Rich

Not to be outdone by the shakeup in the Winnipeg Blue Bomber front office, we decided it was time for a bit of a shakeup at Morning Big Blue. No, we aren't replacing Mike with KelownaBomberFan. For those of you using the main theme, you will have found a bit of a brighter Bomber Blue and Gold when you logged in. The site layout and navigation is pretty much the same, and should be familiar, it has just been updated with a new paint job. Take a long look at that gold bar up top where it says Morning Big Blue - A Winnipeg Fan Community and put your creative hats on, we will be launching a contest soon to replace that text with an official site logo. We've also recently added a weekly Pick 'Em pool starting this weekend (Get your picks in before tomorrow!). As well, Blue Bomber articles from the Sun and Free Press are now being syndicated into our new News Feed forum. We are going to be experimenting a little bit with ads on the site over the next little while. You will see blank gaps in certain places of the site while we go through the approval process. If the revenue that comes out of this is negligible, then they will eventually go away. If it can offset the cost of running the site, then great! If it brings in more then costs, then it will be invested back into the site. I will promise that the ads will be in appropriate places and not cover content. Happy to say that we have recently passed 200 registered members. We've had over 13,000 posts in over 400 threads since moving to the new forum software, with over 3,500 of those posts coming in August alone. Buchko and Mack being fired had a helping hand in that. I think we hit a record with that thread with 590 posts and 11,000 views. It has been a tumultuous time in Bomber land these past few weeks, and that usually means increased work for moderators as people's temper and emotions get the best of them. Happy to say that there has been very few issues that we've had to deal with. The discussion has been excellent, on point, and civilized. Thank you all for your contributions! There are no major changes planned at this point. Some items that are out there and being thought about: I would like to get the Twitter feed back on the site. Still trying to find a way to do this without causing load errors in IE8. Speaking of Twitter. There is an addon that would tweet out created topics through the @MorningBigBlue twitter handle. It would allow you to get updates of current topics in your Twitter timeline. Debating whether or not this would be useful or more on the side of spam on Twitter. If there is interest in this, let me know. We now have quite a few contests going on. Including the CFL Drafts, the Lock of the Week (special thanks to Jpan85 for running this!), Pick 'Em pools. If there is interest I have been eyeing another feature to allow "betting". It wouldn't be real money. It would be something along the lines of people who participate getting a set amount of fake currency to start with and making weekly bets with it. Purely for bragging rights. If there is interest in this, let me know. As always, your feedback is important to us. Is something on the site bugging you? Let us know. We can try to change it (or at least let you know why we can't). Have a suggestion to make the site better, tell us about it. Think we are doing a good job? Well we love to hear about that as well! Now lets go get a win this weekend. Go Bombers!

100 per day. If it was per QB change then I am sure the 10 would have been more then enough! Have to have a limit, just the way the software works. If you ever hit the 100 limit, let me know and I will up it to 1000

The good news is I got the menu to show up in the default theme. The bad news is if you click on the Pick 'Ems menu link, you will get a Server 500 error (this only seems to occur on the default theme) I've gone back to the creator of the addon to see if he has any ideas on why this would be happening. Will keep you updated.

I see why it doesn't work for you, you are on the default skin rather then the Disturbance skin. Never thought to test the menu on the alternative skin. I will take a closer loot at it tonight after work and get it fixed up.

The Pick 'em Pools menu?

Who knew there was a limit. Upped it from 10 to 100

It is an automatic feed. The site software has the ability to convert any RSS feed into posts. It checks every every hour or so for new articles. The Free Press and Sun publish separate feeds specifically for the Bombers, so those are the ones we have for now. They have a general football feed as well but that will pull in all of the NFL news. I would like to get general CFL news as well, but still looking for a source. TSN has an RSS feed, but it is all their news, they don't separate it by sport. The CFL site also has a feed but there is something wrong with it, couldn't get it working last night.

I don't buy this I know nothing about the offense so I won't make the decision. He is the head coach, the leader. His job is to listen to the arguments of his offensive coaches, the reasons they want to play a different QB, then armed with that information HE has to make the final decision. Want Buono a defensive coach? You never would have heard him say such a thing.

So Lawless just said on H & L that Burke wanted to trade for Glenn and they could have had him for a 2nd round pick in the off season, but Mack said no, that Buck was better.

Whether or not Burke wants anything to do with the scheming of the offense, he is the head coach of this team and he should have the final say on the starting QB. Forget this I know nothing about the offense so I wash my hands of it. The buck stops with him ( no pun intended)

Twitter shut down the original interface we were using to get the feed. When I implemented an alternative it broke the site for people using Internet Explorer. Still pecking away, looking for a way to make this work.

I think their hand was forced with the leak to Lawless. I don't think they wanted to blow it all up as soon as they did

I've integrated a new feature into the site, the ability to do pick 'em pools (See the new Pick 'Ems menu up above). It is a little odd starting this in the middle of the CFL season, but better late then never Gives us the rest of the season to test it out and see how it works. For now, it is setup to just pick winners, no ties, no odds. But the addon does support those things. It will track overall leaders, stats, etc. Pools can be setup for any sport, so if there is interest, we can do NFL, NHL, etc. Unfortunately the schedule creation is manual so the NHL would be a lot of data entry. It has been setup so that picks for any week have to be before the first game starts. So for next week (Week 8), picks can be entered up to 7PM next Friday (August 16). Any questions / problems let me know, and good luck!

I think Mack only got an extension the off season before last (2012). He was signed for this season and next (through 2014). http://bluebombers.com/article/blue-bombers-extend-the-contract-of-vice-president-and-general-manager-joe-mack Don't know why they would extend him when he was signed for 2 more years.

Garry as always is on his own side.

It is his first day and he is nervous, and has likely been pushed into this sooner then they planned. You want a CEO that can give a speech or a CEO that can fix this organization?

He will get better at it as he gets comfortable with it. Just needs some practice.

Confirmed that Mack is fired as well

Will he keep Mack?

Is the video streamed?

Now hearing Buchko is fired as well?!?

Agreed

Just announced on TSN that Joe Mack will be fired at 10 AM and Wade Miller will be given a "prominent" role.

I honestly don't know what their qualifications are, but I also doubt the situation they were hired in mirrors Buchko's. In your original post, you asked why the hatred for Buchko, and I tried to answer that. A lot of it stems from his hiring being right after the long term deal with CJOB. Following that with his incorrect declaration of the stadium being ready on time. He started off on a bad foot and he has yet to put a good one down. It is Buchko's missteps and errors (or at least those made under his watch) that make people question his qualifications. Have any of the other people you mentioned gotten the same "negative" publicity? Made the same mistakes? I don't the follow the other teams as closely, so I can't answer that question completely. Do I think all the criticism directed his way is valid? No. Do I think some of it is? Definitely. If Mack is not the guy, he should have been fired in the off season. Is anyone shocked that we have the record we do with little to no changes from last season? I'm not. I was hoping for the best, but I didn't really expect all that much. Mack promised to fix the QB problem, yet Buck was still the starter at the beginning of the season. If someone reporting to me isn't fixing or doing something they promised me they would, then I'm after them until it gets done. Now I don't what discussions happened between the two of them in the off season, and maybe this firing now is the result of that. I'm not advocating firing Buchko at this point. I think he needs to be given time to hire his own guy and put his own operating structure in place, but in my mind, he has certainly used some of his strikes already. The bottom line is that there is something inherently wrong with the Bombers management structure and the way they do things. From Lyle Bauer underfunding Taman in the early/mid 2000's to hiring Mike Kelly and going to Joe Mack and Buchko's missteps, the delayed stadium to the opening day logistical nightmare , this organization has been mired in futility for going on a decade now, and they really don't seem to have a clue as to what they are doing. Especially when you compare the way they are run to the way True North runs the Jets. Is this Buchko? Is this the environment he has been given to work in and stems from the board? I don't know, time will tell. Maybe Nasty Nate has been right all these years and the Bomber board has to go.

He needs board approval for the money they will have to continue paying Mack after they fire him.