Marc-Olivier Brouillette is holding court

Saskatchewan Roughriders safety Marc-Olivier Brouillette already has posted a few victories this year.

The 32-year-old product of Montreal has had a productive off-season working as a lawyer for Legal Logik in his hometown. The company handles a variety of legal issues for its clients, but Brouillette started specializing this winter in fighting traffic tickets.

“A lot of them were settled (before trial) and a lot of them were pleaded down,” Brouillette said when asked about his win-loss record.

Then he added with a chuckle: “In trial, I won’t give specific numbers, but it was a pretty darn good batting average. It was to the point where if anybody in Quebec reads this and they feel that they’ve been wronged with a traffic ticket, they should definitely give me a call.”

Brouillette graduated from law school in 2009 and was called to the bar in 2014, but he put off his legal career so that he could play for the CFL’s Montreal Alouettes — the team that had selected him in the third round of the 2010 CFL draft.

After seven seasons with the Als, the 6-foot-1, 220-pounder out of the University of Montreal signed as a free agent with the Roughriders in February of 2017. But he wasn’t 100-per-cent sure he wanted to keep playing, so he retired on the eve of training camp.

In late June, he took a job with a law firm that focused on construction and real estate law.

Attending an Alouettes game in August rekindled Brouillette’s competitive fire. In September, injuries to some of the Roughriders’ Canadian players prompted the team to reach out to Brouillette to see if he would come out of retirement — and he agreed to do so.

He talked to his boss at the law firm and said he’d continue serving clients from half a country away. Brouillette’s laptop got a workout over the final two months of the season, during which he played seven regular-season games and one playoff contest for Saskatchewan.

After the Roughriders’ season ended, Brouillette took some time off before returning to the legal profession, albeit with a different firm. He also pondered his future in the CFL.

“Coming out of the 2017 season, I still wasn’t 100-per-cent ready to commit to coming back to play in 2018,” Brouillette admitted. “I’d say I was probably at about 99 per cent, but I wanted to take the holidays and make sure that was exactly what I wanted to do and that it worked for my family and myself.

“Once that decision was made, I sat down with the firm and we came up with a plan that worked for everyone where I could combine training at the level that was required to be in shape for the 2018 season as well as be able to continue to advance in my legal career and gain experience practising.”

Returning to the law wasn’t difficult, especially after he was introduced to the world of fighting tickets.

“One time, one of the partners of the firm said, ‘Hey, I’m unavailable on this date and we have a trial. Would you like to do it?’ ” Brouillette recalled. “I said, ‘Yeah,’ and I had a blast doing it.

“I let him know that anytime he had any more files like that, I would love to take a crack at them. Over the past couple of months, I’ve had a chance to do a couple of those and I found it very interesting.”

He handles every type of ticket — “A to Z; anything in the Highway Safety Code,” he said — and likes the fact that the trials are short. Because of that, he doesn’t expect to have to leave in the middle of files or pass them off to other lawyers while resuming his football career.

Brouillette will stay up to date on goings-on in the legal community while preparing for and participating in his ninth CFL season, once again relying on his employers to understand his situation.

He also is in a better place himself when it comes to his situation. In late April, he tweeted that “the flame is burning brighter than ever” and notes that he’s once again fully committed to football.

“In professional sports, you can’t be successful if that’s not your mindset,” he said. “Even when I tweeted that — and even going back to January when I told the organization that my mind was made up and that I was going to be coming back to play in 2018 — that’s just the feeling I’ve had.

“There’s a renewed enthusiasm and excitement in training and even just in the thought of being back out there, strapping it up and getting after it with the guys.”

In November, Brouillette was scratched by the Roughriders just before they faced the Ottawa Redblacks in the Eastern Semi-Final. His wife had delivered a baby earlier in the day and Brouillette had to stay at the hospital with his wife and newborn son.

Brouillette knows it will be tough to leave his family to come to Saskatchewan, but he plans to return to Montreal during bye weeks or to have his wife and kids join him in Regina.

With everything ironed out on the family and legal fronts, Brouillette can focus on winning a starting job.

He didn’t start any games for the Roughriders last season, but he’s ready to battle Mike Edem for the No. 1 job in 2018. With the off-season releases of Jeff Hecht and Adam Laurensse, Brouillette and Edem currently are the only two national safeties on the roster.

“We both know what we’re going into and even if we end up in a situation like last year — where it was safety by committee where we were sharing game reps and both contributing on special teams — I’m comfortable with that,” Brouillette said.

“I’m comfortable with whatever role that (head coach) Chris Jones and the staff have in mind and I know Mike is, too.”