To say that Simon Fraser linebacker Jordan Herdman came out of nowhere would be an understatement.

After beginning the season unranked on draft boards, the Winnipeg native smashed records in the NCAA Division-II Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC), earned an invite to the NFL’s Senior Bowl, and shot up Canadian Football League prospect rankings.

He once registered 26 tackles in a single game. Twenty. Six.

He’s big, smart — he held a 3.9 GPA as a senior in biomedical physiology — aggressive, and eligible for this May’s CFL Draft.

“I’m instinctive on the football field, violent,” assesses Herdman, who holds the GNAC records for career tackles (428), assisted tackles (223) and single-game tackles (27). “I can shed blocks and get to the football. I’m really just a high-motor player.”

While his numbers spoke for themselves, some doubts remained. Coming from a D-II conference, even one like the GNAC with a successful track record of sending players to the professional ranks, some questioned whether he would be able to compete at the next level.

But, after signing with NFL super-agent Joe Linta, Herdman earned an opportunity to answer those questions at the Senior Bowl.

Once there, he made his mark.

After signing with NFL super-agent Joe Linta, Herdman received an invite to January’s Senior Bowl. Once there, he made his mark.

“Going into that game my goal was to just show people that I deserved to play at that level, and I felt I took advantage of that opportunity,” says Herdman, who earned significant interest south of the border with his performance during Senior Bowl week. “It wasn’t too much of a jump for me, (as) we’d played some D-I schools at SFU and I’d trained a lot — I felt like I fit in perfectly.”

Herdman brought far more than his record-setting statistics to the football field last season as a senior with SFU’s rebuilding program.

“He played a very integral role in our defence,” says SFU defensive coordinator Bryan Wyllie. “He ended up being a guy that corrected a lot of things, whether it was mistakes by other guys or conceptually where our guys weren’t quite good enough.”

His former coordinator in Burnaby believes that Herdman’s mind is one of the most underrated parts of the linebacker’s game.

“The transition to the pros will be easy for him mentally, because now he has all his time to focus on film and concepts,” explains Wyllie, who also serves as the linebackers coach at SFU. “He’s the guy who erases problems with his athleticism and football IQ — he’s not going to have any issues picking things up at the next level.”

“I’m instinctive on the football field, violent. I can shed blocks and get to the football. I’m really just a high-motor player.” Jordan Herdman

Playing on a linebacking corps that also included his brother, Justin (another legitimate CFL draft prospect), Herdman led by example on and off the field at Simon Fraser.

“Those two guys together ended up being huge for us, in terms of leadership and the work ethic they brought to the table,” reflects their defensive coordinator. “To have two guys do what they did for us on- and off-field, and in the classroom, made everything a lot smoother during a tough (rebuilding) season.”

Lining up alongside his brother for one final season at SFU before both test the waters of professional football was something Jordan Herdman will cherish forever.

“It’s not often you have that, a brother on the same team as you at the same position,” beams Herdman, whose brother is slated by some to be taken as early as the late-second round come May. “To have somebody right next to you that’s on the exact same page, that you can hold accountable — it was awesome.”

According to CFL.ca’s in-house talent evaluator — Ticats play-by-play man and former McMaster quarterback Marshall Ferguson — Herdman projects similar to another beast of a linebacker on the west coast.

“To me, he just screams (BC Lions linebacker) Adam Bighill,” says Ferguson. “He’s a fire hydrant — a smaller, shorter linebacker that just makes plays he shouldn’t.”

Echoing the words of many scouts, Ferguson says Herdman’s Senior Bowl performance opened eyes on both sides of the border.

“They were making jokes about (Herdman) at the beginning of the week, saying ‘there’s the D-3 linebacker from Canada,’” he chuckles. “But by the end of the week, he was outplaying guys from schools like Notre Dame and Texas.”

To summarize: There’s little doubt that Jordan Herdman is an elite prospect in this year’s CFL Draft.

His college numbers were more than backed up by his performance at the Senior Bowl.

The reality speaks for itself: Herdman’s garnered enough interest from south of the border to host his own pro day in Canada later this week.

He’s big, tough, intelligent and better between the tackles than many gave him credit for.

Whichever CFL team drafts him will know they are taking a gamble. Not on his talent, which is clear for all to see, but on the likelihood of him pursuing opportunities south of the border — a near certainty at this point.

That said, he’s one of the premier players available at his position, and some believe he could be capable of stepping into a team’s defensive rotation as early as next season.