Saskatchewan Roughriders receiver, Brayden Lenius, will be out again this week after only returning for one game following a lacerated kidney in pre-season.
However, this time around he is dealing with a foot injury, which has caused the Riders to move around the Canadians on their roster.
“Brayden’s more serious than we thought. Unfortunately he’s going to be out for an extended period of time,” said head coach, Craig Dickenson when asked about the injury.
Friday was a closed practice for the Riders but Lenius had yet to take to the field leading up to the day.
Now the team is tasked with filling his role with another Canadian. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely Mitch Picton will be healthy enough to fill Lenius’ role for this week’s game as he is dealing with a head injury.
“We’re going to have to figure it out. [Mitch] did very little today. If he can’t go, we’re going to have to change our ratio. We’ll go with an extra American receiver and we’ll make it up on defence,” Dickenson explained.
Dickenson was then asked who could be a possible American receiver that would jump into the role as there have been a couple taking reps with the starters so far this week.
“[Jerreth] Sterns has done a good job, he’d be a guy we’d look at. [Kendal] Watson’s played, it’d be one of those two,” Dickenson said.
Sterns signed with the Riders in early July but has yet to suit up for a Canadian Football League (CFL) game. The 23-year-old was on the Los Angeles Rams practice squad during the 2023 season.
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Watson, on the other hand, has seen action in four games so far this season. He has 17 receptions for 154 yards on the year.
Another player Dickenson was asked about when trying to shuffle the lineup was Albert Awachie, who has primarily been used as the teams’ starting fullback. Awachie has three receptions for 24 yards this season.
“He can get us out of a lot games. He can play receiver if you need him to and fullback so Albert has a real valuable role for this team and one of them is the ability to run certain plays that are different packages,” Dickenson said.
The Riders will release their depth chart on Saturday for Sunday’s matchup against the Ottawa RedBlacks.
