Stegall Back For Another Canadian Football League Season
Winnipeg Blue Bombers star slotback Milt Stegall is taking a pass on retirement.
"I'm not going to beat around the bush, we decided I'm going to come back and play another year," Stegall said Thursday via telephone from his home in Atlanta during a conference call.
"There was some developments that came about, with some business opportunities and secondly, one that trumped everything, my wife is pregnant right now. So there was a lot of things that had to go into this decision."
Stegall, signed as a free agent by the Bombers in 1995, turned 38 last Friday. Last July 27, he broke the CFL record for career touchdowns when he eclipsed the 137 total held jointly by George Reed and Mike Pringle. He now has 144 career TDs and holds several other league records, including most career TD receptions.
He has never won a Grey Cup with the Bombers and suggested all of last season that he was 99.9 per cent sure he would retire, but always kept that tiny sliver of hope open for fans who have come to love him. He has said it's become increasingly difficult to come back every season and be away from his wife Darlene and his son Chase.
He has been dubbed the Turtle Man because of his rock-hard abs as well as the Touchdown Beagle, Quatre-Vingt-Cinq and Chocolate Milt. Among his most memorable catches are a game-winning, last-play, 100-yard reception in Edmonton over the Eskimos on July 20, 2006.
He has been given a key to the city and the street formerly known as Arena Road in Winnipeg was renamed Milt Stegall Drive this past season. Other CFL records he holds include most TDs in a season (23 in 2002) and most yards per catch in a season (26.5 in 1997).
He was named the CFL's most outstanding player in 2002, was named, with quarterback Khari Jones, the top passing/receiving tandem ever in the CFL and was voted No. 15 in the CFL's Top 50 players of the league's modern era by TSN.
"I'm not going to beat around the bush, we decided I'm going to come back and play another year," Stegall said Thursday via telephone from his home in Atlanta during a conference call.
"There was some developments that came about, with some business opportunities and secondly, one that trumped everything, my wife is pregnant right now. So there was a lot of things that had to go into this decision."
Stegall, signed as a free agent by the Bombers in 1995, turned 38 last Friday. Last July 27, he broke the CFL record for career touchdowns when he eclipsed the 137 total held jointly by George Reed and Mike Pringle. He now has 144 career TDs and holds several other league records, including most career TD receptions.
He has never won a Grey Cup with the Bombers and suggested all of last season that he was 99.9 per cent sure he would retire, but always kept that tiny sliver of hope open for fans who have come to love him. He has said it's become increasingly difficult to come back every season and be away from his wife Darlene and his son Chase.
He has been dubbed the Turtle Man because of his rock-hard abs as well as the Touchdown Beagle, Quatre-Vingt-Cinq and Chocolate Milt. Among his most memorable catches are a game-winning, last-play, 100-yard reception in Edmonton over the Eskimos on July 20, 2006.
He has been given a key to the city and the street formerly known as Arena Road in Winnipeg was renamed Milt Stegall Drive this past season. Other CFL records he holds include most TDs in a season (23 in 2002) and most yards per catch in a season (26.5 in 1997).
He was named the CFL's most outstanding player in 2002, was named, with quarterback Khari Jones, the top passing/receiving tandem ever in the CFL and was voted No. 15 in the CFL's Top 50 players of the league's modern era by TSN.
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