Will Johnny Manziel Dominate in Canada and Return to the NFL?

• Johnny Manziel’s #ComebackSZN is heading to Canada, not the NFL. 
• Will the 2012 Heisman-winner take the CFL by storm?
• Could a return to the NFL still be in his future?

Johnny Manziel’s dreams of returning to professional football have come true … sort of, as long as he dreams of playing in 16° weather in southern Ontario.

Earlier this week, the controversial quarterback signed a contract with the CFL’s Hamilton Tiger-Cats. The deal is worth around $400,000 over two years, plus roughly $300,000 in incentives.

Made the decision today to sign my contract with the CFL and further my football career after a long break. Very grateful for everyone that’s been supporting me along the way. I believe this is the best opportunity for me moving forward and I’m eager for what the future holds.

— Johnny Manziel (@JManziel2) May 19, 2018

The Tiger-Cats finished 6-12 last year, eighth in the nine-team league, and had a -102 point differential. They haven’t won the Grey Cup, the CFL’s version of the Super Bowl, since 1999.

Is Manziel being brought in to save the day and lead the “Ti-Cats” back to glory? Is this just a stepping stone for the former first-round pick on his way back to the NFL?

Matt McEwan looked at Manziel’s NFL comeback odds a couple months ago. Time to revisit those in light of recent developments.

Johnny Manziel’s 2018 CFL Odds

Despite Hamilton being one of the worst teams in the league, Manziel doesn’t project to be the starter. That job belongs to Jeremiah Masoli.

Masoli took over the starting role last season when the team was 0-8, and he led the winless Ti-Cats to six Ws in their final ten games, averaging over 300 yards per game through the air to go along with 14 TDs and just three picks.

In short, he was everything Manziel was not when Johnny Football started five games down the stretch for the 2015 Browns.

Despite Hamilton being one of the worst teams in the league, Manziel doesn’t project to be the starter.

Masoli, a former Oregon Duck, possesses a similar dual-threat skill set as Manziel, but has a decided experience advantage, playing parts of five seasons in the league already. That’s a big leg up since the CFL has some key differences compared to the NFL, in particular, in the CFL …

• the field is wider and longer (110 yards x 65 yards),
• the ball is slightly bigger,
• teams only have three downs instead of four, and
• each team has 12 men on the field instead of 11.

Manziel took some first-team reps this week and head coach June Jones (former Atlanta Falcons HC) was confident he’ll get more and more comfortable in short order.

“When he opened up the playbook it’s like learning Chinese, it’s all different,” Jones told The Canadian Press. “Obviously he’s a few weeks away from really feeling comfortable, I’m sure, but every day he’ll get more reps.”

The coach’s confidence, coupled with Manziel’s big contract (by CFL standards), makes Manziel the favorite to win the backup spot over another Oregon product, Vernon Adams Jr. He’ll still be relying on either injuries or significant regression from Masoli to become the starter, though, which leads to conservative odds and over/unders for his first CFL season.

Johnny Manziel’s NFL Comeback Odds

Manziel is only 25 years old and has the chance to reignite his once promising career north of the border. If he plays well and stays out of trouble, a QB-needy NFL team will come calling.

The latter should be the easy part in Hamilton, right, especially with Manziel ostensibly showing a new-found maturity in recent years? (How enticing could the nightlife be in Canada’s version of Pittsburgh?)

The former — i.e. playing well — will be more of a challenge. Many prolific college QBs wind up failing in the CFL. As the Masoli highlights above demonstrate, it’s a very different game that requires a unique skill set. Here are just a few of the wildly successful college quarterbacks who found little success in Canada:

• Graham Harrell (Texas Tech): signed a two-year deal with the Saskatchewan Roughriders in 2009; never saw the field.
• Timmy Chang (Hawai’i): two starts for Hamilton in 2007; 42/89 pasing, 1 TD, 7 INTs.
• Eric Crouch (Nebraska, 2001 Heisman winner): 6/13 passing, zero TDs, 1 INT for Toronto in 2006.
• Troy Smith Jr (Ohio State, 2006 Heisman winner): 143/288 passing, 13 TDs, 9 INTs for Montreal in 2013 & 2014.

But Manziel may just be perfect for the Canadian game. He’s more mobile than Harrell and Chang, has a much better arm than Crouch, and is more accurate than Smith. He’s built in the mold of Doug Flutie, six-time Most Outstanding Player and arguably the most dominant CFL QB of all time, and Flutie himself thinks that Manziel’s skill set will translate perfectly.

Manziel is built in the mold of Doug Flutie … arguably the most dominant CFL QB of all time, and Flutie himself thinks that Manziel’s skill set will translate perfectly.

In the recent Canadian Press story, Manziel relayed the following: “[Doug Flutie] thought this game would translate to what I do very well … He spoke very highly of everything up here and how it shaped him and where he is in his life.”

Encouraging words from someone who did exactly what Manziel is trying to do. But “words are wind, even words like [translate]. I put more trust in deeds.” Committed to the CFL for two years, Manziel is now an underdog to make it back to the NFL ranks. Myriad things will have to go right for Johnny Football to earn another NFL contract, and very little has gone right for him since the 2012 Alabama game.

Do you see Johnny Football’s comeback attempt playing out differently? Let us know in the comments, on Twitter, or on Facebook.