All week, speculation refused to go away that he might give the game a pass.
Instead, Bo Levi Mitchell wound up passing a legend.
“Doug Flutie?” mused slotback Kamar Jorden. “I’d say that’s pretty good company.
“For Bo to do that and for me to be a little part of history, that’s cool.
“But that’s Bo. It’s crazy, all week we didn’t know if he was going to play or not. He will. He won’t. And there was a bunch of people telling him he didn’t need to, because it’s a last-place team and everything.
“Bo doesn’t care about any of that. He’s a gamer. He’s our leader. He wants to help us win.
“And that’s what he came out and did tonight.”
A 30-yard strike to Jorden 2:28 into the second quarter at McMahon Stadium on Saturday evening propelled the Katy, Texas, stalwart past Doug Flutie’s Calgary Stampeder career passing total of 20,551 yards and into second place on the franchise list.
It arrived via touchdown, naturally.
Making the final hurdle, off in the distance, runaway yards leader Henry Burris.
“Tell Hank I’m coming after him now,’’ teased Mitchell. “But to be ahead of Doug Flutie … just amazing, man.
“Look, I’m a realist. I’ve been here my whole career. He was not here his whole career. But I have so much respect what he did for this league. Not just here but for the CFL. To be mentioned in the same breath as him is an honour.
“I loved watching him play. Like everybody else who loves football. He was so great at improvising, at turning nothing into something. A model professional, too. Just a special, special player.
“From my standpoint, (being second all-time) shows a body of work, I guess. But it’s everything I have around me here. I know that.
“I’m not the same guy if I’m somewhere else. I love this team. I love this organization. And I love playing for Dave (Dickenson).
“The receivers they bring in to help me, the O-line they bring in to protect me, those guys give me everything.
“I’m just trying to give everything I can back.”
The knee that had caused such week-long speculation, added Mitchell, held up well.
“It was good. It’s going to be a little bit of a process for awhile, making sure that I’m healthy for games and taking care of it.
“I felt it a couple times but ultimately the O-line kept me upright, did a helluva job letting me get the ball out of my hands. When we do that I think we’re pretty damned dangerous.
“I’m a point guard to facilitate these guys, get them the ball and let them make the plays.”
A stellar, 212-yard first half for the Katy Kid, and his Stamps, leading 19-1, tapered off in the final two quarters and in the final analysis a 25-8 dispatching of the now 1-4 Montreal Alouettes can best be viewed as a professional, perfunctory performance.
It did running the season-opening win string to five, the best since 1995.
“It’s interesting. You win by 17 and you just don’t feel great about it,’’ confessed Dickenson during his post-game availability. “In pro sports every win’s hard and you really should cherish it, respect your opponent and believe that every win should be special, yet I look at what we did offensively … and I didn’t think our special teams were very good.
“Makes me just want to be be better.”
And the guy who seemed to be a coin flip decision to hunker down behind centre?
“He looked pretty dang good,’’’ replied Dickenson. “You guys could tell that he wasn’t hopping out there. But he’s just such a winner. He does all the right things. I know I can call any play. He knows the reads. He can handle the blitz.
“Give their coaches and their defence credit, as well, they did a nice job boxing us up. We just kinda played field position the second half.
“It wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t fun. But it was effective and we got the win.”
Winning being something Mitchell has made a habit of hereabouts.
“I think Doug only played here four years,’’ reminded Dickenson, when asked about No. 19 climbing to the second rung of the Stamp passing ladder.
“But I know I never passed Doug Flutie in anything.
“And I know Bo’s got a lot more in him.”
Saturday’s aggregate of 276 pushes Mitchell up to 20,663 career yards while in charge of the White Horse, a full 11,438 away from Smilin’ Hank.
That might seem a lot …
Still, Jorden, for one, isn’t counting his man out.
“I just hope Bo’s still here to pass Burris,’’ he said, smiling, “and I’m around, too, so that when he does, like it did tonight, the touchdown goes to me.”