On Saturday, Feb 25 the Swift Current 57's Baseball Club will be hosting the 2017 Field Of Dreams.  The organising committee is bringing in the 2016 MVP of the Grey Cup Henry Burris to be the guest speaker.

Burris is a 20 year veteran of the CFL with stops in Calgary, Saskatchewan, Calgary again, Hamilton and finally Ottawa. Over his career, Henry Buris has won 3 Grey Cups, two with Calgary in 1998 and again in 2008 and with The Ottawa Redblacks in 2016. Throughout his career he has always been smiling, whether good time or bad on the field, "Smiling Hank" was at the controls.

Henry Buris focus on football at an early age. Growing up in Oklahoma, the dream of "Friday Night Lights" was always there throughout his high school years. He played his college football at the University of Temple, for the Owls, where he set 20 passing records during his 4 years there. He also met his wife, Nicole, who has been with him every step of his career.

Burris was not drafted to the NFL so he gave the CFL a try and in 1997 signing with the Calgary Stampeders and played backup behind Dave Dickenson for the next 2 seasons. There he won his first Grey Cup Ring in 1998. In 2000 he was not content to stay in Dickinson's shadow and signed with The Saskatchewan Roughriders. He was the starting Quarter Back for the season and started getting looks from the NFL. He left the Riders for the Green Bay Packers for 2001, then went to the Chicago Bears in 2002. He went to Europe to play for the Berlin Thunder in 2003 in the NFL Europe League but found that Canada was calling and returned to the Riders part way the season and stayed with them in 2004. In 2005 as a free agent he signed returned to the Calgary Stampeders and was their starting quarterback for the next 6 years. Buris would eventually lead them to the 2008 Grey Cup giving him his second ring.

At the beginning of 2012, Calgary traded Burris for Kevin Glenn as the Stampeders felt that they had younger quarterback's that were going to play for the position and wanted Glenn as a backup. Burris continued his winning ways and took the Hamilton Tiger-Cats to the Grey Cup in 2013 The Game was played at Mosaic Place in Regina where Hamilton lost to the Riders 45-23.

Hamilton then released the 2 time Grey Cup Champion who then signed with the expansion Ottawa Redblacks, who had just taken Kevin Glenn in the expansion draft. Glenn was traded to BC to make room for Burris. In the second year of playing with Ottawa Burris took the team to the Grey Cup where they fell short of a dream season losing to Edmonton. In 2016 Burris had an up and down year. Burris started the year at quarterback but lost it to Trevor Harris after, it was felt, Burris was not leading the team effectively. When Harris stalled late in the season Burris stepped in like he had never left the starting roll. Burris took the Redblacks back to the Grey Cup. In the pre-game warm-up, Burris felt a pop in his knee and left the warm up early. He had doctors freeze his knee and put on a brace so he could play the game. Little did anyone know that Burris ran for 2 touchdowns, passed for three more, and was sacked a few times all while playing with a torn ACL. The Redblacks were sent to the promised land with a 39-33 victory over the Calgary Stampeders.

In an interview with Swift Current Online News Burris talked about the mentors that he had who shaped him in his career. "I'm thankful I had a number of coaches. from my high school coach, Chris Bunch, and a gentleman named Steve Goldman, he was my offensive coordinator," he said. "He was a coach for a number of years in the CFL,  he coached Damon Allen, Matt Dunigan, Tracy Ham and a number of quarterbacks throughout the Canadian Football League." He also stated, "Of course for me, it was my parents first and foremost. I was one of the lucky people who had my parents, who both are alive, and part of my upbringing." He said,"My parent helped show me the way on how to be successful and getting to where I wanted to get too, they pretty much wrote the book for me."

Burris retired in early 2017 as the fourth all-time passing yards quarterback in the CFL with 63,227. Burris has not been unemployed long. He started his career in the media as morning co-host of CTV Ottawa. He will also be doing some commentary for the Redblacks home games this year. He has one thing on his list of things not yet accomplished. He wanted to learn how to skate so he could join his two sons playing hockey. He needed to heal and rehabilitate his knee this winter but promises that he will be out next year to terrorise his kids on the ice.