comedygeek

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A team *can* win with their backup, but a team shouldn't be *expected* to. It would've been tough for Edmonton to win 14 games and make it to the Grey Cup (and win it) without Reilly down the stretch -- even with Jones' dominant D. If Burris didn't survive the season, the RedBlacks wouldn't have won close to 12 games and definitely wouldn't be playing in the Grey Cup. The Ti-Cats were by most accounts the team to beat in the CFL until Collaros went down. After that, they were doomed. Yes, it was partly the other pieces on offense, and it almost certainly was because of the playbook. But it's pretty fair to want to see a full season out of Willy before completely sacrificing this whole group. (Now, if he goes a 3rd season in a row without playing a majority of the games, I think that in and of itself ends up being a problem that the GM and maybe more should answer for -- as a constantly-injured QB is just as bad as not having a franchise QB.)

This is insane to me. He's talented and makes your team better even with the drops factored in, but shizzzz....

How can they ask for this? They obviously gave the Eskimos permission to talk to him -- what kind of precedent are they hoping to set here??

There is no OC the Bombers could've grabbed that would've made everyone happy. Maas (who isn't an option because the RedBlacks didn't let us talk to him and the Esks are likely going to hire him as HC) might have gotten the most positive response overall, but he still isn't incredibly proven. Jackson would've had detractors (inexperienced), Khari would've had detractors (not a lot of success in past OC roles), etc. The fact is, LaPo was being considered for multiple OC positions -- and possibly a HC position -- across the CFL this off-season, and the Bombers got him. The last time he was an Offensive Coordinator, he was a success. I have cautious optimism heading into the 2016 season with LaPo behind the offensive controls. I think with a healthy Willy and (here's hoping) some aggressive free agent acquisitions, perhaps our offense can match our performance on defense in the second half of 2015 and actually put forth a formidable team effort. And if not, then we clean house at the end of 2016 and start fresh yet again. Yipee!

Ain't everything just peachy in Bomberland? Not fun with the cracks and stuff (ridiculous actually the work they have to re-do this offeseason). But the stadium is more than a year old, and his account of IGF not having the capacity to bring in the trucks for a major performance on the field was also a little (lot) off. But besides those corrections, obviously nothing much is peachy in Bomberland, so that stands.

I watched the whole presentation, and was just behind a pile of Esks fans crowding the first few rows when a bunch of players brought the Cup over to the sidelines to give their fans a closer look. Thought it was very classy, and it was fun to see the Esks fans enjoying their win in a very respectful way. Yes, our futility is legendary and the 25 years since our last Cup is insane. (Technically Ottawa has the longest drought in seasons between all its franchises at 26: 20 with the Roughies, 4 with the Renegades, and now 2 with the Redblacks; Hamilton is also now at a not-wonderful 19 seasons.) But I still enjoyed seeing a team win their first Cup in a decade after having a fairly similar run of futility to us during that time (save for our 2007 season). Hopefully we can turn it around in a couple years and get our first legitimate chance at a Grey Cup victory since 2001 by, say, year 28 or 29? All that is to say that I tried to soak in as much of the Grey Cup as I could, and that included sticking around to see the winners celebrate their trophy.

And significantly higher ticket prices. In an era when attendance is down across the board and everyone has home theatre systems.

Please define "pwnt" because I clearly don't know what the hell it means. Pwnt.. Is the bastardized version of owned. Owned was coined in online gaming.. I believe in halo or counterstrike is where it originiated.. Essentially means, i kicked your ass so bad.. IE I own you. Owned. Pwnt. Hope that clears it up.. Is this actually a real thing or just a tongue-in-cheeked response to a typo?? Neg. online gaming comminity butchers words on a daily basis for laughs and such lol. It probably came about after a typo originally but then caught on like wildfire. Nailed it. It was a misspelling that was made fun of and then caught on like wildfire as an internet term. Words get changed and language evolves all the time -- not just in "internet society". Yes, shortening of things can be annoying (I always try to write things out as fully as possible in texts, tweets, etc.), but look at how different Shakespearean English is to today's Canadian English. Language is fascinating in any form!

John N. Bowman @7Bowman I've reached my expiration date I guess. 10:22 PM - 20 Aug 2015 Montréal, Québec

I'm not saying I've been paying enough specific attention to Hurl to make an assessment one way or the other (besides looking at statistics), however does anyone remember how almost universally hated Muamba was when he started getting more playing time at MLB? Calls for the Bombers' need to "get a real MLB" were all over online forums and heard leaving Bombers home losses. Eventually, he became such a force that he got himself an NFL shot and we all wish he was here right now. If Hurl continues to improve game-by-game, he deserves a chance. If he plateaus for too long or regresses as the season goes on, he's not the answer. (I wish I could drudge up old posts as examples, but this site wasn't around yet at that point, and I'm not sifting through that other site for quotes. )

Absolutely crazy if it shifts mid-season. Not at all surprised if it happens at the end of the season (which could still be announced soon).

I want to say something about Drew Willy's rushing this game. Highlighted not just by thread on here about "pocket passers" vs. "scramblers", but constant talk of Willy's lack of mobility (Paul Weicek was on TSN's pregame show almost insultingly referring to how "obvious" it was Drew Willy wasn't mobile, saying he'll be even worse after a knee injury), it was so good to see him prove a few people wrong today. The thing is, he didn't just prove them wrong today. He's shown over the last 2 seasons in Winnipeg that when he needs to, he can take off. I think this is another fair comparison between Willy and Ricky Ray -- Ray is known for being an accurate drop-back passer, but he can definitely get the yardage on the ground when the opportunity opens up and the need is there. As if to continue the insults, the first question of the post-game Drew Willy presser was, "Can you explain to us how you got more mobile after you hurt your knee?" I loved Drew's response: "I've always been a good athlete in my sense. You know, I was an all-state basketball player. *laughs* You guys can write what you want to write in that sense. I mean, I'm confident in my ability. I'm obviously a drop back quarterback, but at the same time, I try to be athletic out there and get yards when I can." Can we finally stop saying that Willy is a one-dimensional QB? Yes, the MB offense has largely focused on keeping him in the pocket, but I really don't think that has to do with his abilities beyond that (though he's proven that with protection, he's an incredibly skilled and accurate pocket passer). His QB rating is virtually tied with Harris for best in the league (113 to 114) and he's winning us football games. There are problems with these Blue Bombers that one home win can't magically fix, but our starting QB isn't one of them.

I find it *extremely* hard to believe that the architect was asked to design a stadium that would hold no concerts, nor would be able to survive a winter. Concerts happen in stadiums. Any stadium designed without concerts in mind has a clueless architect. Winnipeg has winters. Any stadium designed to not withstand winter has a clueless architect. Even if he is being completely honest that he wasn't asked to factor these things in when designing the building, any non-clueless architect would've recognized these things and double checked. But again, I highly doubt Creswin -- who was planning to run the stadium privately (concert revenue is a big help with that) and have a winter bubble on the stadium for year-round community use -- would suggest it not be build for concerts or the winter. Basically, it really seems like everyone in this situation is an idiot. It's really a miracle we've gotten such a beautiful stadium out of this whole mess.

They aren't but most people 'round this city lack a little thing called perspective. FIFY

Why should it be okay to target people because they "act different"? To me, that's just as bad as targeting them because of their sexuality. Are you against men hitting on women in a bar? Women hitting on men? If you are, then you have a bit of an argument. But the "ridicule" and "hostility" you talk about potentially being met by a guy hitting on another guy at Whiskey Dix is a perfect example of WHY, even with marriage equality in Canada for the last 10 years, there's still a long way to go until LGBTQ people in this country are treated the same way as cisgendered straight people.

But Main Street's still all cracked and broken... Sorry 17to85 the Negatrons have spoken No.. Supah dupah hasn't said anything so... Only a small sample of the negatron minority has spoken. I'd take crazy Lyle Lanley over our previous Lyle any day!

He didn't go to mini camp (he was still draft-eligible at that point). Based on following him in the CIS, Walters and team determined after he went undrafted that Yantz was better than the QBs they *did* have at mini camp, and signed him. As for "getting a fair shot", that's totally up for interpretation. Yantz obviously feels that he didn't, but not getting reps in the last week of practices could very well be because of what others have said above -- maybe in the drills he was way behind, or maybe he was taking too long with the playbook. I had hoped the team was viewing him as a project (just like Reaves), knowing they had no shot this year, but wanting to get them involved now with the hope of it paying off in a year or 2. Obviously they felt it wasn't worth the roster spot, and that the TC and preseason reps were more important to give to the guys who they felt would make the team and need to be fully evaluated. To many Canadian QBs who never get to a CFL training camp, Yantz got more than a fair shot! He just didn't do enough in his limited time to warrant more of a look. I do hope the rules are changed so we can see every CFL team carrying a Canadian QB on the roster some day, and they're given the time to gain experience to match their certain raw talent. But until that happens, they're starting so far behind the 8 ball, it's just not even fair to them. Clearly they were hoping to get a diamond in the rough. In a league where the team holds the options, wouldn't you want to sign a guy that might pan out to a longer deal, when you know you can just release him if he doesn't have what it takes? It sounds more like Yantz is a rookie who just didn't see that side of it, thought the team was more committed to him than they were, and bought into the interviews and press around his signing. It sucks, but it's the way it is. I can't imagine any player looking to sign with the Bombers being told, "You probably aren't gonna make it, now please sign with us." Every player is likely told they're going to get a shot -- nobody would come otherwise. But I also believe the team means it when they say it, even those lower on the totem pole. They're in camp, they're taking part in drills, they're getting reps (and it sounds like through rookie camp and the beginning of main camp, Yantz was getting more reps). He obviously showed to be well behind the other guys, and so the reps dropped off. Again, it sucks, but he got his shot and didn't sieze it. And of course, that's in part because of the system that doesn't value Canadian QBs despite them coming in *way behind* U.S. QBs as far as training, experience, etc. Anyone mad at the Bombers in this situation apparently are more comfortable with the team being nice than trying to win that far-too-elusive Grey Cup title. The best players should make the team, factoring in the ratio. Period.

To be fair, TSN was at IGF a lot these past couple weeks -- it just wasn't their CFL crew.

The changing media landscape isn't a Winnipeg thing, it's global. The music industry was on its way to dying when Napster came out and people started downloading music for free. It wasn't until Apple made it "cool" (and affordable, and most importantly, simple) to buy digital music that people became comfortable paying for something many had been getting for free. There are always going to be people trying to get every piece of software/media/etc. for free if they can get away with it, but most people would be happy to pay for things if a] the price matches what they feel is the value; and b] is equally easy or even easier to get than doing so "illegally". Live sports is something that is keeping many people attached to their cable TV plans, even if they only watch a couple of their 4000 channels for a few hours a week otherwise. But with the amount of money TSN is giving to the CFL, what incentive would the CFL have to start offering a "live stream" package that can allow you to watch games without cable? Sure, in the short-term, it might keep some fans happy. But TSN would be losing customers, its parent company Bell would be losing cable subscribers, and the money the CFL would be making directly from fans would not make up for how much it would piss off their media partner (at least in the current landscape). The free market of media is definitely skewed in Canada with the limited number of large companies owning the bulk of our communications and media options (mobile/phone, internet, cable, TV channels, radio stations, and production). Costs are inflated across the board because they can get away with it, as it's near impossible for a competitive product to come in and drive the prices down. We have some of the worst cell phone packages (prices vs. service) in the developed world, and some of the highest cable/internet fees. I don't blame people for getting sick of how expensive it has become to be "connected", something that's almost a requirement in today's day and age. (I can think of only one friend who manages to mostly stay out of this whole mess -- they have no cell phone, a decent internet package, a home phone, and a Netflix account, and that's it. ETA: God, that was meandering. I won't delete it, but apologies to those that actually get through it.

Excited to be going to the game on Friday with my out-of-town friend (thanks to the generosity of MBB!). Now I'm just gonna have to decide which games I'm going to get a mini pack to, and if I want to spend a bit more to sit closer to the action this year. As for the Grey Cup Festival, I definitely hope to get to TD Manitoba. Outside of that, my offer still stands of holding a MBB party at my venue, with live music and whatnot. No cover, of course (for any of the poor people out there ).

Comedy geek, I got the FREE buddy voucher tickets, but have already offered them out to another party. And no, I'm not charging them money for a ticket I got FOR FREE. However, if they fall through, I'd be happy to offer them up to you as I have no need for the extra tickets myself (using my own 2). I'll know by day's end if they are committing to them or not, so I'll p.m. you if the tickets open up. Appreciate it either way!

Of course it was an exaggeration! I figured all the light-heartedness of the post in general would come across, but I guess not. I always hear about people having unused buddy vouchers or tickets to the exhibition game (hell, I often did when I had season tickets), so I figured the first place to check would be with the die-hard Bomber fans I read and occasionally post with on a daily basis. Appreciate the life lessons from 17 and Noeller, though.

So I was at the Japan/Ecuador World Cup game Tuesday at IGF, and being in the stadium made want to watch Bomber football! I don't have season tickets this year, and so had no thoughts about going to Friday's game (even when I had season tickets, I often skipped the exhibition game). But a buddy in from out of town asked if I wanted to go, and now I want to. But I'm poor and don't want to pay full price for an exhibition game ticket. Anyone out there have any extras? Or discounts? I usually sit in the East Upper Deck (both when I had season tickets 2 seasons ago, and with my mini pack last year) but I'll sit anywhere, obviously. Thanks in advance! And in general, who's going to the game? Who's itching for a Bomber home game, even if it just meaningless preseason? Getting so pumped for the season!

He's not really a big name player. He couldn't even crack an NFL roster. He's basically just famous for being gay. He was also SEC Defensive Player of the Year. Whatever that meant for his NFL or CFL aspirations, he was already a "name" in football circles before coming out.