By George Johnson
Calgary Herald
Double-teamed. Triple-teamed. Didn’t matter. When it came to hunting quarterbacks, where there was a Will, there was a way.
“You know what made it fun?” says Will Johnson. “Tracy Ham.
“We had this thing — this personal war, battle, whatever you want to call it — going whenever we’d play Edmonton. He’d always try to beat me around the corner. When he did manage it, he’d be chirping, ‘You can’t come in at that angle. Man, you’ve got to take a better angle.’ Like that. Taunting me. 
“But I think I got the better of him over the years.
“That’s the challenge. Getting around that corner and reaching that quarterback, whether there’s one, two or three guys in your path. You never purposely try to injure anybody, but sometimes your adrenalin is pumping like crazy and being 6-5 and 200-and-whatever pounds I was playing at at the time . . .”
Arguably, no one in the history of the Calgary Stampeders wreaked as much as havoc as Will Johnson.
He was like Godzilla trampling Tokyo underfoot. Pursued QBs with the fervour of David Janssen tracking the one-armed man in the original Fugitive TV series.
No one has equalled his 99 career sacks.
Named to the Stampeders’ 50-year Dream Team in ’95. A six-time West all-star and five times selected all Canadian, in only eight seasons.
“There were games,” remembers middle linebacker Alondra Johnson, “that he was virtually unblock-able.”
In an era of undersized, quick defensive ends, superb players like James Parker, Johnson, six-foot-five and as quick as a cat batting a ball of yarn, towered over the rest.
Quite simply, the prototype.
“Will Johnson,” says Stampeder president Lyle Bauer, a Winnipeg Blue Bomber offensive lineman during the years Johnson terrorized CFL blocking schemes, “was one helluva football player.
“You look at the range he had for a man his size, the speed . . . when he put his hands up in the air, he was pretty well touching the moon. Fortunately, I was on the interior of the line, at centre, and so was spared the indignity of having him blow past me or throw me aside.
“When we game-planned, believe me, his name came up. A lot.”
The man who used to mug quarterbacks for a living now, of course, keeps the peace as a senior constable in the Calgary Police Service. He coaches minor football and has the past two years branched out into refereeing ( “I wanted to see what the other perspective was,” he says. “See where they’re coming from. How it actually is to make a call”).
On Oct. 22, Will Johnson takes his place on the Stamps’ Wall of Fame at McMahon Stadium, alongside former teammate Alondra Johnson, linebacker Bernie Morrison and ’60s GM Jim Finks in the class of 2010.
“He is,” adds Bauer needlessly, “fully deserving.”
Longtime Stampeder O-lineman Rocco Romano ranks him alongside Elfrid Payton and Grover Covington as the most dominating rush ends of an era.
“I had the misfortune of playing against Will and the pleasure of playing with him. I was introduced to Will Johnson when I was in B.C. in 1990-91 and I can tell you I was a lot happier when I got brought back here to play on his team in ’92. Not only could he pressure quarterbacks, he could chase down running backs. And he was . . . immense. If you look at him, he fit the NFL model.”
Drafted in the fifth round by the Chicago Bears, that NFL dream never materialized.
“My problem was that I played behind Pro Bowlers in both Chicago and New Orleans,” recalls Johnson. “Basically, I was an underweight defensive end in the NFL. If I had the weight then that I do now, I believe I would’ve been an NFL star.
“But being my size, and having guys like Otis Wilson, Wilber Marshall, Mike Singletary, Ricky Jackson and Pat Swilling around, I was moved to linebacker, an unnatural position, and played special teams. I kept pulling hamstrings because I wasn’t used to special teams.
“I do think about the NFL sometimes, even watching games now, wondering what might’ve happened at a different time, but you know, coming up here was a blessing. I did have the opportunity to go back, in ’92 or so, but I declined. It wasn’t about the money for me. I was happy here. I am happy here.
“I can’t be making money and be depressed. For a lot guys, that’s their life. They’re making money, but they’re not happy. I like to be treated a certain way. They pay you a lot of money and they figure they can treat you a certain way.
“Not me. I know I made the right choice.”
Oct. 22 is proof of that.
“He was just a special, special player,” marvels Bauer. “He could cover and he absolutely LOVED to rush the passer. Just turn him loose and watch him hit people.”
Even the best, though, are left to rue the ones that got away.
“I remember one time,” says Johnson, “I had this bead on Damon Allen, one of the best quarterbacks ever. I got just as close as you and I are right now (he holds his hands a foot apart) and I don’t know how he got out of it. Mystifies me to this day.
“He spun or something, I put my head down to hit him and (he opened his hands and stared down at them, empty) he was gone. And I’m like ‘HUH?!’
A wistful smile. “Oh, well. I guess you can’t get ’em all.”
If it’s any consolation, he got more than his share.