By Arash Madani,
CFL.ca
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
Two college graduates, defensive linemen, anxious on the afternoon of the CFL draft, waiting for the phone to ring.
Adam Braidwood and Dexter Ross. Washington State and Minot State. Both Canadian. Both pass rushers. Both products of the Canadian grassroots system. Both U.S. educated.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
One would go first overall. One second to last.
Braidwood with fanfare and the national spotlight to the City of Champions. The defending Grey Cup title winning Edmonton Eskimos selected the six-foot-four, 265-pound 21-year-old with NFL prospects and a PAC-10 pedigree.
Ross, nervously watching 48 others picked before him, going to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on a flyer, one slot before teams ended the proceedings in the sixth round.
Braidwood spent the day at his family home in British Columbia and his afternoon handling media calls. Ross was on the job, at the telecommunications firm he works for in the off-season, anticipating to hear from his agent of where he may be headed to next.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
“It’s an honour and I owe it to the team and to the fans to live up to that No. 1 pick,” said Braidwood, who is from North Delta, B.C.
“I’m happy I’m getting the chance and I want to get to camp to show the coaches I can perform,” said Ross, who grew up in the Ottawa suburb of Kanata.
“My number one goal right now is to get on the starting line-up,” said Braidwood, who played immediately as a college freshman.
“My goal is to make the team,” admitted Ross, red-shirted as a rookie at Minot.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
One took the path down the yellow brick road, the other in the road less traveled. At WSU, Braidwood played in Bowls — with and against future NFL draft choices – and finished a 48-game career with 90 tackles and 13.5 sacks. Ross went from the Ottawa junior Riders club program, while enrolling as a mechanical engineering student at Algonquin College, to settling in at Minot State – a NAIA school in North Dakota. In his second, and final season, there, he was all-America.
Braidwood was on the radar of every CFL team and atop the eight draft boards, despite sitting out drills at the league’s evaluation camp this spring.
A chance meeting with newly-hired Winnipeg defensive line coach Richard Harris got Ross an invite to the Toronto combine. He showed enough for the Bombers to select him with their last pick.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
“It’s been something I’ve looked forward to my whole life,” said Ross on draft day.
“I just hope I can help the Eskimos win another Grey Cup,” said Braidwood.
The call came to Braidwood moments after the 2006 Draft began. Ross’s cell phone went off minutes before it ended.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
Braidwood spent the last weekend in April monitoring the NFL draft. Would he go with teammate Jerome Harrison in the 2006 class?
Ross’s time was spent working on the different techniques that his new position coach taught him in a training session the two had days before at an Ottawa sports facility.
Two kids, same position, same predicament, same day.
Come late May, the past, the draft and the rest is forgotten.
“It will take a full effort,” said Braidwood. “(You) have to compete with so many skilled guys.”
Arash Madani is a sports anchor/reporter with A-Channel television in Ottawa
