CFL all-star Tevaughn Campbell felt more politics being a Canadian defensive back in the three-down league compared to the National Football League.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt like I experienced it more here, to be honest, in the CFL in my first years. When I went down there, no one really knew who I was, so no one knew I was Canadian. Not a lot of people really knew I was Canadian\u00a0until I had a conversation and told them I was Canadian,\u201d Campbell told 3DownNation at the 112th Grey Cup.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like I faced more politics in the CFL being a Canadian corner in my early years and\u00a0corners not really being a Canadian spot. American coaches would bring in their American guys\u00a0and want their Americans to start.\u00a0I feel like it didn\u2019t really have much to do with ability at some times,\u00a0but it had more to do with nationality.\u201d<\/p>\n
After blazing a 4.35 time in the 40-yard dash at the CFL Combine<\/a>, Campbell was selected in the third round, 22nd overall during the 2015 CFL Draft by the Calgary Stampeders. Following his rookie season, he was traded to the Saskatchewan Roughriders in February 2016 for a fourth-round pick.<\/p>\n In August 2017, Campbell was traded by the Riders to Montreal in a deal involving three CFL Draft picks and Vernon Adams Jr. going to the Green and White. He played out that season with the Alouettes and signed a two-year contract extension in the offseason leading into the 2018 campaign.<\/p>\n \u201cFirst day of camp, woke up in the morning, knock on my door, medicals were in the morning, and they\u2019re like, \u2018Alright, we\u2019re going in a different direction. Thank you for your time.\u2019 I didn\u2019t even know who came to my door, I don\u2019t know who it was, but I\u2019m like, OK. I called my agent, my agent didn\u2019t know, so I\u2019m like, alright.\u00a0None of my coaches knew,\u201d Campbell said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I came back, they re-signed me three months later in August,\u00a0I remember going to my coach\u2019s office, and he\u2019s like, \u2018Oh, hey, you\u2019re back.\u00a0You decided to play football again.\u2019 I\u2019m like, \u2018What?\u00a0They cut me.\u2019 He\u2019s like, \u2018We didn\u2019t know they cut you, we thought you left.\u2019\u00a0And I\u2019m like, \u2018Nope.\u2019 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0Never got an explanation.\u201d<\/p>\n Kavis Reed<\/a> was Montreal\u2019s general manager at the time and 2018 was Mike Sherman\u2019s lone season as a head coach in the CFL<\/a>. The Alouettes went 5-13 and missed the playoffs in a year where the birds made a blockbuster trade for Johnny Manziel<\/a> in late July.<\/p>\n According to Campbell, the Als signed him back midway through that season on a one-year contract and wanted to extend him again when the regular season was over, but he said no, instead opting to try his luck in the NFL.<\/p>\n The Scarborough, ON native spent six seasons south of the border from 2019 through 2024, which included stints with the New York Jets, Los Angeles Chargers, Las Vegas Raiders, and Jacksonville Jaguars. He recorded 65 total tackles, seven pass knockdowns, three forced fumbles, one fumble recovery, and one interception over 37 regular-season games, 11 starts. While in the NFL, the six-foot, 200-pound cover man earned approximately $6.3 million USD.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really feels like you\u2019re playing to survive every day, every week. They\u2019ll bring guys in, you\u2019ll see them working out new corners.\u00a0It\u2019s obviously not to say, \u2018We\u2019ll see how he is and then sign him next year.\u2019\u00a0No, they\u2019re looking for a guy that week, that day, that month. They\u2019re always looking to replace you.\u00a0They always tell you, they\u2019re always looking for someone younger, faster, stronger than you. Every day you\u2019ve got to work to be your best,\u00a0even the top guys. The league\u2019s crazy, you don\u2019t know when you\u2019re safe or not,\u201d Campbell said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s hard because you can\u2019t really play as free as you want to play. Sometimes you play so free that plays just come to you, the big plays always see you and they find you. When you\u2019re afraid to lose your job all the time, you\u2019re playing so you don\u2019t lose your job, you\u2019re playing so you don\u2019t mess up this play and don\u2019t mess up that play, let me be in the right spot. It\u2019s not so much, alright, I\u2019m going to go make this pick, if I get it, I get it, if I don\u2019t, I don\u2019t.\u00a0If you don\u2019t get it, you might be going home that night \u2014 dinner on Delta.\u201d<\/p>\n Campbell was released by Jacksonville after training camp in August 2024. He thought his playing career was over and seemed content to be a dad following child number three being born. However, CFL teams were calling, Saskatchewan being one. His agent told Canadian teams he was waiting for possible NFL interest, but another contract offer from down south never came.<\/p>\n That phone call following his Jaguars release led to Campbell signing with the Riders in January 2025. He tied for the three-down league lead with six interceptions and played a key role in the Green and White capturing the 112th Grey Cup<\/a>, number five in franchise history. Saskatchewan even convinced him to play another year in 2026<\/a>. Remarkable when you consider he thought his professional football career was over late in the summer in 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CFL all-star Tevaughn Campbell felt more politics being a Canadian defensive back in the three-down league compared to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":582057,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[166835,166836,159,49,95993,48,7028,521,522,520,8822,68627,8494,1725,11286,13267,1991,222769,1736,2210,222770,941,3430,1723,514,2693,45083,24373,4400,82,28158],"class_list":{"0":"post-582056","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cfl","8":"tag-3down","9":"tag-3downnation","10":"tag-american","11":"tag-ca","12":"tag-campbell","13":"tag-canada","14":"tag-canadian","15":"tag-canadian-football-league","16":"tag-canadianfootballleague","17":"tag-cfl","18":"tag-chargers","19":"tag-grey-cup","20":"tag-jacksonville","21":"tag-jacksonville-jaguars","22":"tag-jaguars","23":"tag-jets","24":"tag-johnny-manziel","25":"tag-kavis-reed","26":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","27":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","28":"tag-mike-sherman","29":"tag-montreal-alouettes","30":"tag-new-york","31":"tag-new-york-jets","32":"tag-nfl","33":"tag-raiders","34":"tag-riders","35":"tag-saskatchewan","36":"tag-saskatchewan-roughriders","37":"tag-sports","38":"tag-tevaughn-campbell"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582056","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=582056"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582056\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/582057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=582056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=582056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=582056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}