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<\/p>\nJust five years into his Canadian Football League career and two things jump out instantly about Tommy Nield, one of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers new free agent additions:<\/p>\n
He\u2019s a winner, having already earned three Grey Cup rings during his days with the Toronto Argonauts (2021-24) and last year with the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
\nAnd there are undoubtedly worst nicknames for a receiver than \u2018Touchdown Tommy.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m grateful, for sure, to have already been on some great teams in a short span of time in my CFL career,\u201d said Nield in a chat with bluebombers.com from his offseason home in Guelph, Ont. \u201cComing to Winnipeg \u2014 the program and the history of the Bombers speaks for itself.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve only heard good things about Coach O\u2019Shea and the staff there and that there\u2019s a real brotherhood type of vibe. That\u2019s something that aligns with what I believe in. It\u2019s about playing together as a team and competing your tail off.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nield, who doesn\u2019t turn 27 until April, arrives in Winnipeg at an interesting point in his career. He\u2019s already got the championship bling from the Argos and Riders and is coming off a season in which he posted career-best numbers with 42 receptions for 535 yards and five touchdowns in 13 games, 11 of them starts.<\/p>\n
But with the Riders loaded with Canadian talent at receiver, including Samuel Emilus, Kian Schafer-Baker, Ajou Ajou and Dhel Duncan-Busby, he wasn\u2019t offered a contract when the free agent negotiation window opened earlier this month. The Blue Bombers, however, see a receiver with good size at 6-3, solid numbers and a championship pedigree.<\/p>\n
He\u2019ll now be expected to step in to the spot Jerreth Sterns previously held as a starter and give the club the option to start three Canadian receivers along with Nic Demski and either Kevens Clercius, Joey Corcoran or, potentially, a 2026 CFL Draft pick.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t get an offer from Sask and so that wasn\u2019t really in the plans. And when Winnipeg reached out I had a really good conversation with Coach O\u2019Shea and it just seemed like a great fit for me,\u201d said Nield. \u201cI know the culture is great in Winnipeg, there\u2019s a winning tradition and there are great fans and it\u2019s a great facility. It just felt like the right fit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked about the narrative that he\u2019s still got a lot more to give, Nield offered this:<\/p>\n
\u201cOh\u2026 100 percent. Definitely there\u2019s unreached potential. Last year I unfortunately started off the season with an ankle injury, but had I got to play a full 18 games I would have had even better numbers. That\u2019s my main goal: stay healthy, practice hard, practice every day and be available all the time. The rest should then take care of itself.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m big on preparing through the week and understanding what kind of defence we\u2019re going against. It\u2019s about developing that relationship with the quarterback and knowing where he\u2019s going to be going with the ball and where I\u2019m going to be. When you\u2019re in sync with the QB it\u2019s pretty tough to stop. I\u2019m good at building that relationship with the quarterback and knowing what he expects from me and what to expect from him.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the intriguing part here for Nield and the Blue Bombers. The growth he\u2019s experienced as a player since his rookie year in 2021 has been exponential and if Winnipeg can tap into that further this year, then \u2018Touchdown Tommy\u2019 \u2014 he scored the winning TD in the Western Final win over the B.C. Lions last year with just seconds remaining \u2014 could become an important part of the offence here.<\/p>\n
\u201cGoing into this year I\u2019m so much more comfortable,\u201d said Nield. \u201cLast year I built a lot more confidence because that was a year where I got to have a more consistent starting role and when I started in Toronto, I was more the sixth or seventh receiver and not really a solidified role. Last year was huge for my development. When you\u2019re getting all the reps in practice, you\u2019re able to play fast on game day.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been around a lot of different people now, going into my sixth year and I\u2019ve learned from all of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
To that end, Nield credited the receivers he was around in Toronto to begin his career and raved about working with Rider QB Trevor Harris and the Saskatchewan receivers as well as offensive coordinator Marc Mueller and receivers coach Marquay McDaniel.<\/p>\n
And now it\u2019s about doing the same thing here in Winnipeg.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m super excited to join the Bombers and get on a new team and meet the guys,\u201d he said. \u201cSure, there is a bit of a bittersweet feeling because I did love being in Saskatchewan. I know there\u2019s a big rivalry between the two teams, but I can\u2019t say anything bad about my time there. I\u2019m grateful I was given an opportunity to start there. It was a lot of fun. I built some great relationships with those guys and the coaches.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year was probably the most fun I\u2019ve had playing football but now I\u2019m ready to build off that in Winnipeg. I\u2019m really pumped.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just five years into his Canadian Football League career and two things jump out instantly about Tommy Nield,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-483393","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-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483393","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=483393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}