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May 10, 2016

Ready to pick six

Dave Dickenson and John Hufnagel at the 2016 CFL Combine in Toronto (Photo by Johany Jutras)

Barring a last-minute trade, the Calgary Stampeders will choose sixth overall in the 2016 Canadian Football League draft.

Draft order is determined by the previous season’s results and the Stamps get to pick one spot sooner in the opening round because Winnipeg forfeited its top pick after selecting Garrett Waggoner in last year’s supplemental draft.

This is the fifth time in the modern era of the draft — i.e. since territorial exemptions were eliminated in 1985 — Calgary will draft sixth overall.

  • In 1991, the Stamps selected Duane Forde out of Western at No. 6 and the running back was part of Stamps Grey Cup-championship teams in 1992 and 1998
  • A couple of years later, the Stamps again had the sixth pick and this time they spent it on a defensive lineman out of Cape Breton university named Mark Pearce. He spent three years with the Stamps and, incidentally, is now working as a blacksmith in nearby Cochrane
  • Kamau Peterson was drafted sixth overall by Calgary in 2001 and the receiver spent three seasons with the Stamps before going on to win the CFL’s Most Outstanding Canadian award in 2008 as a member of the Edmonton Eskimos
  • In 2007, Akron receiver Jabari Arthur was tabbed sixth overall and, like Forde, he wound up being part of a pair of Grey Cup teams as a member of the Red and White

 

Three other sixth-overall selections later played for the Stamps after being drafted by other teams — defensive back Davis Sanchez by Montreal in 1999, running back Jesse Lumsden by Hamilton in 2005 and defensive lineman Brian Bulcke by Edmonton in 2010.

The best ever sixth overall pick in the modern draft era was made in 1998 when the Alouettes picked up Brigham Young’s Ben Cahoon, who merely went on to become the all-time leading receiver in CFL history.

Other notable pick-sixes were Sean Fleming (by Edmonton in 1992), Adriano Belli (by BC in 2000), Paris Jackson (by BC in 2003), Dean Valli (by BC in 2006), Brendon LaBatte (by Winnipeg in 2008), Calgary native Marco Iannuzzi (by BC in 2011), Shamawd Chambers (by Edmonton in 2012) and Nic Demski (by Saskatchewan in 2015).