WBBFanWest

And this, ladies and gentlemen is my nominee for the "The Glass IS Half Full Post-Of-The-Year" award, or as it is also known, The TBurger

I hope this one's true. Gives Willy a chance to prove it or get cut if he's not worth the $400K. Which is, sort of... exactly what we were trying to tell you earlier. So are you now going to argue with yourself? That would be fun to watch! Actually you were telling me that it was worthwhile to pay Willie 400K this year, but don't let the facts get in the way. And it would have been, but don't let reality get in the way

Maybe we can offer them Willy and our first round pick for Crompton. Seems like a can't miss trade to me.

I hope this one's true. Gives Willy a chance to prove it or get cut if he's not worth the $400K. Which is, sort of... exactly what we were trying to tell you earlier. So are you now going to argue with yourself? That would be fun to watch!

I think that in all fairness, you should probably write a strongly worded letter the the Chair of the Winnipeg Football Club. In it, you can outline your concerns and include your extensive CV which will demonstrate just how informed your opinion is. I'm confident that once they read the letter, they will give it the attention it deserves Lots of folks think whatever the Bombers do is right. I disagree with something the Bombers did. Not the first time. Won't be the last time. I still hope it works out. That being said, do you think that Willy's worth more than the rest of the young QB's in the league? Here's the thing, it doesn't really matter what I think. It's what the GM of the Bombers thinks. Personally, I think that this was the right move for a lot of reasons. Firstly, it tells Willy that the organization has confidence in him and believes that he can be the future for us. It also sends the rest of the team a message that the club is serious about getting things done and removing any possible distractions. It also says to everyone that the days of nickel and dime tactics are behind us. We'll pay the going freight, so if you perform, you'll get the coin. We call all those things "optics" and guess what? They matter.

Then he'd tell a long story about the days of leather helmets and a time when people used to wear onions on their belt. Good for Willy and the bombers - I'm guessing base salary is more aroun $300-350 with incentives 1/4 of the cap is now tied up in QB and OL, Bob Wylie is full time... if there's a problem now, its on MB's schemes. Well, in fairness, it was the style at the time.

I think that in all fairness, you should probably write a strongly worded letter to the the Chair of the Winnipeg Football Club. In it, you can outline your concerns and include your extensive CV which will demonstrate just how informed your opinion is. I'm confident that once they read the letter, they will give it the attention it deserves.

The crux of the matter is... 'Is Willy a franchise QB'? If you think he is then you want to lock him down for as long as possible no matter the cost. If you think he's a JAQ (Just another QB) then you don't care if he's signed or not. If you're not sure (Me) then you want him to prove it before you give him the big bucks. Your argument would be valid if contracts were guaranteed, but seeing that they are not, the worst thing that happens is that we pay him top dollar for one year and if he doesn't pan out, we cut him. If he is the real deal, then we are getting exactly what we are paying for. So this is, in my opinion, a small gamble, compared to the potential big payoff.

The Beatles broke up????????? Say it ain't so, Joe... When did this happen????????? It was for the best. Ringo was carrying the other three guys and it was time he went out on his own to show who the real talent was. He's actually coming through Penticton in September, and bringing Oates from Hall and Oates and Garfunkel from Simon and Garfunkel.

This is indeed good news. Tens of Argo fans are rejoicing as we speak.

Bellefeuille was out of work because he still had term left on his contract where he was getting paid, so he used that time to take a sabbatical and tour NFL camps to learn new offensive philosophies. I'm not arguing with you in that he's "average", but that's why he was out of work, as far as I know it was his choice. In 2012 he was OC for the Omaha Nighthawks, so he was still involved in football and if he had signed a contract with them, then it would seem that he could have been available in the CFL if anyone had really really wanted him. I look at it and say that he missed the start of the 2012 and 2013 seasons and if he was someone in great demand, he wouldn't have been available for us to sign in August of 2013.

Bellefeuille has, to the best of my knowledge, never been described as a great offensive football mind. If he was, he would never have been out of work for as long as he was. What you see in his record is what you get. Middle of the road offence, not too imaginative but with enough talent, workable. Anyone who expects that he's more that that is setting themselves up to be disappointed. I see the team working this way, offense scores 25 or so points in a game and the defense does it's best to keep the opposition under that. For me, our success or failure will likely rest on our D. Not expect Marcel to be the author of a "shoot the lights out" dominating offensive plan because his history tells us it ain't gonna happen.

A guy who wasn't even ranked in the last report is now number 1? I'm no expert in this stuff but can someone enlighten me as to how that happens and how common it is?

I'm actually thinking about coming to Winnipeg during TC and taking in one of the days. I'd gladly report back on what I saw, especially O line stuff, and frankly, other than a few hosanna's and maybe a large gaudy medal, I won't require anything in return.

Sounds like the trip was well worth it.I don't want to start a new thread for this - does anyone know when single game tickets go on sale? If you sign up for the CFL Field Pass newsletter at CFL.ca they usually have a pre-sale code for single game tickets that's good for games league-wide. Thanks for the tip!

As always... Hopes high. Expectations? Not so much.

People that know more then you and i have charged him with murder. Held without bond yet. I havent watched not one cop or anyone for that matter say that. Maybe a jury will say its not murder ,,, but the fact is hes been charged with it and not only that but held with no bond. Police often over-charge. It's a technique. That's why you will read about people being charged with multiple counts relating to the same offense and then end up pleading to one of them or only one or two actually remaining when it goes to trial. Keep in mind as well that this was an extremely fast arrest. Video surfaced and he was immediately charged. Murder would be the reflex charge. manslaughter would be a charge you'd consider after investigating. Again, as I wrote earlier, CNN reported that "Murder" in that location requires pre-meditation (or, if I recall, some other factor which I think they thought of as a race-based killing in this case). No one is arguing the cop planned it and the longer this goes the more it seems it was not racially motivated. I dont believe the officer has had a court date yet. We'll see if the charge sticks. If it does, you watch, the DA will ask the judge to let the jury consider manslaughter as well. But we're talking opinion. We dont have all the facts, only what has been released. Was that murder? No. Was it murder when the 73 year old volunteer accidently shot a suspect? No and no one is suggesting it was. I wasn't going to continue to discuss this with you because I really don't see any point, but I will point out one obvious thing. For a criminal charge, the intent of the suspect is in almost all cases, critical to determining what, if any, charge is to be laid. In the case of the 73 year old, it would appear, on the face of it, that he had no intent to cause death. He thought he was going to discharge his taser. In the case of the SC officer, he knew he had his gun in hand and he fired at a fleeing suspect, not once, not twice, but eight times. Clearly his intent was entirely different. By the way, in law, it is not just what a suspect thinks that is important, but also the reasonableness of his or her decision. For instance, if the officer says he had fears for his or others safety and that is why he chose to fire at a fleeing, unarmed suspect, the reasonableness of such a belief will be examined. Would a reasonable person have thought the same? I'm not going to bother commenting further because from what I can see, your intent is to argue for the sake of arguing, so it really is pointless to try and convince you of any other view. I just wanted, for the sake of accuracy and for the benefit of others who might be reading this, to try and insert a little information that might prove useful.

Joe Burnett walks into a bar. Bartender says, "Why the long face?"

The rest of the world seems to thoroughly disagree with you. So do I.

I was thinking that an easy way to see if Morley is back is to wait until they announce the roster prior to training camp. If he's on it, then he's back. If not, then his isn't. Not really a whole lot of sleuthing needed to solve this mystery.

Either that or it's the old fall back charge: "refusing to resist arrest"

Absolute total bullcrap. Need to call that what it is. When police shoot and kill someone it's always news. It might just be local news at first, but if there is any indication that things are not as they seem, the story gets spread pretty quick. In these days of cell phone cams, blogs, facebook and the like, stuff like that, you don't keep it quiet for long. So again, the reason that unarmed white people don't get shot by white police is not the fact that its unreported, it's that it doesn't happen anywhere to the same degree that it does to black folks. But yea, white folks are dropping like flies and the news people can't be bothered to mention it. Yea, that's the ticket... i didnt qualify my statement in "degrees". if you think a white cop shooting a white suspect in Winnipeg would make CNN, you're completely out to lunch. You're twisting the discussion and trying to get people to agree with you. No one is saying there isnt racism. But every time a black guy is shot by a white cop, it isnt racism. Ever walk around in some areas of Winnipeg at certain times, as a white guy and faced racist remarks? It happens. The original point being, this is a bad shooting by a cop. Thus far, nothing indicates race played a role. We'll see if that changes as more info comes out. Not going to go round and round on this because you don't seem to want to hear it so let me just say that if a white policeman shot and killed an unarmed white guy in Winnipeg in a similar manner to what happened in South Carolina, it would most certainly get play across Canada, which is the country where it took place. We call that national coverage. Would it get play on CNN, I suspect it would. But seeing that white cops shooting unarmed white suspects doesn't happen all that often, we might have to wait a long time to find out.

Absolute total bullcrap. Need to call that what it is. When police shoot and kill someone it's always news. It might just be local news at first, but if there is any indication that things are not as they seem, the story gets spread pretty quick. In these days of cell phone cams, blogs, facebook and the like, stuff like that, you don't keep it quiet for long. So again, the reason that unarmed white people don't get shot by white police is not the fact that its unreported, it's that it doesn't happen anywhere to the same degree that it does to black folks. But yea, white folks are dropping like flies and the news people can't be bothered to mention it. Yea, that's the ticket...

I think the "police aren't targeting black people because they're black, but only because they're poor" argument is pretty much horseshit. The numbers don't add up. Consider how black people fare in non-fatal encounters with law enforcement: according to the 2009 U.S. Census (http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0695.pdf) there were about 3.7 million black families under $30,000 income in the USA, and 13.1 million white families under $30,000 income. If the imprisonment numbers tracked with income, then you'd expect to see roughly 3-4x as many white people in jail as black people, because there are many many more poor white people than poor black people. However, according to the Prison Policy Initiative (http://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/rates.html) blacks and whites each account for about 40% of the prison population. Blacks are many times more likely to be imprisoned than whites are. If the American justice system is indeed blind to race, then why are black people being imprisoned at such an elevated rate? Well what are the geographic distributions of these poor people? Are poor white people located in smaller rural settings and poor black people in urban environments? That setting can make a huge difference on whether someone is involved in crime. I think it's the easy way out to just play the race card. Same thing happens up here when people play the race card with regards to the incarceration levels for natives vs. non-natives. It's not a race thing other than one race is over represented in the absolute **** economic conditions. And I think it's naive (at best) to suggest that race is not an issue. Prejudice and racism exists. One can try and find other explanations that might be a bit more palatable than admitting the obvious, but that doesn't change reality, I think it is far more nuanced than simplifying things to be about just race. Of course there can be other things at play in a given situation, but to suggest that racism isn't the main point is just plan silly. Again, if it's not racism, where are all the unarmed poor white folks being killed by white police? Poor is poor, underprivileged is underprivileged, but yet that isn't happening. Also, if this is a poor issue, how come a black man driving a nice car in an affluent neighbourhood is way more likely to be stopped by police than a white guy driving the same car in the same area? Some call it profiling, but really that's just racism prettied up. Like the old saying goes: a pig with lipstick is still a pig.

I think the "police aren't targeting black people because they're black, but only because they're poor" argument is pretty much horseshit. The numbers don't add up. Consider how black people fare in non-fatal encounters with law enforcement: according to the 2009 U.S. Census (http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0695.pdf) there were about 3.7 million black families under $30,000 income in the USA, and 13.1 million white families under $30,000 income. If the imprisonment numbers tracked with income, then you'd expect to see roughly 3-4x as many white people in jail as black people, because there are many many more poor white people than poor black people. However, according to the Prison Policy Initiative (http://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/rates.html) blacks and whites each account for about 40% of the prison population. Blacks are many times more likely to be imprisoned than whites are. If the American justice system is indeed blind to race, then why are black people being imprisoned at such an elevated rate? Well what are the geographic distributions of these poor people? Are poor white people located in smaller rural settings and poor black people in urban environments? That setting can make a huge difference on whether someone is involved in crime. I think it's the easy way out to just play the race card. Same thing happens up here when people play the race card with regards to the incarceration levels for natives vs. non-natives. It's not a race thing other than one race is over represented in the absolute **** economic conditions. And I think it's naive (at best) to suggest that race is not an issue. Prejudice and racism exists. One can try and find other explanations that might be a bit more palatable than admitting the obvious, but that doesn't change reality,