Former Saskatchewan Roughriders receiver Shaq Evans knows his CFL career could have been longer —\u00a0unfortunately\u00a0injuries cut it short.<\/p>\n
“It was super difficult, mentally and emotionally,\u00a0I felt like I was getting ready to be one of the best for years to come. I felt like I was going to be on top for at least another four or five years, that’s what I felt I had in me. I knew the work I put in, I knew the talent I had and I put it on display in 2019. To come in 2021 and have a fractured leg and then come back in 2022\u00a0is when I really felt like myself again. I felt like:\u00a0‘OK, I’m\u00a0about to be an all-star again,” Evans detailed on\u00a0the SportsCage.<\/p>\n
“Then to have the same thing happen on the other leg was\u00a0super unfortunate. You think about it,\u00a0I know I would still be playing if it wasn’t for the injury bug; that’s part of football. Some people are more fortunate than others to avoid\u00a0significant injuries\u00a0and some aren’t. I’m\u00a0one of the people that\u00a0wasn’t able to avoid injuries that set you back a lot.”<\/p>\n
Before Evans spent his time with the Riders, he was in the NFL. The\u00a0New York Jets selected him in the fourth round, 115th overall\u00a0in the 2014 NFL Draft.\u00a0After the Jets, he played for the\u00a0Jacksonville Jaguars, New England Patriots\u00a0and Dallas Cowboys.\u00a0Overall, Evans made\u00a0over $850,000 USD in his NFL career.\u00a0He\u00a0joined\u00a0the Roughriders in 2018.<\/p>\n
“I remember coming home after I got released by the Cowboys and my agent told me that there was a workout for CFL, the one they do in the States. It was in May 2017,\u00a0it was at this high school\u00a0and the field was terrible, I remember that it was horrible. I showed up,\u00a0I conducted a few one-on-ones, ran a 40-yard dash\u00a0and completed a vertical jump.\u00a0Jeremy O’Day, who’s the GM now, he was the head of scouting at the time\u00a0and\u00a0he was the one that evaluated me,” Evans recalled.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“After that, we stayed in contact,\u00a0they wanted me to come up\u00a0in 2017, but I was still holding out for NFL offers.\u00a0I didn’t come up but as soon as January, I told them if I don’t get signed this year, then next year, 2018, I’m with you guys, and that’s what happened.\u00a0February of 2018, I signed my contract with Saskatchewan.”<\/p>\n
Evans played four seasons with\u00a0the Riders\u00a0from 2018 through\u00a02022\u00a0and his last team in the CFL was the Ottawa Redblacks in 2023. In his second season with the Roughriders, he earned\u00a0an All-CFL selection. Through his five years in the CFL, Evans\u00a0accumulated\u00a0206 receptions for 3,181\u00a0yards and seven touchdowns in 64 games.<\/p>\n
When Evans had the chance to witness Rider Nation at Mosaic Stadium, he knew it was special.<\/p>\n
“I remember we played against Toronto to open the season in 2018,\u00a0I was able to really take it all in and look around because I didn’t even dress for that game.\u00a0A\u00a0lot of people probably don’t remember or know, I didn’t even put on shoulder pads and helmet that game.\u00a0I was\u00a0on the sideline,\u00a0looking around like:\u00a0‘Wow, this is, crazy,” Evans explained.<\/p>\n
“It’s less people here than I played in front of\u00a0but I feel the energy of 80,000 to 90,000 people.\u00a0I\u00a0felt the passion and the love that they really have for this team. I was like:\u00a0‘I’m so thankful and blessed to be a part of this.’<\/p>\n
Evans is still\u00a0involved with football after his professional playing career\u00a0concluded.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight now, I’m coaching high school football. We’re actually getting ready to start our summer camp. That’s what I’ve been doing to keep myself busy for a little while,\u201d Evans said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe league, I haven’t been following it too much. For me, it’s\u00a0still hard to watch because I feel like I should still be playing. I dibble and dabble in it a little bit. I definitely keep up with the Riders win-loss record at least.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Saskatchewan Roughriders receiver Shaq Evans knows his CFL career could have been longer —\u00a0unfortunately\u00a0injuries cut it short.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472522,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,192116,82],"class_list":["post-472521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-football-league","tag-canadianfootballleague","tag-cfl","tag-nflcflsaskatchewan-roughridersshaq-evans","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472521","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=472521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/472522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}