Mike

Kwaku Boateng who looked washed in 2021 and didn’t play in 2022? No thanks

I hope in 15 years, Bailey is still with the club somehow as our very own Pinball type guy. Hearing those quotes .. wow There’s absolutely no way he took a pay cut. Also, be quiet

You and me both bro

My god

Good business practice is spending money where it makes you better, not spending money on mediocre return at a position of need. There wasn’t a single DT available worth signing, you can’t force it into reality. We’ll have to go a different route this year with that spot because the free agent route was not available.

The right move this year isn’t to wait at all, not when they’ve essentially pushed all their chips in the middle. I think they’re going to be forced to wait either way since Hamilton isn’t going to give up a guy like Bennett but if they COULD get him, you have to give it a shot this year. That being said, he also fits next year. I can’t see a situation where we aren’t replacing at least half of our starting DL next year and the cash we save by seeing Willie and/or Jeffcoat depart is easily spent on keeping Schoen and signing a guy like Bennett. lots of tough decisions ahead for our front office, 2024 is going to be a wild year

I can’t see Hamilton, in a Grey Cup hosting year, taking futures from one of their biggest obstacles in order to improve them in the now unless you absolutely blew them away with an offer. I can see Hamilton saying no to our next two first rounders, to be honest. Only kind of trade I can maybe see working is something along the lines of Dobson for Bennett, which is probably a trade I’d make but you have to think long and hard about it now that we don’t really have any upcoming OL in the pipeline and Desjarlais isn’t coming back.

I’d be shocked if Hamilton traded us Bennett. I’d also be shocked if we didn’t heavily consider the idea of trying to trade for him or someone like him. They’ve made it pretty clear that this year is *the* year for us, our first round draft pick probably isn’t going to contribute at the level a third year Canadian can. Sure, you can try and sign him next offseason but we want to win now. I’d offer up our first rounder without hesitation. I think it’d take more

Same. I wonder how many neg-list guys are getting scooped up by the XFL/USFL. I know we’ve been hit hard by it. Donald Payne, Terrell Bonds, John Daka are all names we’ve released on that neg-list reveal that are now in the XFL.

No argument about the validity of injuries, I’m just saying they’re both starting to develop a history of missing too many games and/or being too beat up at the end of the year, so if we don’t have a well thought out plan B going into this season, it’s really our own fault.

The general consensus you’ll hear is that the hold up is the majority of lower level players don’t want their salaries published.

Most teams have their 2 non-SAM linebackers playing essentially interchangeably these days, so I’ll just use that criteria and say I’d rather have McManus, either Williams (Avery or Jordan), Thurman or Judge over Bighill at this point in time. Feels to me like we’re stuck in the same time warp that makes Hamilton fans think Simoni Lawrence is still good. What I’d really like to see is if we can scout a young one to come in and replace either Kyrie or Bighill. If we have to use the same excuses of “they’re just covering up for injuries” this year when we’re going to trot out the same guys who we’ve been having that problem with for two years, we’re really doing it to ourselves at this point.

Has nothing to do with the league though

I don’t mind bringing Jeffcoat back, but we obviously need a third (and probably fourth) DE that can rotate in. The only known guy left that interests me is Shane Ray but obviously he’s pretty injury prone himself and for some reason, I get the sense he’s XFL or USFL bound anyways

doesn't really work that way though, you're still trying to create competition for camp. If you sign a guy and he's beat out by a drafted player, off he goes. It's not like these bottom half of the roster types are leveraging bonuses.

no kidding

Serious question: who takes Jeffcoat over Orimolade this year?

I’d love to have Bailey, I just don’t know where you play him if you’re putting Demski, Schoen and Lawler in the slot (which they should be)

Referring to last year when we made the mistake of prioritizing Maston over Darby and then pairing him with Kyrie to surround Bighill. Love me some Kyrie … really really underrated and fantastic player … but the guy is a bandaid. He’s played like 33% of our games in the past two years.

If only we had not committed ourselves to surrounding our struggling, aging MLB with players who are very injury prone or coming off major surgeries.

“he’s pretty good” isn’t exactly what I’m going for when we’re talking about the highest paid player in his position, but I wouldn’t even agree with that assessment, personally. He was a step behind a ton of plays and as it was happening, everyone chalked it up to “well he’s just covering for other people so they’re using him differently” and to me, he just looked slow and a step behind. He was probably the most constant offender on our entire D when it came to whiffed arm tackles. He averaged 4 tackles a game and didn’t really contribute a whole lot else, which is not what I’m looking for from a top level MLB. Yes, I get he can drop back in coverage and give different looks, but so can a guy who can fly around a bit more and have a little more impact on the field. Part of me wonders if O’Shea sees a reflection of himself in Bighill, the decline in overall play has been very similar to what O’Shea saw when his time was coming to an end. If you’re looking to set me up for an I told you so, you’ll be looking for a long time. I hope Bighill has an absolutely massive season for us. Why would I want anything less?

Genuinely one of the worst contracts in the CFL, in my opinion. Statistically one of the worst middle linebackers in the CFL and he’s the highest paid American LB? If we’re in the Grey Cup this year, he’ll be 35 at kickoff, has developed a recent trend of being too hurt by the end of the season to be effective when it matters and is visibly slower every single year, but we treat him around here like he’s 28 year old MOP candidate Bighill because FIFO, “he’s covering for other people” and because he’s a SAV4GE. I know Bighill has intangibles and leadership that bring value to the room, but the blind love for his play over the past few years has me really puzzled. He’s not good.

I really like Toronto’s roster construction a lot. If MBT is back, I feel like they have a shot to do big things again and I feel like we could see a Grey Cup rematch, although that could depend on Bo and his arm in Hamilton. Our offense is clearly head and shoulders above Toronto’s (and anyone else’s) but their D was better than ours (imo) last year and you can definitely argue they’ll be even better this year … going from McManis/Henoc/Edwards to McManis/Williams/Pickett is huge, they’ve got a lot of good solid bodies in the secondary … especially if Carnell is as legit as he looked in limited action last year … and a similar ability as our front office to find new ones, plus I really do think between both DL, the most impactful player is Shawn Oakman and we don’t, as of right now, have anyone comparable. Willie and Jeffcoat are still impact players but in my opinion, they need someone around them to take the pressure off, they were often one step late last year and if it’s not age, then it’s likely a lack of support and rotation. I’m not saying we don’t have a very good defence, but on a straight up talent level taking anything and everything else out of the equation, I genuinely would trade our best DL and LB (let’s call it Willie and Kyrie) for theirs (Oakman and McManis) and not really think twice about it. Depth is a different discussion, but I also don’t love how we trot out Gauthier, Briggs, Maruo and Jake Thomas so frequently. Our D depth has taken a big hit over the last year or so everywhere but in the secondary, there’s no Kongbo or Rutledge as of today to fill those rotational reps that we may need to depend on this year.

I’m wondering if Bailey ends up being a guy who comes back here just because it’s that or the XFL/USFL for him. Seems like he may get caught in a situation where other teams don’t want to pay for the intangibles we appreciate from him.

Just to make sure … you know you’re not on the team, right?