Field Gulls
The Canadian Football League began a brand new season on Thursday with a Montreal Alouettes overtime thriller over the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. This is a bit of a transition year for the CFL, with a new broadcast rights deal set to begin next year, along with a major set of rule changes that will soon move goalposts to the back of the end zone and reduce the size of the playing field. Oh yeah, and eight of nine teams get into the playoffs moving forward, which is stupid.
As is annual tradition at Field Gulls, we like to comb through the CFL rosters and see if there are any former Seahawks we recognize. Maybe you remember some of these names from yesteryear! Everyone listed here has bare minimum been on a Seahawks training camp roster, even if they never played in a regular season game.
Bell was certainly a preseason standout in Pete Carroll’s final season, but never made the active roster. While he signed a reserve/future contract after the 2023 season, he was let go in May and had multiple UFL stints. In the CFL, Bell had 12 tackles, a sack and a forced fumble in his BC Lions debut season. He’s back for a second year in the Canadian part of the Pacific Northwest.
Incidentally, the Lions also had former Seahawks punt returner Jaelon Darden on the preseason roster, but he was let go during cutdown week.
An intriguing UDFA last year, Alexander didn’t make it to training camp. The former LSU corner has had no foothold elsewhere, whether with the Buffalo Bills or UFL’s Houston Gamblers. Even in the CFL, Zy finds himself on the practice squad.
Dublanko was on the Seahawks’ 2022 preseason roster and that’s as far as he got. His dad is Canadian and so are his grandparents, so he’s actually considered a domestic player instead of an “import.” After mostly playing special teams in 2024, Dublanko had 80 tackles on defense and a couple of sacks.
As we noted recently, Lawler just signed (by CFL standards) a massive contract, a major payoff for one of the league’s best receiver. Lawler was drafted by the Seahawks in 2016 and stuck around on the practice squad until 2017. As a CFL player, he’s racked up several All-Star honors and just posted an 86 catches/1,443 yards/14 touchdowns season. He began this year with four catches for 58 yards in a loss to Montreal.
Howsare had three weeks on Seattle’s 2016 practice squad after starting out his NFL career with the New York Jets. Much like Lawler, he’s found success in Canada, and last year he had a career highlight by taking a fumble back for a touchdown.
Howsare has 45 sacks in his career, including a career-high 13 last...
