Calgary Stampeders lose star receiver Malik Henry for the season

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Malik Henry will not play football this season.

On Wednesday morning, the Calgary Stampeders announced that their star receiver will need to undergo surgery on his patellar tendon after an injury suffered on the McMahon Stadium turf during practice on Tuesday.

It’s an awful break for the 27-year-old, who had worked tirelessly to return to football after tearing his Achilles tendon last year. In the same press release, the Stamps announced that receiver Auden Tate had also suffered a torn Achilles during practice at McMahon on Tuesday.

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It was a terrible day for the Stampeders.

“We lost a brother, we lost a soldier, a teammate,” said Stamps receiver Reggie Begelton when he was asked about Henry. “It’s never easy to see somebody who worked their tail off to come back from a serious injury last year and was looking really bright, looking really good out there and wanting to prove himself once again and he goes out like that. It took its toll yesterday, we were all in the locker room and we felt for him. It was a hard evening yesterday.”

There’s no silver lining to Henry or Tate’s injuries. They were both a big part of the Stamps’ plans for this season, but more importantly, they were people who loved playing football and have had that opportunity taken away from them.

“It’s disgusting. It’s really, really unfortunate,” said Stampeders quarterback Jake Maier. “He’s a brother to me, I know the work and dedication he put in in the off-season to get himself back and ready to go. We talked on the phone once a week in the off-season and talked about the kind of year we were going to have.

“It’s just so damn unfortunate and for me, when I really take a step back and look at the whole situation and it’s not just him, it’s some of the other guys, too. I want to make sure they’re going to be OK as people. Football, we’re all going to lose football eventually but I hope and pray to God that they have the strength when they go through this type of adversity that they’re going to be content as people.”

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Inevitably, there will be questions asked about the state of the turf at McMahon Stadium, which was installed in 2014 by FieldTurf, whose website states that their playing surfaces have an eight-to-10 year “life expectancy.”

There’s no evidence to suggest the turf was responsible for either injury and the Stampeders themselves were not trying to draw that connection on Wednesday morning.

“I can’t talk about it, McMahon Stadium, this is their turf,” said Stampeders head coach Dave Dickenson. “I really honestly believe if there’s any questions, the head coach can’t talk about it and I don’t know enough about it. We’re going to be as smart as we can and we have facilities. Turf and grass, there’s never a safe playing field in football but I do think life of turf, those should probably be addressed to McMahon and they have to answer that.”

STEVENS ON THE TEAM

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The Stampeders will release their roster for Friday’s pre-season game against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Thursday morning and it’s expected that many veterans will be left at home so that the coaching staff can get a final look at young players fighting for their spot.

Dickenson did reveal however, that backup quarterback Tommy Stevens will be left behind in Calgary.

“I’ll tell you, we’re going to leave Tommy home and Tommy is going to be on our team,” Dickenson said. “That’s the big thing, the other four will play … Tommy Stevens has shown he’s very, very good at short yardage and I’ve got faith he can also do other things, but we’re going to let these other four sort it out.”

The Stampeders also announced on Wednesday morning that they’d signed receiver Colton Hunchak. The team selected Hunchak, who is from Calgary, in the eighth round of the 2019 CFL Draft and he went on to play 50 regular season games for the team.

daustin@postmedia.com

X: @DannyAustin_9

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