After Pat White abruptly retired from baseball two months ago, many felt that his heart was in football, and he wanted to try that again. He held no press conference, had no press release, nothing to reveal his plans. Maybe he didn't have any plans. We ran an April Fool's article about what Pat's plans were that many people thought was true. We had a good laugh at that here at the Smoking Musket offices.
The timing of Pat's announcement led me to believe two things: A) He did it in time to avoid Spring Training, and B) It would give him enough time to get his body ready for football again. Specifically, ready for the CFL, whose training camps begin in June.
Word filtered down from Canada today that the Toronto Argonauts have picked up his rights from Winnipeg after they renounced his rights last week. The amount of time that it took for the Argos (as they refer to them up north) to snatch up his rights led some of their CFL analysts to believe that Toronto is intensely interested in signing White.
Pat has been seen at several of the Mountaineer Spring Practices recently. Some think that it's possible he may try to pursue a graduate assistant position on the team, but at the same time, he may just be there to watch his brother, Coley White, try to crack the depth chart. He has been mum on what his plans are thus far.
The Argos are already stacked at the QB position after recently trading for Steven Jyles. Jyles hails from Louisiana where he played his college ball at ULM. Also on their roster is former USF QB, Matt Grothe.
If White still wants to pursue a career in football, then moving north of the border, playing in the CFL, and joining the likes of former Mountaineer, Avon Cobourne, could be in White's best interests. Perry Lefko, a CFL analyst, thinks that White's game would translate well to the CFL style of football.
White is listed at about 6-foot, 200 pounds and is considered the prototypical player for the CFL- if he decides to pursue it.