Travis Bond is Ford tough … or maybe it was a Chevy … or perhaps it was a Dodge.
The Saskatchewan Roughriders’ newest offensive lineman doesn’t know what type of vehicle ran into him that day in 2012 — he once called it “a Ford Explorer-type truck” — but he knows he was fortunate to walk away from the hit-and-run with relatively minor injuries.
“It was not my best moment,” a chuckling Bond said from his off-season home in Colerain, N.C., on Friday, two days after signing as a free agent with the CFL’s Roughriders. “As long as I was OK and I was able to walk away from it, that’s all that really mattered.”
Bond was a junior at the University of North Carolina when the incident happened. He was riding his scooter to a study session when he saw a vehicle coming straight at him on the wrong side of the road.
“He hit me head on and the scooter and I launched into the air,” said Bond, who has estimated the truck was travelling at around 20 miles per hour. “I fell and then the scooter landed on top of me. The scooter actually was OK; I pretty much saved its life.
“I stood up and saw a big dent in the truck (where his right shoulder and arm had hit) and then the guy just drove off. I didn’t think much of it. I just hopped back on my scooter and went to study hall.”
Some of Bond’s classmates advised him to go to a hospital to get checked out, but an examination and X-rays didn’t reveal any injuries.
A couple of days later, though, Bond felt something amiss during a weightlifting session with his Tar Heels teammates.
“I told my coach, ‘My wrist feels kind of funny,’ ” Bond recalled. “He told me to go see the head athletic trainer. I went there and then I went back to the hospital and got an MRI on my wrist.
“Two nights before, I’d just had an X-ray and somehow nothing showed up. When they took the MRI, they informed me that I had a broken wrist.”
Surgery was required on his right wrist, but that was the only injury Bond suffered in the incident. Apparently, being a bruising 6-foot-7, 356-pounder helps in those situations.
“I always thought I was a tough kid growing up,” Bond said with a laugh. “I never want to experience something like that again, but being able to walk away from it does show a lot of toughness for a man or a football player.”
Bond hopes to bring that grit to the Roughriders. He spent the previous two seasons with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, with whom he was a West Division and CFL all-star at guard in 2016.
Asked about the 27-year-old offensive lineman on Wednesday, Roughriders head coach-GM Chris Jones spoke about Bond’s size and the edge with which he plays. As Jones said: “He’s one of those guys who gets up in the morning and likes to smash people.”
Bond, who noted that he does play with “a lot of attitude,” agreed that running into people is important to his game.
“You’ve got to attack everything you do every day, no matter what it is,” Bond said. “If you’re just going to a regular 9-to-5 job, you’ve got to wake up looking forward to outdoing someone.
“There are different ways you can do that — you can outthink them or you can outwork them — but I like waking up and enjoying the feeling of smashing somebody on the football field.”
Bond has played every position on the offensive line during his pro career, which also has included stops in the NFL with the Minnesota Vikings, Carolina Panthers and St. Louis Rams.
He signed with the Bombers in 2016 and spent the first five games of their regular season on the practice roster. He eventually played 12 games that season — impressing folks enough in that time to be named a league all-star — before appearing in 16 games in 2017.
He didn’t know much about the CFL before arriving in Winnipeg, but he seems to have picked things up quickly.
“I’m just thankful for the success I’ve had,” Bond said. “Being released by the Rams that last time set me back a little bit and I almost retired from football, but then I got the call from the Blue Bombers in 2016.
“When I started playing (in Winnipeg), the success was really and truly a blessing. I’m thankful for the opportunity I had with them and being able to further my career — and now I’m with the Roughriders. Being patient with the whole process made it worth the wait.”
Bond said he signed with the Roughriders because he liked the moves he had seen the team make this off-season. While he’ll be reunited with another former Tar Heel (quarterback Marquise Williams) in Saskatchewan, Bond also will get to face his ex-Bombers mates in the Labour Day Classic and the rematch.
“It’s going to definitely be different, but at the end of the day, it’s still football and you’ve got to do what you do on the field,” Bond said of facing the Bombers. “I’ve got a lot of respect for the guys on that team who I played with but, unfortunately, business takes you elsewhere.
“I’m very happy with the decision that I made to sign with the Roughriders.”
