On Oct. 10, Calvillo, the quarterback for the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League, eclipsed Damon Allen’s record of 72,381 yards passing when he threw a 50-yard touchdown pass to Jamel Richardson in the third quarter of a 29-19 victory over the visiting Toronto Argonauts.
The completion set off a celebration that featured taped tributes on the stadium’s video screen from Warren Moon and Dan Marino, who rank fourth and fifth on the passing list. (Brett Favre, who holds the N.F.L. record, ranks third with 71,838 yards.)
Yet the milestone moment had little resonance for those outside Canada. Who, after all, is Anthony Calvillo?
“I’ve never had an American come up to me and recognize me,” Calvillo said by telephone from Montreal. “The only people that watch the C.F.L. games are family members of players up here. That’s usually how it’s been, and I don’t blame them because when I came out of high school and college, I also didn’t know anything about it.”
Calvillo grew up near Los Angeles, played at La Puente High School, attended a local community college for two years and ended up at Utah State, one of three universities to offer him a scholarship. The others were Louisiana Tech and Southern Illinois.
As a senior in 1993, Calvillo led Utah State to a Big West Conference co-championship and a win in the Las Vegas Bowl, the first and only bowl victory in the program’s history. But the 6-foot-1 Calvillo was considered too short to play in the N.F.L.
Unable to attract scouts, Calvillo decided he would become a teacher and a football coach at a high school near his hometown. Then, unexpectedly, a coach at Utah State secured a tryout for him with a C.F.L. team then based in Las Vegas. He competed with 12 other quarterbacks from programs like Oklahoma and Illinois. He made the team and eventually became the starter.
“I didn’t even know Canadian football existed until then,” his mother, Christina, said in a telephone interview. “I told him he was going to the other side of the world.”
The Canadian game is different from the N.F.L. version. The field is 110 yards long (with 20-yard end zones), not 100. There are 12 players to a side, not 11. There are three downs, not four. And then there are the team names: the Eskimos, the Roughriders, the Tiger-Cats.
The larger field and the absence of a fourth down, which makes teams throw more on first and second downs, contribute to the passer-friendly style of the C.F.L., allowing Calvillo to showcase his ability. He has completed at least 60 percent of his passes in each season since 2003 and threw for 6,041 yards in 2004. Calvillo played with two teams in his first four C.F.L. seasons before joining Montreal in 1998. Since 2000, when he was named the starter, the Alouettes have made eight appearances in the Grey Cup, the C.F.L.’s championship game. Montreal, which plays at Winnipeg on Saturday, is the two-time defending champion.
“He’s had a number of different coordinators, coaches and philosophies here,” said Jim Popp, the Alouettes’ vice president, general manager and director of player personnel. “And he’s continued to perform and lead teams to Grey Cups. That tells you about the dedication and inner desire he has to meet challenges, and that’s for off the field, too.”
In 2007, Calvillo’s wife, Alexia, received a diagnosis of lymphoma, and he took a leave while she underwent chemotherapy. She has been cancer-free since, but he was found to have thyroid cancer last off-season. He needed two operations and treatment with a radioactive iodine pill, but was healthy by the season opener in June.
Calvillo said that winning a championship, not breaking the yardage record, was his motivation to return this year. He makes his decision to play on a year-to-year basis, but he said he would be content with his career when it ended, even though he never reached the N.F.L.
In 2002, Calvillo had his best chance to break in “down south.” He thought the Pittsburgh Steelers were close to signing him as their third-string quarterback, but they opted for a younger player. That effectively ended his dreams of making the N.F.L.
“Once that window was closed, I shut down that chapter in my life,” Calvillo said. “I’ve had an amazing career, but my journey’s not done. I’m still writing this amazing story.”
And so Anthony Calvillo’s historic career continues: 72,770 yards, and counting.
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