Tasker (Most Underrated) player in the CFL

Part of the reason he’s not talked about as much as perhaps he should be is that he’s a pretty quiet dude. I spent most of a day with him back in March and I don’t think I heard him say ten words in that time.

Absolutely. Same thing for Masoli, IMO. Don’t think you’d ever say that about Carter or Manziel.

Or Duke Williams or James Wilder Jr. or…every player including Medlock receives more mention than Tasker?

Unless of course it’s Rod Black on TSN than it’s Luke Tasker son of Steve Tasker great NFL player in his day with the Buffalo Bills, just down the highway from Hamilton haha?

GO CATS GO!!!

I hate drawn out endzone antics. I don’t think they’re cute. I like guys like Tasker who act like they’ve been in the endzone before. It’s just another day at the office for Luke Tasker and make no mistake, the endzone IS his office.

ya, screw guys like Stala, or Joe Montford, or Darren Flutie who showed some emotion every now and again

Thought I’d revive a Tasker thread, based on all of the other receivers that have seen thread action since the last post in this one. (Multiple Sinkfield threads, multiple Mike Jones, a Bakari, a McDaniel, a Toliver, a Speedy B, couple of Owens, etc.)

Luke is doing well with 4 TDs in his last 6 games. He has been one-half of what has (too often) been a two-receiver set for the Ticats, and still somehow gets open and makes plays.

At 917 yards on the season, he could break through 1,000 in the next game, or if not, surely sometime in the next four, giving him his third 1,000-yard season in the past four years.

Despite missing two games in 2018, he still ranks 5th in the league in receiving yards. (Banks is 2nd.) Interestingly for a guy not known for his speed, Tasker ranks 3rd in the league in YAC with 369 yards - already a career high for him. He’s been making long runs with the ball that I don’t think we’ve seen in the past, thanks in part to blocking from guys like Speedy and Jones.

At 61 receptions, Tasker is unlikely to match his record-setting 104 catches from 2017, when he played all 18 games.

On a personal note, I took a picture of my son with Luke after the BC game, when he was one of two players (along with Jackson Bennett) whom I saw on the field for the post-game Families on the Field event. He signed things and posed for as long as people asked him to.

Luke has been laying low the last couple of games, first to Jones, and then to Banks. Back to his second down possession role, it seems.

I’m thinking he is lulling the defences a bit, and expect he is going to have one of his big yardage games in the near future, maybe Ottawa?

Luke balances out the team with his cool demeanor. Its nice to have a double threat for possession reciever, between him and speedy.
Speedy walks the talk…Luke just walks…both ways gotta love it.

Hacky Sack? Oh man… I didn’t mind Fantuz just punting it into the endzone stands but hacky sack was kinda Turkish…

His hands have always been impressive but his work after the catch has been superb, not the fastest guy, but probably the smartest when it comes to running with the ball and the great blocking from Speedy is something we’ll be talking about formyears to come.

Nice interview with Luke. He talks about how hard it is to get to the Grey Cup, how much he owes to Kent Austin, what it’s like to play for Jones and Glanville, and his thoughts on his post-football career.

Another story about Luke,
Do we even deserve this guy??
Sometimes I think we just take his awesomeness for granted! :slight_smile:

Ticats' Tasker credits success to former coach Austin

Luke Tasker will forever be grateful to Kent Austin.
Austin was Tasker's head coach at Cornell, then gave him another lease on his pro football life by adding him to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats practice roster in 2013 after being released by the NFL's San Diego Chargers.
Austin promoted Tasker to the active roster 11 days later and the East Aurora, N.Y., native had four catches for 53 yards in his CFL debut, a 35-11 loss to the Calgary Stampeders.

The five-foot-11, 189-pound Tasker has repeatedly justified Austin's faith. The 27-year-old slotback is closing in on a third 1,000-yard season (61 catches, 916 yards, six TDs) with Hamilton (7-7), on a bye this week standing second in the East Division behind Ottawa (8-5).

"This is my sixth season and I don't know if I'm here without him," Tasker said. "And who knows if it's with Hamilton, an area my wife and I have fallen in love with and its proximity to Buffalo and our home.
"I owe much to my relationship with Kent and Tommy Condell (former Ticats offensive co-ordinator and Cornell assistant), that's why I came here because I was familiar with their system. They trusted me and it's how much they trusted me that I was able to make it up here. I owe a lot of that to Kent."

MUCH MORE HERE

Great story by Drew Edwards giving Austin some positive ink.

Wait, what?

Milton writes about Tasker’s breakout from a “possession receiver” to more of a deep threat, with average yards per catch ~20% higher than his career numbers.

The continuing evolution of Luke Tasker

“Within our system he gets opportunities to be not just a possession receiver, ? Jones was saying Wednesday as the Ticats wrapped up the practice week before heading to Ottawa for the opener of the home-and-home of the year. “Before, he was that: running the shorter stuff, running the unders and the in and out routes. Now he has a lot of plays where he can take it deep, if they give it to him.?

Couldn’t come at a better time, with most of the deep threat recievers on the shelf.
Notice no one even talks about the big tall reciever that can go up and catch the ball in traffic.

Luke is a great player, we ticat fans know it; TSN knows it too, as they have had a pic of Luke in the background in their studio telecasts for years …