Twenty years ago today, the Saskatchewan Roughriders completed a blockbuster trade from which the team derives enduring benefits. Then-GM Roy Shivers acquired two future Grey Cup-winning quarterbacks — Kerry Joseph and Darian Durant — in one deal on April 12, 2006. Success on the field, sparked in so many ways by Joseph and Durant, was the catalyst for franchise-record profits and, ultimately, a new stadium. Our three-part retrospective begins here with a focus on the Joseph-Durant trade. On Monday, the emphasis will shift to a 2007 season that changed everything. The series concludes on Tuesday with Durant’s reflections on the early part of what became a legendary career.
One trade.
Two future Grey Cup-winning quarterbacks.
Twenty years ago today.
On April 12, 2006, then-Saskatchewan Roughriders General Manager and Director of Football Operations Roy Shivers consummated a blockbuster CFL deal that brought Kerry Joseph and Darian Durant to the Green and White.
“We’ll go down in history for that one, that’s for sure,” Joseph said with a laugh.
The Ottawa Renegades were history after the 2005 CFL season.
The folding of the franchise after four seasons led to a dispersal draft. The Hamilton Tiger-Cats owned the first overall selection because they had the dubious distinction of finishing last in the league’s overall standings in 2005.
Saskatchewan was to pick third, after the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. A quarterback being foremost among the Roughriders’ needs, Shivers sought to acquire the No. 1 pick from Hamilton.
That he did, sending running back/returner Corey Holmes (who had been named the league’s Most Outstanding Special Teams Player in 2005), defensive back Scott Gordon and a first-round Draft pick in 2007 to Hamilton.
Shivers then opened the dispersal draft by selecting the multi-talented Joseph, who had thrown for 4,466 yards and rushed for another 1,006 with Ottawa in 2005.
That wasn’t all.
Without much fanfare, the Roughriders and Tiger-Cats also exchanged the rights to two negotiation-list quarterbacks — Durant and Reggie Ball.
Durant, whose CFL rights were initially owned by Ottawa, had been claimed by Hamilton in the Renegades’ negotiation-list dispersal draft.
“We were desperate for a quarterback,” Shivers reflected, “and it worked out pretty well all around.”
Oh, did it ever!
Joseph was the Cup-winning starting pivot in 2007, when he was also named the CFL’s Most Outstanding Player.
Durant was behind centre for heartbreaking championship-game losses to the Montreal Alouettes in 2009 and 2010 before guiding Saskatchewan to an historic home-field Grey Cup win in 2013.
“It’s amazing when you think about it,” marvelled Roughriders Vice-President of Football Operations and General Manager Jeremy O’Day, who was the team’s starting centre in the 2007, 2009 and 2010 Grey Cup Games.
“We’ve only won five Grey Cups and that one trade resulted in two quarterbacks who won the Grey Cup.”
In 2007, Joseph enjoyed his finest year as a CFLer, throwing for 4,002 yards and 24 touchdowns. He added 13 TDs on the ground, rushing for 737 yards and averaging 8.2 yards per carry.
He soon became just the fourth Roughrider to win Most Outstanding Player honours, following George Reed (1965) and Ron Lancaster (1970, 1976).
Joseph capped a storybook season by piloting the Roughriders to a 23-19 Grey Cup victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Nov. 25, 2007. He rushed 10 times for a game-high 101 yards and threw a 29-yard TD pass to Andy Fantuz.
“It was like a story written in heaven,” Joseph reflected.
“It was great to see (offensive lineman) Gene Makowsky get his first Grey Cup after 13 years in the CFL. I remember telling him, ‘You’re going to be the first one to get this trophy.’ ”
Next in line was O’Day. Still with Saskatchewan as its Vice-President of Football Operations and General Manager of the reigning Grey Cup champions, O’Day hoisted the trophy to punctuate his ninth season as Roughrider.
O’Day had joined the Roughriders in 1999, following two seasons — including the championship year of 1997 — with the Toronto Argonauts. As a first-year Saskatchewan player, he endured a three-win season that ended with nine consecutive defeats.
Hired in December of 1999 with the mandate to rescue the Roughriders from virtual rock bottom, Shivers soon named Danny Barrett the Head Coach.
The win count steadily improved under Shivers and Barrett, increasing to five (in 2000, when the Roughriders also registered a tie), six (2001), eight (2002) and 11 (2003). Three consecutive 9-9 seasons followed.
The team returned to the playoffs in 2002, after being excluded six times in a seven-year span, and advanced to the Western Final in 2003, 2004 and 2006.
“I thought we progressively improving from year to year,” O’Day said. “We were kind of at a point where we just couldn’t figure out a way how to win the division final and get into the Grey Cup.
“We were close, getting into the playoffs every year, and it was progressive all the way up to 2007. The team kind of got a little better each year.”
The progress appeared to have stalled in August of 2006, when the Roughriders’ record fell to 3-5. The team rallied with a 46-15 victory over the visiting Hamilton Tiger-Cats, but that resounding win wasn’t enough to save the GM’s job.
Shivers was surprisingly dismissed on Aug. 21, 2006, two days after the rout against Hamilton. Eric Tillman was then hired as the Vice-President of Football Operations and General Manager. Barrett was retained as the Head Coach.
Five days after Shivers’ departure, the Roughriders blew out Hamilton once again. Saskatchewan won 51-8 at Ivor Wynne Stadium.
Joseph did not play in either matchup with the Tiger-Cats due to a troublesome right knee. Marcus Crandell started the Aug. 19 game at Taylor Field, only to suffer a dislocated elbow. Rocky Butler, the next man up, finished the home game in fine style and was the quarterback of record one week later in Hamilton.
Joseph dressed for the finale of the home-and-home set but, as a precaution, watched the proceedings from the sideline. With Crandell on the injured list, Durant suited up for his first of 157 regular-season games as a Roughrider. Among quarterbacks, only Ron Lancaster (246) played in more.
Seeing late-game in Hamilton, Durant completed his first CFL pass (to Corey Grant for a 14-yard gain) and carried the ball for a 20-yard gain.
The latter scramble was reminiscent of Durant’s first play as a Roughrider. In a June 3, 2006 pre-season game against Edmonton, he took off on a 24-yard run on a pleasant spring day in Regina — a city with which the former University of North Carolina Tar Heels standout was unfamiliar until the trade of April 12, 2006.
“You’re going to Canada … going to Re-geena, Saskatchewan,” he said with a laugh.
“I’m looking at the weather (before making his first trip to Saskatchewan) and wondering, ‘What do I pack? What do I bring?’ So I packed two pairs of sweats and two pairs of jeans — and a couple of T-shirts and socks. I just didn’t know what to expect.
“It’s my very first training camp. It’s Day 2. I’m trying to make the team. As a quarterback, one of the worst things that can happen at practice is bad weather. And what did we have? A hailstorm.
“I remember thinking, ‘There’s no way I can make the team. I can’t even get the reps. The weather’s bad. I’ll never be able to make it.’ ”
In time, “all hail Darian Durant!” became the refrain. But it took a while.
After the game in Hamilton, 678 days elapsed before he would again run or throw the ball in the regular season.
With Joseph back behind centre, the 2006 Roughriders finished third in the West Division before defeating the Calgary Stampeders 30-21 at McMahon Stadium in a first-round playoff game. The season ended a week later with a 45-18 loss to the host B.C. Lions.
Tillman soon announced that Barrett’s contract, which was about to expire, would not be renewed. Former Roughriders quarterback Kent Austin was hired as the replacement.
Under Tillman and Austin in 2007, the Roughriders won 12 regular-season games (the team’s highest total since 1970), earned a home playoff game (the first in 19 years) and won the third championship in franchise history.
It was an overnight success story that, upon reflection, was nearly seven years in the making.
“I think that some people probably overlook the Roy and Danny era,” O’Day noted. “They really established that foundation of players and that family atmosphere among us, so they had a big part of it.
“I think what got us over the top was just a new voice and a few tweaks to the roster. The next thing you know, we’re winning what was at that time our third championship.”
The second championship-game victory was celebrated after Austin threw for 474 yards and three touchdowns in a 43-40 conquest of Hamilton on Nov. 26, 1989.
Named the Offensive MVP of the 1989 Grey Cup, he added CFL Coach of the Year honours to his lengthy list of laurels after the 2007 season.
By the time the latter award was presented, though, he had been hired by his alma mater (the University of Mississippi) as its Offensive Co-ordinator.
Austin’s departure was the first shocker of the off-season.
On March 5, 2008, Tillman traded Joseph and a third-round Draft pick in 2010 to the Toronto Argonauts for offensive lineman Glenn January, defensive lineman Ronald Flemons, a first-rounder in 2008 (used to select defensive lineman Keith Shologan) and a second-rounder in 2010 (receiver Jordan Sisco).
The trade took place after Tillman and Joseph were unable to agree on contract terms for 2008. Joseph had signed a restructured deal, calling for a salary reduction, leading up to the 2007 season. Renegotiations took place with several players that winter, with a CFL salary cap about to become enforceable for the first time.
A year later, an impasse was reached before Joseph was dealt.
“I’m a man of faith and I truly believe God does things in a certain way,” he said. “I didn’t want to leave Saskatchewan, but it opened the door for Darian to come in and become the starter and win his Grey Cup.”
Durant started four games in 2008, when he was among four quarterbacks to see front-line duty for the Roughriders during a 12-win season.
Installed as the full-time starter in 2009, Durant helped Saskatchewan earn top spot in the West’s regular-season standings for the first time since 1976. He then started his first of three Grey Cup Games with Saskatchewan.
A fourth such appearance looked like a realistic possibility when the 2014 Roughriders won seven straight games to improve their record to 8-2.
In the eighth win, however, Durant suffered an elbow injury that ended his season and, for all practical purposes, that of the Roughriders.
The offence struggled with two untested pivots, Tino Sunseri and Seth Doege, at the controls.
Having seen enough, then-GM Brendan Taman signed a familiar name — Kerry Joseph — on Oct. 9, 2014.
Sunseri started one more game before the 41-year-old Joseph, wearing No. 5, handled the quarterbacking for the remainder of the season.
Although Durant was on the injury list, he and Joseph were teammates once more.
Joseph announced on Dec. 5, 2014 that he would retire as a Roughrider. He returned to Saskatchewan in August of 2019 to be enshrined in the SaskTel Plaza of Honour.
“The people in the city of Regina and the province of Saskatchewan really opened their arms and welcomed me,” Joseph reflected.
“I was only there for two years, basically, but it still feels like home.”
Joseph was joined in the Plaza by Durant and Shivers in 2024. Fittingly, they were inducted as a tandem 18 years after one franchise-altering trade facilitated their alliance and, as history would show, so much more than anyone could have imagined on April 12, 2006.
