\u2019s getting it. For me, I\u2019ve got to make sure I put some plays in gameplan that he\u2019s comfortable with and repped before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Doege, 27, signed with Toronto on May 27 and had one practice before helping the club earn a 30-23 exhibition win over Hamilton on May 30. He likens that scenario to the one he\u2019s currently facing as the Argos prepare to play Montreal on a short week.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey gave me about 30 plays and I went into the pre-season and played well in the game,\u201d he said. \u201cNow I\u2019ve got about 70 plays with about three days of practice so it\u2019s essentially the same thing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just going to try and get as many mental reps on my own as I can and go in there ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n
Doege spent his first two CFL seasons with Edmonton (2023-\u201924), appearing in 20 regular-season games while completing 43-of-68 passes for 593 yards with four TDs and four interceptions. Doege said the time spent with the Elks allowed him to get acclimated with Canadian football.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe 12 guys was a lot different when I got here,\u201d he said. \u201cJust learning from everybody else — I had Taylor Cornelius, I had McLeod (Bethel-Thompson), I watched Tre (Ford) — watching guys in front of me and really learning from everybody\u2019s mistakes has helped me.\u201d<\/p>\n
And if he starts Friday, Doege said it will be important to not dwell upon the importance of the contest.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I got into the game (Saturday), I was telling myself, \u2018Slow the game down, process it,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cYou can\u2019t really have the moment be too big for you.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t want to think that this game is going to get us into the playoffs or not. I\u2019m just going to go try to do my job (and) execute the play that\u2019s called.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 After rallying the Toronto Argonauts to victory last week, Jarret Doege is expected to get his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-148977","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cfl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-canadian-football-league","11":"tag-canadianfootballleague","12":"tag-cfl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}