Rich

There is little chance that they are going to drop into the bottom 5 of the league, and I'm not sure that draft position makes much of a difference after that. Throw in the lottery in the first round, I want to see them go all out and play to win the remainder of the season. See them playing for jobs. I would however like to see guys like Hutchinson get some NHL expereince once we are officially eliminated. A little off topic, but does anyone know what the deadline is for send downs to the AHL for playoffs? I wonder if they will end up sending guys like Trouba and Scheifele (once he is healthy) down to the rock for a playoff run.

It is his 5th year but he is only 22. Based on your statement, would you give him more time to develop in the NHL if he only had fewer years in the NHL and the rest had been played in the minors? Players need time to develop regardless of where they play. Give him time to develop the other parts of his game. He has no where near hit his peek or plateau and has already had a 30 game season.

About as active as they have been in years past. Don't exepct any signing of top tier free agents. Probably a couple of mid to low end free agents. This is not a salary cap team. They can't get into bidding wars for the top free agents.

They were in a real tough spot this year. At trade deadline, they were still very much in the playoff hunt. If you start trading away assets at that point in time, what are you telling all those guys in the dressing room. What are you telling the fans. At the same time, this isn't a Stanley Cup contender even if they made the playoffs, so you aren't going to go start trading young assets for rentals, it just makes no sense to do when you are very likely to fizzle out in the first or second round. Winnipeg is still a small market, and they are building the team in the way a small market has to. And that takes time. In hindsight, sure I would have taken whataver I could have gotten for Setoguchi and hopefully a half decent return on Jokinnen. But Chevy doesn't have the benefit of hindsight, and I still believe the choice he made was the right one. This is still a young team with no to little playoff experience. There was a chance to get some this year, and that is a very important part of building a contender. It typically takes a few years for players to learn what it takes to win in the playoffs before they get success. They had a legit shot to get some of that experience this year, so they took it by not trading away players. Too bad it didn't work out. The prospects that Chevy has been drafting are just starting to become "NHL ready" now. There was abslutely nothing prospect wise from Atlanta. He still has a few more years to prove his plan out.

Asper isn't doing it for free, I assume. His company will be paid quite well for the work. I am sure the work wasn't tendered so he'll pocket that money. So he is going to be paid quite well ..... by himself? From what I understand of the deal, it is more of a trade. Where he will put up the press box in exchange for his box suite being paid for X amount of years. So of course the work wasn't tendered, who else would do that deal?

We could certainly setup a new forum for Winnipeg Jets / NHL talk. I don't think it will ever get as busy as HF Boards for Jets talk, but if there is interest, it is relatively easy to setup.

In BC this year:

Sure one of them will be the safety because there really is no one else and we don't have the NI in other areas to play an import there. The question will be is will any of them be any good, or will they hurt us...

Topic split from the Bomber forum

I've split off the posts on global warming and moved it to a new topic in general. This thread has gotten a little bit derailed.

Any challenge system implemented would be limited, in that you would have a limited number of calls per game / quarter or whatever. Coaches won't be able to throw it on every play, and would likely keep it for game changing plays, long plays, missed TDs, etc. It would probably tie into the existing challenges they get now, just extend what they can challenge. I agree they need to be more consistent in what they consider PI across all games and officials.

None

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It is one thing releasing a player to go to the NFL. Another to sign him up with your team so he can't go play for another CFL team for the duration of the contract. That is why you have contracts.

"Renovations" http://www.gov.mb.ca/health/publichealth/environmentalhealth/protection/docs/hpr/closures.pdf That list is kind of disturbing to read..... ignorance is bliss.

I would like this, for the NFL to have an option to buy out CFL contracts. At least then teams would get compensated for finding / developing / promoting players. This will never happen though, because the NFL already limited the signing bonus to these players a team can payout, so it doesn't look like the NFL really wants to go down that road.

If the CFL were even close in money to the NFL, I would agree that players should play out their contracts. But seeing the discrepancy in salaries between the two leagues, the short career window of professional football athletes, and how they risk their bodies for our entertainment, I have no problem with releasing a player early if they have a legit shot at getting on an NFL roster. While we may lose a few star players every year in this manner, if the CFL is viewed as a viable stepping stone to get a shot at the NFL, then we will attract far more talent then we will lose. Most of the guys that are in the CFL are fringe NFLers at best. Let them take their shot at the payday, most eventually come back. I know the argument is that these guys wouldn't have a shot at the NFL if it weren't for the CFL, their careers would be dead. But if you owned or ran a company and an employee of yours came up to you and said they had an offer to make 10 times what you are paying them, would you really tell them no?

I'll go.

I hope this incarnation of Ottawa succeeds, I don't want to see them fail, but I think it has been proven over the last 10 years that the CFL can afford for Ottawa to fail. The league has gotten to the strongest it has been in decades without Ottawa. And while it may need Ottawa and another Eastern team to grow further, the league certainly won't crumble if Ottawa folds again.

The scarcity of the game is what made it special. With the number of those games they had this year, I don't think many people outside of Vancouver really cared. I know I had it on for a bit in the background, but it has become too saturated to really care that much. And if it was mostly for the people of Vancouver, might as well keep the roof closed and keep the people dry.

The league is the healthiest it has been in decades. The players deserve to get paid, say what you want for 6 months work, but these guys put their bodies on the line (with the real threat of long term injuries) and have to leave their families behind. They deserve to be fairly compensated. I'm not saying to go back to the structure that almost bankrupt the league in the 90s, but a salary cap tied to league revenues only makes sense.

I think it is pretty naive to think you can judge the leadership impact a player has on a team based on what you see from the field (where you are watching from either your living room or so far away you can't hear what the player is saying) or post game interviews where 99% of the time players are simply giving canned responses. Leadership is displayed in many different ways. But you need to be with the team during practice, on the road, in the dressing room at half time, in the work out room to see who are the leaders on the team. With the access (or lack of) that fans have to the team, they have to rely on what other players say or the media (who typically get their insight from what the players say or observations from being closer to the team). At the end of the day it is only the coaches and players who know who the true leaders are on the team.

Thats an interesting read. Thanks for posting. According to that article he is released but will be continued to be monitored to ensure that he continues to take his medication, and if he refuses to take his medication he will be institutionalized again.

Unofficially I believe the one-year anniversary would be May 28th. Rich/Mike may be able to correct me though. I believe you are correct. At least that is the earliest post on this board. I'd have to check the archives of the original site before we upgraded to this software. Not sure if that is the date we opened or the date we migrated over to IPBoard. I'll check tonight when I'm home.

I wish I could be paid to attend trainign camp. In some years past, I've taken holidays to watch.