Murray Wood: Who's hot... and who's not
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There’s a version of football players most people never really get to see.
It’s the one after the game ends. When the pads come off and the stadium quiets down. When the players stop being a number on the depth chart and go back to being… just people.
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When you ask the Saskatchewan Roughriders what they’re good at – besides football, of course – you don’t always get the answers you might expect.
Stick around Mosaic Stadium long enough, and you start realizing football is far from the only talent these guys have.
It’s just the only one anyone ever asks them about.
The art of slowing down
On the field, wide receiver Daniel Wiebe is trying to separate from defensive backs at full speed.
In his downtime, he’s collecting hobbies at almost the same pace.
“I do enjoy the arts,” he said with a smile, almost as a disclaimer.
Then it unravels: music, sketching, painting, crocheting, wire art, collage. ukulele, guitar, piano. At a certain point, it starts sounding like he should have a storage unit just for supplies.
“I like to do a little bit of everything, basically,” he said.
Saskatchewan Roughriders celebrating Daniel Wiebe’s game-winning touchdown in a 31-27 pre-season victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at Griffiths Stadium in Saskatoon on May 23, 2026 (Saskatchewan Roughriders / Electric Umbrella)
He started getting into most of those activities about a year ago, and what he found was something completely removed from football’s pace.
“It feels very meditative, feels very slow,” Wiebe reflected. “And I like going slow everywhere else, just not on the field.”
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While most guys are scrolling on their phones between meetings or waiting for practice to start, Wiebe usually has a pencil in hand instead.
“I like to take a little sketchbook wherever I’m going,” he said.
And somehow, he said, his hobbies all seem to feed back into football.
“Getting the hand dexterity, it’s helped a lot,” he said, explaining how the art of crochet has helped him up his game.
Daniel Wiebe explained that activities like crocheting and playing instruments have improved his hand dexterity and, in turn, his performance on the field. (Daniel Wiebe/Submitted)
“Just slowing down… calm the nervous system and just kind of be in the moment, forget about ball for a little bit.”
Somehow, the guy who plays at full speed for a living has figured out how to spend his downtime doing the exact opposite.
Off the field, on the piano
Defensive back Nelson Lokombo did not sound like a guy excited to answer the question: What are you good at besides football?
“I was trying to keep it secret,” he said. “I knew you were gonna come here and ask people for their hidden talents, so I said, ‘OK, I’m gonna play dumb and pretend like I don’t have anything.’”
That’s a pretty suspicious answer for someone claiming not to have an off-field talent.
Just a few seconds later, Lokombo revealed that he is a self-taught pianist.
While most 12-year-olds were busy mastering video games, Nelson Lokombo was teaching himself to play the piano by ear. No lessons, no sheet music, just a keyboard and a knack for figuring things out. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)
“I just listened to the music, and I had a keyboard, and I just learned,” he said.
No lessons. No big setup. Just a 12-year-old boy figuring it out one note at a time.
“I just practiced over and over again,” he said.
Lokombo said he learned and played classical pieces like Für Elise and Rondo Alla Turca entirely by ear.
“I’m pretty good with hearing the notes and matching it to the keys,” he said.
And even then, he still tries to downplay it.
“I’m a little rusty right now.”
Not bad for a guy pretending he didn’t have a hidden talent.
Baking under pressure
Offensive lineman Daniel Johnson spent his offseason getting into baking. Not casually, either.
“That put me out of the bakery in the grocery stores,” he said proudly. “I bake all my own stuff.”
Daniel Johnson’s résumé is unusual: offensive lineman, protector of quarterbacks, enthusiast of loaf cakes. One minute he’s handling a pass rush, the next he’s wondering whether the banana bread needs a few more minutes in the oven. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)
And apparently, his focus has narrowed almost entirely to loaf cakes.
“I’ve been trying loaf cakes this whole offseason,” Johnson noted.
“I’ve been trying different types of loaf cakes. I’ve been trying like chocolate chips, chocolate swirls, cinnamon loaf cake, I tried a lemon loaf cake, blueberry lemon loaf cake.”
The way Johnson talks about baking sounds almost identical to the way coaches talk about football. It involves discipline, precision and absolutely no room for error.
“With baking, it’s more perfection,” he explained. “You have one thing wrong and the whole thing goes wrong. That’s why I like it, because you really got to lock in when you bake.”
The man talks about loaf cakes like there’s a full game tape review involved.
Whether he’s moving defenders or mixing batter, Daniel Johnson is a firm believer that the best results come from repetition. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)
More than football
Outside the helmets and the highlight reels, there’s a version of these players that doesn’t fit neatly into positions or stats.
A receiver with a sketchbook, a defensive back at a keyboard, a lineman perfecting loaf cakes.
When it comes to the Saskatchewan Roughriders, football will always be the headline.
But if you take the time to ask, you’ll quickly realize it’s far from the whole story.
The Dos Equis “Most Interesting Man in the World” has nothing on Daniel Wiebe. The Roughriders’ receiver spends his off-field hours playing music, drawing, painting and crocheting. It’s a collection of talents that makes him one of the most fascinating personalities in the locker room. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)
