Now that Ted Laurent has proven to be Canadian, teams are clamouring for his rights.
Ted Laurent is an anomaly.
He is a 23-year-old Canadian who has lived the last half of his life in the U.S. Laurent played at a major American college that normally doesn't attract Canadian players. He recently found out that he is considered a non-import according to the Canadian Football League's status eligibility, which deems a player Canadian if he has lived an aggregate period of seven years in Canada prior to the age of 15.
So this explains why on Monday, when the CFL has its supplemental draft for Canadian players who weren't eligible for the annual draft, Laurent will be available, along with three others, and teams are salivating at the prospect of acquiring his rights.
Kito Poblah, a 6-foot-1, 210-pound receiver from Central Michigan, is considered the other blue-chip prospect among the group, but Laurent is the most intriguing of all. He is 6-foot-1, 304 pounds, whose 40-yard dash time has been clocked at between 4.94 seconds and 5.12, bench-pressed 225 pounds 29 times and had a vertical jump of 28 inches. Collectively, he has a decent motor for a big man and good athletic skills.
He went to university at Ole Miss, a football factory of sorts in the southern part of the U.S. Programs in the eastern part of the U.S. are usually drawn to Canadian prospects. Then again, Laurent is not your routine Canadian player.
He grew up in Montreal and left with his maternal aunt to live in Georgia at the age of 12. His mother, who worked several jobs to support him, figured he would have a better way of living with his aunt.
"To be honest with you, I don't remember exactly why I moved to the United States," he told sportsnet.ca on Friday in a phone interview from Georgia. "When she decided to move to the States, my mom told me to go with her. Growing up, my mom used to work a lot, so I used to go back and forth to my auntie's house. She kind of raised me too. She was like a second mom to me."
Laurent began playing organized football for the first time as a "physical activity," but by his sophomore year in high school it became more serious when he realized he could receive a scholarship and a free education. He received scholarship opportunities from several schools Mississippi State, Louisiana State and Miami, but chose Ole Miss because he wanted to be like standout all-pro defensive tackle Warren Sapp, whom he admired. Sapp attended the Miami, so that was Laurent's first choice but changed his mind when the head coach at Ole Miss at the time, Ed Orgeron, told him he was the one who coached Sapp in university and converted him from a tight end to a defensive tackle. After Laurent's first season, he was fired and replaced by Houston Nutt, who turned around the sadsack program.
In four seasons, Laurent registered 57 total tackles (27 unassisted) and 5.5 sacks (two of them unassisted).
Laurent was projected as a final-round National Football League draft pick, but wasn't chosen. He expected to be signed as a free agent, but the NFL lockout has put all that on hold because teams don't know what the new collective bargaining agreement will be like and what the salary cap will be.
But the CFL has provided a different opportunity. A distinct Ole Miss/CFL connection has some tentacles to Laurent's sudden availability. Edmonton Eskimos' general manager Eric Tillman attended Ole Miss as did former CFL player and coach Kent Austin. He returned to his alma mater in 2008 in Laurent's second year with the team after coaching the Saskatchewan Roughriders to a Grey Cup win in 2007.
Laurent said about two to three weeks ago he was contacted by Tillman about his eligibility as a non-import. Laurent had some messages sent to his Facebook site before that, but hadn't paid much attention to it. When Tillman called, Laurent began to take it more seriously and then had to provide documentation to the CFL to prove his non-import status.
"It wasn't hard, it was just frustrating," he said. "It was one thing after another. Once I'm through thinking it's done, I've got to get some more stuff done. There wasn't enough proof that I was Canadian enough, so I had to send in more stuff. It was probably going on for probably a good week and a half or two."
CFL teams wanting to claim a player in the supplemental draft have to put forward a bid to the league office. The teams don't know what the others are bidding, and the ones with the highest offers are awarded the rights to the players. If more than one team offers the same bid, the one with the worst record the year before receives the rights to the player. Winnipeg, with the first pick, and Edmonton, with the second, are expected to show strong interest in Laurent and Poblah.
Had Laurent been eligible for the original draft in May, he would have gone no worse than third, according to one source, possibly first overall. So it's expected a team wanting him or Poblah will have to forfeit a first-round pick in next year's draft.
Laurent said regardless of the results of the supplemental draft, he will likely hold off on signing with a CFL team, which open rookie training camps next Thursday, because of his desire to try the NFL.
"If there's not any movement, I will go to the CFL," he said. "My plan right now is just working out and just waiting."
As for being considered a Canadian now after living the last half of his life in the U.S., Laurent said: "I can't forget where I'm from and my roots. I'm Canadian. The fact I moved to the States, it's not going to change me. It's not going to make me more American. I just lived there for a long time."
