SportsCage football analyst Glen Suitor is impressed by Trevor Harris' discipline and elite preparation heading into his 14th CFL season.
"I strongly suggest people listen to that part, training your mind and how important it is to be confident enough to ask for assistance in that area. That's been something that people have been reluctant to do, athletes reluctant to do because you might get labelled or whatever and nowadays it's commonplace," Suitor said to SportsCage host Barney Shynkaruk.
"It's so important when, as Trevor mentioned, 80 percent of the game at the highest levels is from the shoulders up. Why not spend the time to strengthen that part of your whole package? As you would the physical part."
In 2025, Harris led the Riders to a Grey Cup win, defeating the Montreal Alouettes 25-17 to earn their fifth CFL title in franchise history. After the game, he was named the championship game MVP. The 39-year-old started 16 regular season games for Saskatchewan last year, completing 74 percent of his passes for 4,549 yards with 24 touchdowns and 11 interceptions.
Suitor played in the CFL from 1984 through 1994. The evolution of sports science has changed from his perspective compared to Harris and current athletes.
"The late eighties, mid-nineties were sort of the beginning of the core training, the different types of techniques, taking care of your body in different ways and how important massage therapy even is,” Suitor recalled.
“Those kinds of things that we thought were sort of the luxury things that you did on holidays at that time, go and have a few beers, then go work out, running banks… I remember watching those videos of different NFL guys running banks and things like that and thinking, 'Let me try that.”
Suitor compared the real life evolution in training for athletes with the Rocky movie franchise.
"When Rocky came out, everyone was looking at how Rocky was training as opposed to Apollo Creed and everyone started training that way,” Suitor said “Now it is so in-depth, the science behind it, the studies, the trainers, and the professionals that are specifically there to help you mentally or to help you work on your rotation, arm speed, and all of those things for quarterbacks. It really has changed in a big way and in a good way."
In other Riders news, the team was nominated for the inaugural Ted Goveia award alongside the Calgary Stampeders and Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
"Ted passed away, sadly. He had a great history in Canadian football within the management, football ops, GM, and things like that," Suitor said.
"I'm not sure who is all involved in the actual voting on this award. I think it is each team's football ops group that is voting for it. It's about time, in fact, it's way overdue that the head of football ops and the rest of the team in that area, not just the individual, not just Jeremy O'Day, but his whole staff, like Kyle Carson and the rest of the group, they're all part of this award. It's not necessarily an individual award, it's a group award for football ops, and I think the Riders are front-runners."
The winner of the award will be announced in Edmonton on Wednesday, March 25.
