Brandon

I'm throwing Jefferson in the top three tonight.... the guy disrupts the line big time

Honestly I'd rather they trade Nichols and a 1st rounder to BC for Reilly and then cut Reilly at the end of the season. Make one push for the grey cup and move on with Strev and McGuire next season. More likely scenarios though... Keep Nichols as starter and ride him for the season... Give Nichols two more starts and if the output is the same ... game three they start Streveler. Tandem the QB's giving them split time.... doubt that they will do this though.

I only managed to watch half of the game (thanks MTS) what I saw was Jefferson in complete beast mode. The guy is only on a 1 year contract... a must re-sign ASAP. I think people are a bit to harsh on Bighill, I'm not sure which player it was but on Calgarys first touchdown someone else completely whiffed on a tackle that gave them the extra 30 yards on that big play. I'm not really worried about anyone on our D at this point. Nichols started out fine, made quick reads and hit Matthews , Lawler and Wolly for 10 + yard gains and they were tight spirals. After that though.... ummm looked absolutely blah. I agree with whoever said he was playing to keep his stats intact. A huge move for coaching to put Strev in at the end.... could this be the beginning of the end for Nichols? I guarantee Nichols will be having a pouting temper tantrum cuz of that. Maybe it will light a fire under his ass? Harris won't last the season with his current work load... they need to start spreading it out and getting first downs from other players. Why the hell is Whitehead not more involved? He ran those Mike Kelly special jet sweeps so damn effective early on and they haven't gone back to him?

My bloody PVR facked up and half of the game was scrambled (thanks MTS). From what I did see ... Nichols did go intermediate a few times in the first half with great success. First read quick tosses to Wolly , Lawler and Matthews. It worked beautifully. After that I saw a continuous checkdown to Harris. Even Suitor mentioned it. I don't know how LaPo can be blamed completely for this all of the time. He's not calling 3 yard checkdowns to Harris all night long is he?

I won't fault Walters, he's brought in A+ Free Agents , drafted well and has recruited some really good imports. I definitely would lock him up. O'Shea is frustrating because of his poker face and outsiders having zero reads on what he really thinks/feels about the way his players really are playing. On the other hand we have heard numerous positive reviews about the culture and the respect the players have for him. I'd consider him untouchable as well. Coordinators this is where it's a bit dicey. We definitely could use a fresh set of eyes on the defense. I'd have no problems if they moved into a different direction as we have so much talent on our d that on talent alone we will get by. On offense I'm not completely on the blame LaPo bandwagon like a few others. I'd like to see this offense being ran by someone decent like Harris or even Reilly. If we move on I also don't think it's the end of the world because unless you get a wacko like Kelly, anyone should be able to do decently with all the talent that we have.

Had tickets been priced at a normal price then yes it would of sold out.

It's been done many times before for other events around the world.

Riders are getting lucky with facing teams with the injury bug

Ticket count is at around 8000 with 15 days left....

This team top to bottom struggles mightily on making any sort of mid game adjustments.

Thank goodness, at least people in the area can breathe easy now.

I think he and Glenn have/had different issues. With Glenn if he was hit a few times early he then held onto the ball to long and his quick hitter game would be gone for a quarter or two. He would turtle up. With Nichols it seems like when things don't go his way he just unravels and either will make a crap throw into well covered receivers or he holds onto the ball to long and then makes a crap throw for minimal gain. When things are working for Nichols then he tends to be able to make more then one read and throw it down the field. Both guys completely sucked when it came to being mentally tough.

So what's the excuse for last season when he had an experienced O-line that gave him time and he still was off on many of his throws?

I'd expect a 9 year vet to be able to make a pass over 5 yards and without the receiver having to contort or dive to catch the ball. Their is reason why people have zero patience with the guy anymore. The easy stuff shouldn't be such a massive struggle for the guy to perform. He shouldn't require every single player around him to be playing at an all star level just for him to make a few passes.

The o line in Toronto was great. Harris had huge holes and Nichols had time. Stop making excuses. As I said before he had time and kept throwing way off the mark. The Gumby comparison is absolutely perfect.

Considering the limited amount of pro training he's had... I dare say he was already more entertaining then guys like Bobby Lashley and Brock Lesnar. Also looked very off the juice which I guess is a good thing?

I just can't buy the play calling excuse. Are you suggesting that LaPo is calling for 4 yard dump offs to Harris and having all of the receivers running routes as decoys? I keep bringing it up but last year when Streveler was in , immediately guys like Wolly started getting targeted 10 - 15 yards down the field on plays that start out exactly like the ones that Nichols run. Also you can't fault LaPo when Nichols has time in the pocket and his receivers have to dive, jump, fall back just to catch the ball. If I were to put a blame % between the two... it would be 80% Nichols and 20% LaPo. My only gripe with LaPo is that he doesn't use more sweeps and other plays (i.e. hand off to whitehead) when it's obvious late in the game that they will be running up the gut.

Cain Velasquez looked damn good in the ring! WWE should get on that before AEW scoops him up!

I don't know each off season they speak about how Matt Nichols is in better condition (lost weight gained muscle) and how he has studied film and etc... etc... I think the issue with Matt is mostly mental and a close 2nd is his athletic ability. The whole game manager is a nice way of saying "White guy with limited mobility, limited arm, smart brain". It's the same BS when they call every black qb "True athlete" meaning "Strong arm, great mobility, dumb as a door knob" See Jonathan Jennings.... Everyone craps on Streveler running to much and crap on his throwing mechanics.... at least with Streveler the guy is a bull dozer and has good speed so late in the game when we need only one first down he's much more likely to roll out and bull doze his way for 10 yards then Nichols doing his patented panic and throw a ball into the turf for 5 yards.

Lol I don't see a chance of us going after Arbuckle.

Zero chance of Streveler starting barring a Nichols injury. I don't see him getting game time this weekend unless the club is absolutely getting pummeled and they'll put him in with 4 minutes left so he can hand the ball off to kill time.

Anyone looks good compared to Nichols. The last few games his throws have been looking very Alex Brink like....

1 - Not quite the same, Willy was beaten down and had zero time to make his reads/throws. With the lack of mobility Willy couldn't buy time to make a pass. When the o-line started coming around Willy was already completely shell shocked. Nichols has the friggin time... the guy simply doesn't have the arm , the legs, the confidence to make tight throws. 2 - I think people are over exaggerating the crapping on Bighill. While he hasn't been rock solid he's far from playing bad. I think a lot of the bad look comes from the completely open 10 yards down the field zone that the Blue allow. 3 - Those three teams only put the back up in because of injury. What makes no sense is that this team did sprinkle in Streveler last season and a bit earlier this year in a few series to mix things up. Why in the bloody hell would they not do this when Nichols is absolutely tanking and can't make a single first down? It blows my mind? Would it kill them to at least give Chris a shot?

I gave up on him last season, if a QB can't make a simple routine pass despite having time to throw the ball.... that's enough for me to jump off the bandwagon. Last season our receivers continuously had to dive, scoop, stretch , jump just to make a routine catch. So rarely did they get the ball in the mitts. This season Nichols struggled with the same but at least he was making accurate deep throws. The last two games is a lot like last year.

Well it was obvious that the first play was going to be an inside hand off to Harris. I don't understand why they didn't try anything with Whitehead or at least pitch it to Harris. 2nd play was your typical Nichols panics throws a terrible pass that's well short of the first down marker and throws the ball in a crap location where the receiver has to go down to get it. Why Matthews isn't getting the call on a 9 yard curl blows my mind.