{"id":697877,"date":"2026-05-27T20:50:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T20:50:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/697877\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T20:50:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T20:50:17","slug":"hogan-argos-turn-to-youth-on-d-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/697877\/","title":{"rendered":"Hogan: Argos Turn to Youth on D-Line"},"content":{"rendered":"

It all starts up front.<\/p>\n

Those words are spoken often when talking about the success of a football team. It emphasizes the importance of dominating the offensive and defensive lines.<\/p>\n

For the Toronto Argonauts, it was one of the main goals of the off-season, to replenish the shelves to give the Argos a fresh look along the lines in 2026.<\/p>\n

The highest profile additions on the defensive line are tackle Ralph Holley, back from a year in the NFL, and end Jonathan Kongbo, one of the team\u2019s priority free agents. He joins the Boatmen from Edmonton along with his positional coach, Demetrius Maxie.<\/p>\n

The coach will have another pair of first-year Argos at his disposal, both part of the 2025 draft.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Paris Shand is a GTA kid, who attended Bill Crothers Secondary in Unionville before heading to a prep school in Connecticut. It worked out for him, as he played NCAA football at a pair of prominent programs, Arizona and LSU.<\/p>\n

It earned the 6\u20194\u201d, 270 pounder a shot in the NFL, as he signed with the Bills last season before becoming a late cut in training camp. He\u2019s now back home in Toronto, playing for the team he cheered for as a kid.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an amazing opportunity,\u201d Shand told Argonauts.ca. \u201cI love to be able to represent my hometown, play in front of my family and friends, and anyone in the community. To represent the kids that want to get to where I\u2019m at and do the things I\u2019ve done. I\u2019m grateful for this opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shand fell to Toronto in the second round a year ago. He was a first-round talent who slipped because teams felt he may stick in the NFL for a while. The lineman comes with a great pedigree; he\u2019s athletic, explosive, smart, and can line up at end or tackle, making him a Swiss army knife for Maxie. But the coach is quick to pump the brakes in terms of immediate expectations, emphasizing that Shand is still new to pro football.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is a rookie,\u201d the coach said to Argonauts.ca. \u201cHe has a lot to learn. We have to fix a few things, tweak a few things that he didn\u2019t get taught along the way, especially trying to be a pro. But you can see the reason why he got those opportunities to go down south. He has great length and size, and it\u2019s just his demeanour, he\u2019s all business. He\u2019s going to be a great asset for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Maxie sees a steady improvement from Shand, a talented athlete who played on Canada\u2019s national U-17 basketball team in 2017, and whose father Kevin played on the men\u2019s national senior basketball team. Paris also competed in track and field, winning an OFSAA silver medal in shot put.<\/p>\n

Like his coach, he feels that training camp has gone well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel myself getting better every day, coming in here and focusing on one specific aspect of my game and working on getting at least one percent better every day. I feel like I\u2019ve been doing that, so I\u2019m happy with the camp so far.\u201d<\/p>\n

He has the ability to play inside or outside, giving the Argos options on how to construct their defensive line. Shand doesn\u2019t care, he\u2019s just happy to get on the field again.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, it never matters. It\u2019s football, if they tell me to line up at corner, I\u2019ll line up at corner.\u201d<\/p>\n

That attitude is shared by tackle Soane Toia (so-AWN-ee toh-EE-ah), the Argos second-round pick in the 2025 CFL Global Draft. Like Shand, his enthusiasm for the game is obvious.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s ferocious,\u201d Maxie said of the Tonga native. \u201cHe\u2019s explosive, agile, and has great quickness. He\u2019s a guy that has great recognition of movement that\u2019s happening in front of him. He\u2019s able to change direction at the drop of a hat.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Argonauts.ca asked 6\u20190\u2019, 280-pound Toia to provide a scouting report on himself. What separates him as a player?<\/p>\n

\u201cMy motor. I feel like I was made for football,\u201d he said. \u201cMy main focus is to get off the ball and react to whatever, and I love that. It\u2019s what Coach Maxie coaches, attack. Just get off the ball and just react to whatever comes. I feel like that describes me as a player.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like Shand, the 24-year-old Toia is a part of an athletic family. His brother Jay plays defensive tackle for the Dallas Cowboys, while another brother, Siaki Ika \u2013 who like Shand played at LSU \u2013 also plays pro football in Dallas, with the UFL\u2019s Renegades.<\/p>\n

The family\u2019s love for football comes naturally.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy dad has always been athletic,\u201d said the San Jose State product. \u201cIt\u2019s what I always grew up around; my older cousins, my older brothers, everybody just played football. It was competition at home, just to see who was going to be the best.\u201d<\/p>\n

Toia\u2019s family moved to the United States in 2016, settling in Simi Valley, California. He made his mark there, totaling 35.5 tackles for loss in his final two seasons at Grace Brethren High School.<\/p>\n

While he\u2019s one of the lowest profile Argos at this stage of his CFL career, he could very well start alongside Holley at tackle when the Double Blue open the season June 12 in Montreal.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

ARGO NOTES: The Argos \u201cHuddle Up\u201d anti-bullying program wrapped up its 25th season by welcoming four Guelph area schools to practice. They sat in the stands at Alumni Stadium, watched the Argos on the field, heard from program founder Jason Colero, general manager Michael \u201cPinball\u201d Clemons, and players Chad Kelly and Cameron Judge. The program has spoken to close to a million students over thousands of assemblies in that quarter century.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Argonauts.ca missed much of the on-field activity while helping out Colero, but in limited viewing, Theren Johnson certainly stood out. The recently signed defensive back had knockdowns on back-to-back plays when the offence was practicing no huddle. He later had a lengthy pick-six during skelly (no linemen) \u2026Ethan John also had an interception he ran back for a touchdown\u2026The Argos final pre-season game is Friday night in Guelph. It\u2019s a rematch with the Tiger-Cats at 7:00 at Alumni Stadium. Tickets available at Argonauts.ca.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It all starts up front. Those words are spoken often when talking about the success of a football…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":697878,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-697877","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\/697877","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=697877"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697877\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/697878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=697877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=697877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=697877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}