TBURGESS

He's had 2 years to prove that he deserves an opportunity. When he got one, he didn't have any success. BTW I'm in Calgary these days and simply posting as much as I do around here while not posting at all on any other teams sites proves I'm a Bomber fan.

Neufeld was the starter until he got injured (again). Bond's both better and cheaper. Without Bond, we don't win as many games as we did last year. JFG has to be penciled in as a starter this year. The other candidates are Richards and Coates. All of our import receivers are better than them. Hurl mostly played special teams last year and took some reps on D. That's the same as Bass and Bennett. I don't think it's going out on a limb to say that Hurl made more money than either of them. If we reduced the number of starting NI's, we would replace the worst one with an import. That's why I chose the players I chose. They are likely the worst NI's who get starting time. BTW: Muamba isn't that great and Greenwood is still looking for a job because a LB with concussion problems isn't going to get a lot of chances.

Nice try... I also defined a bunch of different things in the grey area and he's none of them. I haven't seen a single example of any success that Richards has had in the CFL. As it stands Jade freakn' Etienne had more success in the CFL.

Lets try this another way... Neufeld or Bond (at way less money BTW)? JFG over any of our import receivers? Hurl over Bass/Bennett? Personally, I'll take the better players. 1 more thing... Folks seem to have taken reducing the NI ratio by 1 or even 2 players to mean getting rid of all the Canadian players in the league, which is never going to happen. We're talking about losing the two worst NI's on every team. Players that most fans couldn't even name.

Tons of grey area between success and failure, but you can't call him great or good or above average or average or slightly below average yet. That leaves failure IMO. What else is there?

Because a certain number of NI's are mandated for every team and the number of NI's who can actually play at a starters level is less than the number who are mandated, those NI's are paid big bucks, well over the 100K mark. The going rate for a top draft pick, who hasn't showed that they can even play in the CFL is over $100K. Backup NI's are getting more than $100K simply as insurance. The savings for backup imports vs backup NI's would be pretty significant or the backup NI's would have to take a pay cut to compete. No, 100K isn't going to change a high profile athletes mind to come to Canada, but it's not about competing for players with the NFL. We all know that the CFL can't do that. It's about bringing in better players for less than their current NI counterparts are getting and that's what most top end US s college players are. I think there are a lot of US players who'd love to continue their playing days.

You're right. The cap wouldn't likely change so the SMS would remain the same. What we would end up with is better players for the same money.

Folks admit that Richards hasn't had any success what so ever in 2 years, but still say you can't call him a failure? What would you call him? Great? Nope. Good? Nope. Average? Nope. Below Average? Sure, as long as you add Way before the below. Will he be a failure this year? That remains to be seen. Has he been a failure so far? U bet.

Reducing the number of NI's by one or two a team wouldn't do anything to hurt the development of NI's. The best NI's get an NFL shot anyway, Most college ball players, NI or not, will never make either the CFL or the NFL. That doesn't stop them from playing at university or college or juniors. Reducing the number of NI's doesn't mean changing the CFL rules to match the NFL or losing the Canadian identity of the league. It just means less guaranteed jobs for NI's. Teams could always choose to carry more NI's if the NI players are as good and as cheap as the imports they replace. There's no such thing as a hundred years of the same number of NI's. The number of NI's has changed before and it will likely change again. The rules change almost yearly these days and it's the rules that make the CFL special. Changing the ratio would make running a CFL team less expensive and would allow us to watch better players playing our game.

1 catch in 2 years is failure. I don't see how anyone can say he's succeeded in his CFL career. Richards is under contract. He'll get one more chance with the Bombers in TC this year. Assuming we draft a receiver, he'll be in competition for the last NI receiver spot. With 2 years of experience, he'd better win it, or else he'll find himself looking for a new job.

I'm a big Trestman fan. Popp is a good GM. As long as he doesn't try to be a coach again, they should be great additions to the Argos. Should have happened back in December if they wanted to have the maximum chance at a winning season this year, but I still think they will make a pretty big difference this year.

My bad... I didn't realize you were including playoffs in the number of wins. I'm the one claiming that a playoff win is better than a playoff loss. You're the one calling the cross over a heroic achievement.

If the Riders had traded for Tate, Ripper would be singing a different tune. If we had traded for Tate, I'd be just another cheerleader.

Not everyone. The Riders, Argos, and the Als were definitely worse.

If you actually read my posts, you wouldn't make the same mistakes twice. Go back and look at the number of wins for both teams. Hint: Blue Bombers 11 7 Eskimos 10 8 I'll take a playoff win over a playoff loss every single time.

We weren't interested? What's your source for this 'fact'?

They won 10, we won 11 (Our 11th win being against backups). They went 5-1 down the stretch. We went 3-3. They won a playoff game. We didn't.

BLM has won all the meaningful games, so Tate's not had any chances. Not sure how that's a knock against Tate.

5-1 down the stretch and a playoff win isn't the participation trophy and it's way better than we did, both down the stretch and in the playoffs.

Drew Tate is one of the best backup QB's in the league. He's thrown for 4670 yards and has 32 TD's to 15 Int's. I'd take him over either of our backup QB's and it's not even close.

The last 3rd of the season plus the playoffs is a better indication of where Edmonton really was last year.

Biggest off season acquisition this off season IMO: http://www.cfl.ca/2017/02/21/report-redblacks-acquire-drew-tate-trade-stamps/ I'd have paid a 5th rounder in the draft for Tate in a second.

And you cherry picked the Edmonton stats, cuz they went 5-1 in the last 6 games. And Edm won a playoff game. And we went 3-4 in our last 7 games if you include the playoffs.

The Bombers and the Eskimos were very closely matched last year, so I'm not sure that Hervey would want to help us out either. In fact, it may make more sense for the Esks to help the Riders than to help us. OTOH, I'd love to see Franklin in B&G. Better than us. They won a playoff game, we were one and done.

We went 3 and 3 in our last 6 games. Lost to Cgy, Edm, and Ott. Got some breaks to win 2 very close games with BC. Won the last game of the year against Ott when they didn't play their top 2 QB's or a bunch of other starters to 'win when we needed to'.