S.J. Green: Two Autographed Cards

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It's Super Bowl weekend, so I thought I could feature some football players, which I haven't done in a while. Solomon Junior Green always wanted to play football, having been a fan of the Dallas Cowboys' Emmitt Smith, Michael Irvin, and Troy Aikman during their heyday, and he slowly made the ranks in Florida youth leagues to earning a full scholarship with the South Florida Bulls, but limited minutes meant he was passed over by the NFL. He eventually acepted a tryout offer from the CFL's Montréal Alouettes and quickly became a star, accepting Anthony Calvillo's passes and converting them into touchdowns, often with just one hand: During Green's time in Montréal, he played alongside and in the shadows of legends like Calvillo and slotback Ben Cahoon (one of the best Canadian-born players of all time), but fans know his worth as an eight-time CFL East All-Star, two-time CFL ALl-Star and three-time Grey Cup champion. He may make it to the CFL Hall Of Fame some day on the strength of 716 career receptions, 10,222 yards, 60 touchdowns and back-to-back championships in 2009 and 2010 in 12 seasons. He topped the 1000-yeard mark seven times.

He'll forever be linked to Marc Trestman, who coached hi to the back-to-back Grey Cup wins with Montréal, then brought him over to the Toronto Argonauts where he won a third campionship in 2017, and also brought him back home to Florida in 2020 to play with the XFL's Tampa Bay Vipers, although that experience only lasted a couple of months, since the league started in February but folded in April. H briefly belonged to the New York Jets in 2010 but was released from the practice squad in time to join the Alouettes on successful their title defense.

He's said to want to come back to the CFL to play one final season with the Alouettes, although Covid-19 - which cancelled the 2020 season altogether and may well do the smae to 2021 - may stand in his way.

Here he is in the colours I most associate him with, the Als' white uniform, on card #50 from Upper Deck's 2014 CFL set:

One unifrom I didn't like so much was the recent alternate, but he still rocked it like it was the coolest thing on earth:

He signed both in blue sharpie in 2016. As a former season ticket holder, he was one of the players I enjoyed watching most and who made the trip to Percival Molson Stadium worth taking cramped public transit, then walking uphill for 15 minutes to get funnelled into a single entrance with 20,000 other faithful partisans to spend $15 on a tasteless beer for. If he does come back and fans are allowed in, I'll certainly go.