Article content continued

DEAN DORMANT

If the Lions are leaving their top offensive weapon in its holster, the Eskimos are doing the same to their newly acquired counter-punch on defence.

Fans will also have to wait to see Larry Dean make his debut in green and gold. The top-end free agent brought in to replace the retired J.C. Sherritt at middle linebacker has been left off Edmonton’s depth chart for Sunday.

“He’s had a great camp for us and we’re evaluating the rest of our linebackers,” said Eskimos head coach Jason Maas. “There’s no need to have him out there playing in the pre-season. He’s done a tremendous job from Day 1, he’s taken every rep at middle linebacker he’s needed to take, they’ve all been top-notch, full-speed.

“So we know what we’ve got with Larry, we just want to find out with the other guys and put more pressure on them to play and see what they’re about.”

TEST DRIVE

Sunday will be the first time new Eskimos quarterback Trevor Harris (Do we still have to refer to him as Reilly’s replacement?) gets to take the offence out for a real-life test drive against some opposition.

But just how many laps will he get to take around the track?

“Yeah, they’ve told me but I’m not sure how much I’m supposed to say,” Harris said of the number of series he expects to gets. “I’m really excited about going out there and playing and donning the green and gold for the first time and going out there with the guys and going to battle.

“We’re going to go out there and attack it just like we would any game day and give our full effort. Hopefully we can execute fast and effective and take the tempo to them.”

Of course, they’d like nothing more than to kick things off with a win, but there are plenty of details to work on in Sunday’s exhibition at the same time.

“We always just want to make sure that we’re in control of ourselves, execution-wise,” Harris said. “And being detailed and doing the right things, making the right decisions and making the right depths and making catches, handing the ball off, letting our O-line do different things.

“Those sorts of things.”

Email: gmoddejonge@postmedia.com

On Twitter: @GerryModdejonge