Bombers’ Oliveira healthy, but unhappy for No. 2 designation

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Brady Oliveira, the Canadian Football League’s reigning Most Outstanding Canadian, wore a look that didn’t express the joy one might feel when set to return to the lineup after his team’s walkthrough on Thursday.

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The man who rushed for more than 1,500 yards last season seemed to have a bone to pick, apparently antagonized by his position on Winnipeg’s depth chart, specifically under Johnny Augustine, or No. 2 ahead of the team’s Week 3 matchup on Friday with the 1-1 B.C. Lions at Princess Auto Stadium.

“I don’t make those decisions,” Oliveira said. “If (head coach Mike O’Shea) thinks that’s best for the team, then we’re going to roll with it.”

Asked if he saw himself as the backup, as the depth chart suggested, Oliveira repeated himself.

It seemed clear that he disagreed with the decision.

“I’m ready to go,” he said. “I’m locked in. I’m dialled. I’m fired up, man. I want to get back out there and play my style: Smacking heads and doing what I do best.”

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Asked, then, if he felt 100 per cent, he agreed.

“If it was up to me, I’m ready to go,” Oliveira said. “I’m good to go.”

So, if it were up to him, he would be first on the depth chart?

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m a competitor. I’ve been the starter the last two years here. I’ve earned that.”

Oliveira watched the entire training camp from the sidelines but returned for Week 1, rushing 11 times for 38 yards.

Far from his best, it was in line with the rest of Winnipeg’s anemic offence in their season-opening loss to the Montreal Alouettes.

He was injured in that game as well, a knock to one of his knees, according to Winnipeg’s injury report, which kept him out of the team’s Week 2 loss away to Ottawa last Friday.

Augustine filled in, rushing seven times for 31 yards and a touchdown while adding another 27 yards on a pair of catches.

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O’Shea, meanwhile, confirmed that his running back wasn’t thrilled with the decision.

“Nobody likes to hear that,” the coach said.

Whether or not the two had a chat about it — Oliveira said they didn’t, O’Shea said they did — might be up for interpretation.

But O’Shea’s reasoning was cut and dried.

“With the very limited practice from the start of training camp to now — next to none — and we put him in that Week 1 game, and it didn’t look how Brady would have wanted to look, and certainly not how we wanted it to look,” O’Shea said. “We just took a different approach to it this week, trying to ease him into it.”

And O’Shea feels Augustine’s earned more touches.

“Johnny’s carried the load all through training camp,” O’Shea said. “He’s taken all the reps and deserves a chance to step out there and do more.”

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The last thing the Bombers need, coming into a big game on Friday with an 0-2 record for the first time in eight years, is to rush Oliveira back.

And this all could be for naught.

You wouldn’t normally see a guy unfit to play listed as second on the team’s depth chart. He’d be on the one-game injury list.

They may ease Oliveira in, as O’Shea said, but they wouldn’t risk re-injury if there was a risk for one.

Whatever the case, controversy or not, Winnipeg’s offence needs to get going and quarterback Zach Collaros is glad to see his usually No. 1 in the backfield back in the backfield.

“You know how much of a competitor he is, how much he means to our team,” Collaros said. “Not just the offence, but our team. So he’ll provide a lift just from that standpoint of being back in uniform. Just really excited for him. He’s one of the guys who’s an ultimate competitor as well.”

Winnipeg comes into Week 3 averaging just 67 yards on the ground and 3.7 yards per carry, totals flirting with the CFL’s basement.

Collaros wasn’t unaware of the exact rushing totals, but he was clear about one thing:

“Everywhere we need to improve,” he said.

sbilleck@postmedia.com

X: @scottbilleck

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