Esks blue chip draft pick retires at 22

Eskimos' 2016 draft pick Doug Corby retires at 22

[b]There's been a remarkable flood of young CFL and NFL players retiring lately, including former NFL safety Walter Thurmond walking away at 28 Tuesday.

Still, the news that Edmonton Eskimos' receiver Doug Corby has retired at 22 is particularly surprising, especially considering that he was just drafted, seemed to have a ton of CFL potential, had been in camp for less than a week (rookie camps opened last Wednesday, full camps opened Sunday) and had never played a professional game.
According to Eskimos' head coach Jason Maas, Corby didn't feel like continuing in football.

Corby didn't return a request for comment by the time this piece was published, so we don't know exactly why he left, but he's certainly not the only player to walk away from football young.

Corby seemed to be a great CFL prospect, too, so this is a significant blow for the Eskimos. He had a great university career at Queen's, and led all of Ontario University Athletics with 19.3 yards per catch last season; he also put up the best 40-yard-dash at this year's CFL Combine, recording a time of 4.505 seconds.
That speed and big-play ability is rare for a Canadian receiver, making him a very valuable CFL commodity. (He was also one that even drew some NFL interest, attending a New York Giants' minicamp with several other CIS players.)

We don't know why Corby walked away, but if it was to pursue opportunities outside of football, that might be more evidence that the CFL needs to look at boosting its lower-level salaries.
The minimum salary in 2016 is $52,000, and while that's not bad by the standards of the general population (especially for a job that mostly runs from May through November; players need to train and stay in shape in the offseason and attend occasional team activities, but that's not a full-time pursuit), it's a long way from the millions many professional athletes make.

Football's also an extremely punishing game that can have negative effects on the rest of your life, from concussions, knee or back injuries, or other wounds, so it isn't unreasonable to see some guys walking away young.[/b]

[url=https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/cfl-55-yard-line/eskimos--2016-draft-pick-doug-corby-retires-at-22--just-two-days-into-camp-211741894.html]https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/cfl-5 ... 41894.html[/url]

So would he walk away if the minimum salary was $75,000 a year? My guess yup because if it there was an opportunity outside of football some $25,000 a year most likely wouldn't sway most.

Hey, maybe the CFL teams shouldn't be spending what they do on American coaches as some suggest and instead putting that money towards contracts. Don't know.

too many possible reasons to try to pin it on money, which I think is unlikely

didn't have the heart for it
didn't want to work hard enough for it
didn't want to ruin his body
Depression and other related problems
other things he wanted to do that he felt he would enjoy more
girlfriend pressure, afraid of him getting hurt, or wanting to live elsewhere, etc

Montreal blew the draft :lol:

, so this is a significant blow for the Eskimos SO hasn't played in the CFL as a third string maybe player!!!!
Hugh Blow to the ESKies!!!!!!!!!!!! Really.

Not a blow, it just puts into perspective that trying to label a winner or loser the morning after the draft is silly.

It is a bit of a blow. How many drafts do they have in camp right now? They went future on some and I think only have later round picks there now. That is going to sting.

Maybe he realized that practising a few days with pro players, that he wasn’t that good. Maybe he went “ouch” after getting tackled a few times by pro players; players that are bigger and faster than the guys he faced in CIS football.

[i]Yup, Montreal blows the draft every year according to “specialists” and fans of other teams :roll:

Except for a handful of games, probably less than 5 (due to injury mostly), the Alouettes have fielded an ALL CANADIAN offensive line since 2007! From 2007-2015 an all canadian offensive line.

9 consecutive seasons of an all canadian offensive line! Because Popp drafts offensive lineman; the best offensive lineman! All of those canadian offensive lineman were draft choices, except one (Paul Lambert).

Suck on that! :cowboy: [/i]

And Dave Mudge

But that doesn’t mean the Als start more Canadians than any other team, it allows them start more imports at the talent positions. ALL teams try to draft and start as many Canadian “O” linemen as they can.
Ottawa started more Canadians at the talent positions last year which gave them the flexibility to start imports on the “O” line.

Or maybe he found a better job. That happens a fair bit. Remember when Sandy Beverage retired because a job as a firefighter opened up? Better pay, better benefits, longer term prospects, much lower risk of having your contract cut short by the whim of management.

If the kid found a better career opportunity and did what’s best for his future, I say good for him. Not sure why some people here feel the need to immediately speculate on the worst possible reasons and put someone down when they have no idea what happened.

:thup:

Picking draft winners and losers is for talking heads who need to fill air time. The true answer won’t be known for a while yet.

Can take up to 7 years. Was looking at the 2011 Draft where the Als picked Blake and Martin. They said the same thing how Popp had blown that draft by taking a kicker (Which he converted back into a first round pick for Edem who played three years and then converted that back into a sixth rounder =a long snapper Timms just drafted).

You look at it today.
Very few players are around. Muamba who as picked first played two years in the CFL. Butler had one good year and left Saskatchewan and Sinopoli left Calgary, the teams that drafted them and developed them. :slight_smile: We won’t talk about Hamilton drafting Moe Petrus in the first round and never even had intention to play.

But Montreal consistently develops its own Canadian talent instead of poaching from other teams. Apart from Giguere and Picard (an injury fill-in for Brodeur-Jourdain), almost every national player on our team is someone we drafted and developed: Ruby, Blake, Perrett, LBJ, Matte, Brouillette, Martin, Klassen, Ackie, Shorthill, Lue, etc.

Now I get that Ottawa is an expansion franchise, so they had no choice but to poach, but we still compare favorably to non-expansion CFL teams when it comes to developing our own Canadian talent.

Knowing that a team needs a good pool of Canadian talent to win the Grey Cup in most instances, losing any Canadian even someone not projected to start, does sting somewhat as depop mentions. Good Canadians are hard to find as those that might have been interested that are good but never drafted might have accepted another job and forgot about football immediately. The Canadian talent pool is smaller perhaps than some people think once the draft is over.

Another thing that’s come into play is that these mide round to late draft picks is where you get your 50k ST players that allow you to compete for the higher price talent.