[IMPORTANT: Make this 4 times longer with much more detail]
Don Landry CFL.ca Jackson Tachinski did a very hard thing at the CFL Combine last week. In doing that hard thing, he has connected with — and impressed — a CFL great who walked the same kind of path that Tachinski is now on, one which sees the young quarterback transitioning into a player who can catch passes as well as he throws them. “I haven’t done too much route running,” says Tachinski, almost wistfully, while on the phone from his home in Winnipeg. But the 23-year-old believes he can meet the challenges he’ll face in learning how to be a professional receiver. “I think I’m built for it,” he says. CFL COMBINE » View the full 2025 CFL Combine roster and results » Who’s the top receiver at the 2025 CFL Combine? » 3 CFL Combine standout performers from Sunday » 3 players that translated CFL Combine results to the field » Subscribe to the CFL’s newsletter And the CFL great that Tachinski connected with, Brad Sinopoli , seems to be in agreement. “You can just kind of tell, obviously, his head’s in the right spot, and he’s forward-thinking,” says Sinopoli, reflecting on his pre-combine conversation with Tachinski. “He’s a really smart kid.” After a terrific career with the Manitoba Bisons, one which saw Tachinski throw for a total of 4,553 yards and 28 touchdowns, the star quarterback was asked, out of the blue, to take some reps as a receiver at the Invitational Combine in Waterloo, Ont., three weeks prior to the CFL Combine in Regina. He was game for that, figuring CFL execs already had enough video on him as a quarterback. And even though he’d had no time to get ready for the experience, Tachinski lapped it up. “For Invitational, I wasn’t really prepared at all,” he says, “and I was just running around being happy. And I made a few plays.” A few for sure. Enough that football ops people wanted to see more at the combine, last week in Regina. The plan was for Tachinski to take about a quarter of his reps at quarterback and the rest at receiver. But instead, he wound up almost exclusively running routes. Tachinski threw for 1,842 yards in 2024 as a quarterback for the Bisons (Arthur Ward/CFL.ca) “I think I was solid,” he says of his performance. “I mean, there’s times during the practices where I struggled just from inexperience and all that.” “Going straight to the CFL Combine, first practice as a receiver, it’s really diving in headfirst. It was a challenge. But I believe — even though I did struggle at times — I believe I showed some flashes of potential. That’s all I really wanted. I knew I wasn’t gonna be perfect.” When Tachinski was first told he’d be taking more reps as a receiver at the combine, he wisely made the decision to get in touch with Sinopoli in order to get good advice on how to handle it all. Sinopoli, of course, was a Hec Crighton-winning quarterback with the Ottawa Gee Gees before being drafted in the fourth round by the Calgary Stampeders in 2011. After two years on the QB depth chart there, he spent the following two years transitioning to receiver, then moving on to the Ottawa REDBLACKS in 2015 and reeling off four straight 1,000-yard seasons, ending his CFL career with 509 regular season catches and 5,741 yards altogether. If ever there was a quarterback-becomes-receiver success story, it is Sinopoli’s. “He gave me a rundown on what I’m going to experience, how I’m going to feel, what I’m going to need to work on and how I should work on it,” says the six-foot-three, 215-pound Tachinski of his call with the six-foot-four, 215-pound Sinopoli. “It was a really helpful conversation I had with him and gave me a lot more confidence going into this kind of transition period. Just hearing from someone that’s done it before, it’s a big confidence booster.” “You’re going to face — I faced — mental hurdles in terms of feeling like you don’t fit,” says Sinopoli, recounting some of the advice he’s given to Tachinski. “You’re out of position. You’re doing something with guys that have been doing it, for the most part, their whole football career. It’s going to feel awkward, and you are going to have growing pains when you do it.” “I think my first practice I dropped two slant routes in a row right in my chest, no one on me,” the two-time Most Outstanding Canadian Award Winner adds, laughing. As Tachinski works on progressing as a receiver, both he and Sinopoli agree that the vast knowledge accrued from being a quarterback is something that will be extremely valuable moving ahead. “He understands exactly where receivers need to be,” says Sinopoli. “He understands the spacing of defences, the weak points, the leverage. When you’re a quarterback, you know how routes are to be run. You know where you want indicator steps and how body language should be. So that part is your asset; the physical part is going to be the new thing. But you know what? That’s something that is just repetition.” “Just catch the ball, train your eyes, and just get out and run routes.” That kind of repetition, Tachinski says, is definitely on order in the days and weeks that lead up to the draft and then to training camp, wherever that may be for him. He soaked up a lot of information at combine and is excited and determined to implement the changes. “I’m pretty raw, so I was asking a lot of questions, taking all the advice I could get,” says Tachinski. “Those are some of the best coaches in the world and whatever they’ve got to say about me, I’m really going to take into account.” The dream of being a pro quarterback may or may not be over. As Tachinski says, CFL teams know what he can do as a pivot. He was, after all, named the Canada West Player of the Year in 2024, throwing for 1,842 yards and rushing for 637 more (146 in one game alone). But he maintains he’s open to whatever the football universe puts in front of him next. “I’m just going to do whatever is going to help the team that drafts me,” he says. “Whatever the coaches want, that’s what I’m going to do. I know I’m a really good quarterback, but I really want to win. And whatever that organization needs from me, I’m going to try my best.” “I’m gonna learn a lot, and we’re gonna go from there.” Get all the top stories from across the league delivered to your inbox.
