gcdrought

Nichols was an obvious improvement and gave the team an immediate spark.  But I thought the whole team was fired up from the start.  Great to see...finally.  Now let's follow it up with a couple more wins in a row.

One of the absolutes when a QB drops back is he hopes his receivers have beat the DB's or LB's and that one or more of them will be open.  The better your receivers, the better any QB will look.  Everybody tends to concentrate more on the O-line, but the receivers are just as important if not more so.  If the QB drops back and the receivers haven't beaten their man, the QB has to check down or be sacked.  So you and Matt right.  The QB and O-line are always the ones blamed, but the talent in your receiving corp is just as critical to success.  And the Bombers, right now, don't appear to have that great a group.

But at least we have continuity and consistency......

Mack got the team to a Grey Cup.  But they went totally downhill from there.  The team finished 21-39 during his regime, so I disagree that he found "a lot" of good players.  You don't win 1 of every 3 games when you're signing a lot of good players.  Some were signed yes (like every team), a lot no.
Yes, he was better than the current regime but almost anyone could better that.  Walters' record, if you include the 12 games he was interim GM in 2013, has been 15-39.   And in his last 35 games his players are a staggering 8-27.   Five straight years of just plain bad football.

Mack got the team to a Grey Cup.  But they went totally downhill from there.  The team finished 21-39 during his regime, so I disagree that he found "a lot" of good players.  You don't win 1 of every 3 games when you're signing a lot of good players.  Some were signed yes (like every team), a lot no.
Yes, he was better than the current regime but almost anyone could better that.  Walters' record, if you include the 12 games he was interim GM in 2013, has been 15-39.   And in his last 35 games his players are a staggering 8-27.   Five straight years of just plain bad football.

Respectfully, I don't know about this being "in his own head".  Maybe, just maybe, he is not all that good a QB to begin with.  We signed him when he only had something like 3 or 4 starts and a sub-.500 record.  He went 2-10 after a bit of a fluky and lucky start to his first season in Winnipeg (2014).  He went 3-3 last year before being hurt and he's 1-4 this year while healthy.  And if we're being honest, much of his yardage/TD success this year has been in garbage time of losses.
It's a team game so not everything should fall on the QB's shoulders when a team is struggling.  But the reality is Drew Willy is well-below a .500 QB during his CFL career.  Yes, the Bombers rewarded him a $400,000+ contract, but that wasn't based on successful results.  Willy will regain the starting role down the road if Nichols, pretty much a professional career back-up, stumbles as he likely will.   But personally I think the Bombers' view of Willy's talent level is much greater than the on-the-field reality.  I haven't given up on Drew, but there really doesn't seem to be any advancement in his play other than when the other team goes into a prevent defence mode.  Maybe it's a "head/mental" issue as you suggest and the talent will surface.  I hope you are right.  Or maybe the guy is just not all that good and his well-below .500 record is the real deal.

You get what you hire.  Joe Mack's out of the CFL for many years and has never been a GM in any football league.  Well let's hire him to re-build the team.  Joe Mack hires Mike Kelly, a guy who has never been a CFL Head Coach, but who is an old friend.   The disaster known as the 'Mack era' ends and the Board hires Wade Miller as President, a guy who has never even tried putting together a CFL football organization.  Miller walks down the hall and hires Kyle Walters, a guy who has never been a CFL GM and whose experience as an Assistant GM was with a losing football team.  Kyle Walters hires Mike O'Shea who has never been a CFL coach.
It's like the main criteria that the Bombers' look for when trying to build a winner is never have any sort of winning experience in the CFL.  IF you've actually won in the CFL as a President, a GM or a Head Coach...we're not interested in hiring you.  My initial thought is 'it's going on the cheap'.  But then you give a QB a $400,000 per year contract ?  But it fits the pattern, he's never achieving a winning record in the CFL.
I love the Bombers, always will.  But I am fed up with the way they try to build a winner.  Their No. 1 priority is hiring someone who has no experience and has never been successful in the CFL.  Mack, Kelly, Miller, Walters, O'Shea...no experience whatsoever in the positions they were hired for.  What type of organization penalizes their loyal fans that way?  And despite their disloyalty to the fans with their terrible hires, I will turn on the TV yet again and cheer for a team I was once so proud of.
 

Could everybody please stop quoting KptKrunch. The ignore function doesn't work for those posts. 

Miller himself said he wanted to return the winning tradition, and there were so many write-ups about his other business successes.  I don't bear the guy any ill will, but he personally made the single biggest decision that could restore that winning tradition - hiring a GM to be the team's personnel architect.  And things have gotten worse.  If things don't turn around the Board has to look elsewhere for a President, or they have to demand he hire a far more proven GM. 

The rose-coloured glasses folks try to control every message board by using words like troll, etc. so don't take it personally.  If they had their way, changes would never be made and kumbaya would be sung after every losing game.  I'm exaggerating, but I find those at either end of the spectrum (always positive or always negative) impossible to chat with because they're never objective.  Your question is a good one.  Would a second embarrassment to Calgary, this time on our home turf, cause a coaching change?  I think it would cause more concern with Walters and Miller than some think.  If they're badly beaten by Calgary, I think the four-day window to the next game saves him.  But if they go 1-5 there's a good chance they'll make a change.  They have to start winning to help the bottom line.  Let's hope we can upset Calgary and put the topic to rest for a while.

The rose-coloured glasses folks try to control every message board by using words like troll, etc. so don't take it personally.  If they had their way, changes would never be made and kumbaya would be sung after every losing game.  I'm exaggerating, but I find those at either end of the spectrum (always positive or always negative) impossible to chat with because they're never objective.  Your question is a good one.  Would a second embarrassment to Calgary, this time on our home turf, cause a coaching change?  I think it would cause more concern with Walters and Miller than some think.  If they're badly beaten by Calgary, I think the four-day window to the next game saves him.  But if they go 1-5 there's a good chance they'll make a change.  They have to start winning to help the bottom line.  Let's hope we can upset Calgary and put the topic to rest for a while.

A great win.  Yes at times it was a little ugly but there was so much more energy and fight than Weeks 1 and 2.  Kudos to all the coaching staff and players.  Well done!  Hopefully it's the beginning of a winning streak.

A great win.  Yes at times it was a little ugly but there was so much more energy and fight than Weeks 1 and 2.  Kudos to all the coaching staff and players.  Well done!  Hopefully it's the beginning of a winning streak.

People are mad because the Bombers have played crappy football for going on 6 years now.  Not average football, but crappy football.  Winnipeg fans deserve better than bad season after bad season.  I used to accept this poor play saying 'oh it's just one or two bad years'.  But even I have come to the point of anger.  Get someone in here who can build at least a competitive franchise.  Other teams routinely do it, while the Bombers remain the league doormat.  Sorry, but 6 straight years of bad football and 25+ years without a Grey Cup in a relatively small league is unacceptable.

People are mad because the Bombers have played crappy football for going on 6 years now.  Not average football, but crappy football.  Winnipeg fans deserve better than bad season after bad season.  I used to accept this poor play saying 'oh it's just one or two bad years'.  But even I have come to the point of anger.  Get someone in here who can build at least a competitive franchise.  Other teams routinely do it, while the Bombers remain the league doormat.  Sorry, but 6 straight years of bad football and 25+ years without a Grey Cup in a relatively small league is unacceptable.

Agree with much of what you've put down here. Joe Mack was an out of the blue (sorry for the pun) signing - there was no one on the board with football knowledge and they went with a recommendation from an old guy (Paul Robeson) who had fleeting memories of Mack as a bird dog (scout) in the 80s.
Way too many "out of the blue" hirings that have resulted in performance toxicity. Examples:
Jeff Reinbold hire.
David Asper as chairman of the board.
Gary Etcheverry and Marcel Belleifulee hires.
Garth Buchko as President (no real football knowledge other than discussing games w/ Bob Irving at CJOB studios)
Paul Lapolice firing - replaced with Tim Burke
Mike Kelly hire - and the carnage caused and final soiling of Lyle Bauer's reputation
and now currently = fresh green hires
Wade Miller as CEO/President
Kyle Walters as General manager
Mike O'Shea (a guy with only a few years of special teams coaching) as head coach
Probably better to let the current guys run out their contracts, have season tickets take a minor to moderate dip and scour the earth for people who can do the jobs.
Bomber board of directors, for all intents and purposes is just a coffee/wine/liquor klatch with no real football or football administrative skills
 

You clearly don't understand the power structure of the team.  Mack was given full control to run the team.   His title was G.M but there was no one above him who was interested in day-to-day football affairs.  So he was the guy entrusted with turning the program around.
When Mack was fired Wade Miller was hired, as President I think, and he was given full authority to run the team.  He hired Walters, and he and Walters hired O'Shea.  How can you ask what do Mack and Miller have to do with one another.  They were both "the guy" given total authority on football decisions.  Their titles were different; their mandate was the same.  Fix the team.
As for "you're not going to find proven winners", that's a defeatist copout and it's also untrue.   Saskatchewan went out this past off-season and paid big money for a proven winner like Chris Jones and they gave him the keys to re-build their team.  He has replaced 35 of the 44 players from last year's team and I'll bet you Saskatchewan, 3-15 last year, wins more games than the Bombers do this season.  Guys with proven winning track records are out there.  You just have to have the guts to go and get them, and if that means paying more, big deal.  You'll have more fans in the seats with a winning team and the investment will pay off in no time flat.  I gather from your comments that you think it was fine to hire Mack, a guy who had never been a GM and had no affiliation with the CFL for some 25 years.  And then to hire Miller, a guy who had never accomplished anything in a football management position.  The major blame for this team lies with its Board.  They keep on hiring guys with no track record of building a winning CFL team. 

You clearly don't understand the power structure of the team.  Mack was given full control to run the team.   His title was G.M but there was no one above him who was interested in day-to-day football affairs.  So he was the guy entrusted with turning the program around.
When Mack was fired Wade Miller was hired, as President I think, and he was given full authority to run the team.  He hired Walters, and he and Walters hired O'Shea.  How can you ask what do Mack and Miller have to do with one another.  They were both "the guy" given total authority on football decisions.  Their titles were different; their mandate was the same.  Fix the team.
As for "you're not going to find proven winners", that's a defeatist copout and it's also untrue.   Saskatchewan went out this past off-season and paid big money for a proven winner like Chris Jones and they gave him the keys to re-build their team.  He has replaced 35 of the 44 players from last year's team and I'll bet you Saskatchewan, 3-15 last year, wins more games than the Bombers do this season.  Guys with proven winning track records are out there.  You just have to have the guts to go and get them, and if that means paying more, big deal.  You'll have more fans in the seats with a winning team and the investment will pay off in no time flat.  I gather from your comments that you think it was fine to hire Mack, a guy who had never been a GM and had no affiliation with the CFL for some 25 years.  And then to hire Miller, a guy who had never accomplished anything in a football management position.  The major blame for this team lies with its Board.  They keep on hiring guys with no track record of building a winning CFL team. 

I didn't hear O'Shea's comments, but I have to admit they are troublesome.  Most of us here know what we are watching and we know there have been two straight games where the opposition has given up a bunch of garbage yards in the 4th quarter.  For O'Shea to suggest the team played well in the 4th quarter is either blind desperation or he thinks we are all rubes and don't know Calgary had a 29-point lead and rushed only 3 giving Willy and the receivers all day.
I cheered for O'Shea initially but he now reminds me a much nicer Mike Kelly.  Both of them treat the fans as fools sometimes, as if we don't understand what is going on on the field.  Mike - if you don't know it and that seems next to impossible - your team only looked like they were playing well in the 4th quarter.  The opposition basically let you score as long as time ran off the clock.  You do understand that - don't you?

You have to rate QB's by how they perform when the game matters. Willy has generated about 100 yards passing for the first 3 quarters of both games.  That's dismal.  And no, he wasn't under a constant rush.  
How a guy who probably hasn't won 15 games in the CFL and has lost far more has a $400,000 contract is beyond me.  I was all set to cheer for the guy when we got him.  Sure he was our third choice after Collaros and Burress, but big deal.  But he simply has not developed.   He doesn't seem to see the field all that well and if you put any sort of pass rush on him he's in real trouble.  Right now he's the worst starting QB in the league...despite all the cheap 4th quarter passing yards he's gotten when the other team rushes only 3 guys and gives him and the receivers all sorts of time.   I'll be the first to congratulate him if he can turn things around.  But other than a few games after he first joined the Bombers, he has been decidedly sub-par.