I'm starting to wonder if this whole ''recruiting receivers is easy'' is just a myth? Seriously, since Taman brought in Bruce & Simon over 15 years ago what home grown talent have the Bombers brought in? That's with Richie/Taman/Kelly/Mack/Walters, so we can't just point the finger at one regime. We had Denmark, but who else? We had absolutely no one besides Milt Stegall from 2004-2007 until we picked up Terrance Edwards off the scrap heap from Montreal (so that's the second recruit) and signed Derrick Armstrong. I literally can't think of any other decent receiver we've recruited since then aside from Denmark & Edwards. Does anyone else have ANYONE whatsoever? I guess Romby Bryant would be another, even though I'll never condone the piss poor effort he displayed in 2009.

Then you look at a team like Ottawa who made the Grey Cup this year, yes they were an expansion team in their second year, but they also had four highly paid 1000 yard receivers and 5th highly paid scrub. Toronto was able to bring in Gurley and Hazelton this year, but aside from that teams around the league seem to be struggling to bring in impact receivers. The problem we face here is identical to the one in Saskatchewan, BC and Montreal.

 

Chris Matthews comes to mind, but I'd have to go through old rosters to find others.

I thought armstrong was another teams find - riders maybe?  I think it mostly comes down to limited amount of teams, allowed to bring limited amount of players to camp, and limited amount of scouts,  with connection and eye for talent limitation. One teams scouts might do well finding recievers while anothers can find dbs easily. Once tc cuts happen teams usually pick and choose over some now available info on these players

The guys Mike Kelly brought in for a cup of coffee were decent.

The last few years it has been slim pickings... Sims Walker or whatever his name was good but gone asap.

 

Did you see the Denver receivers dropping many passes the other day? Players that make millions?

 

People think Moore didn't do enough for what he got paid.... he regularly went up for bad passes, and regularly got killed and injured for his work. So the complaint was ... he's injured too much. yeah, cause he's doing his job. look at the beating that some of the other bombers took this year. Kohlert, for instance.

 Chances of getting clobbered are very high, and I suspect a lot of players aren't that interested in getting maimed going for a tough catch.

 

tough to find guys that want to do that.

Edited January 20, 201610 yr by Mark F

Greg Carr, is the only name that is worth mentioning. 

34 minutes ago, Mark F said:

Did you see the Denver receivers dropping many passes the other day? Players that make millions?

 

People think Moore didn't do enough for what he got paid.... he regularly went up for bad passes, and regularly got killed and injured for his work. So the complaint was ... he's injured too much. yeah, cause he's doing his job. look at the beating that some of the other bombers took this year. Kohlert, for instance.

 Chances of getting clobbered are very high, and I suspect a lot of players aren't that interested in getting maimed going for a tough catch.

 

tough to find guys that want to do that.

That's why I like the big receivers. It's hard to hurt those guys and it's usually the DB or safety that ends up being clobbered. Arceneaux on Washington comes to mind from last year. Ellingson for Ottawa too.

 

 

Most are able to let guys develop half year or full year before thrown to the fire. Real success of Calgary and Hamilton.

14 minutes ago, Jpan85 said:

Most are able to let guys develop half year or full year before thrown to the fire. Real success of Calgary and Hamilton.

...was a Montreal trademark for years, too....

There is a huge supply of receivers in the States and I believe that almost all of them that find their way up here could be successful in the right circumstances.

But its just not that easy.  Every receiver in the CFL has just tasted the first defeat of their career, likely, when they got cut from the NFL.  So the challenge is finding guys with the right attitude and the mental strength to overcome that without being cocky.  And the mental aptitude to adjust to the CFL game.  And on top of that, they have to be patient.

So how do you quantify all that from watching film and/or a couple camp sessions?  Maybe, just maybe, you can have a short conversation with the player himself or one of his coaches but can you learn enough from that?  Hell, athletically, all these guys are good enough.

But the things that separate the good from the great... That's the tough part.  I don't believe it's "easy" at all to recruit for receivers or any other position group for that matter.  Because "good enough" doesn't win the Grey Cup.

Is our problem the receivers, or the 95 or so QBs that we keep injuring and then trying to replace since 2010?  No consistancy in the pocket means no consistency down field.  

PS When Milt Stegall and Terrence Edwards take up receiving spots for 10 years each, you don't have a lot of spots to fill.

 

13 minutes ago, ALuCsRED said:

Is our problem the receivers, or the 95 or so QBs that we keep injuring and then trying to replace since 2010?  No consistancy in the pocket means no consistency down field.  

PS When Milt Stegall and Terrence Edwards take up receiving spots for 10 years each, you don't have a lot of spots to fill.

 

Have you forgotten how desperate we were to find a decent receiver to play next to Milt so he wasn't triple covered? We literally tried making Chris Brazzell and Kamu Incompleterson our number two guys.

Ahhhh the old dime a dozen recruiting logic. I concluded years ago that there is no such thing.  If it were true, we would've had better imports on the OL in recent years. 

Taman has Simon, Bruce, Bryant. Mack had Matthews, Denmark, Carr, Jeffers-Harris. I'd say its been more of a Walters issue.

I also wonder the affect of the differences in CFL football players need to adjust to when coming up here, not just the QBs.  Some can pick up instantly, maybe others need to adjust fundamentals and thinking. Unfortunately, some players dont even make it through TC while working on these things but given other opportunities flourish 

4 hours ago, Taynted_Fayth said:

I also wonder the affect of the differences in CFL football players need to adjust to when coming up here, not just the QBs.  Some can pick up instantly, maybe others need to adjust fundamentals and thinking. Unfortunately, some players dont even make it through TC while working on these things but given other opportunities flourish 

You make a very good point.  The rookie players that pick up the nuances of the CFL quickly may not turn out to be the best players in the long-run but they demonstrate that they're the smartest rookies in camp within a very short time frame.  Slow learners need not apply.

4 hours ago, rebusrankin said:

Taman has Simon, Bruce, Bryant. Mack had Matthews, Denmark, Carr, Jeffers-Harris. I'd say its been more of a Walters issue.

Carr and TJH were flash in the pans. While Taman found those three players in just under 10 years, including going from 2001-2008 without bringing in one decent receiver. 

BnG, fair enough. I agree that its been an issue but also feel that our prior GMs did it better than our current one.

2 hours ago, rebusrankin said:

BnG, fair enough. I agree that its been an issue but also feel that our prior GMs did it better than our current one.

I agree. Both Carr and TJH have produced far more for us than any receiver we have seen from this current regime. Mack also found that guy we lost to Ottawa in the expansion draft that put up nice numbers for them a couple years ago. Name escapes me at the moment.

 

Edit: Wallace Miles

Edited January 21, 201610 yr by gcn11

6 hours ago, Blueandgold said:

Carr and TJH were flash in the pans. While Taman found those three players in just under 10 years, including going from 2001-2008 without bringing in one decent receiver. 

TJH wasn't really a flash in the pan, he just let a bad attitude destroy what could have been a nice career. Carr I do think made a mistake taking the big money deal. Once you get paid like that expectations are different and you become a target if you don't produce enough to warrant the money. If he had stayed in Winnipeg I wonder if his career wouldn't have worked out differently. 

41 minutes ago, 17to85 said:

TJH wasn't really a flash in the pan, he just let a bad attitude destroy what could have been a nice career. Carr I do think made a mistake taking the big money deal. Once you get paid like that expectations are different and you become a target if you don't produce enough to warrant the money. If he had stayed in Winnipeg I wonder if his career wouldn't have worked out differently. 

Yea, In Edmonton he struggled to get on track right away, and despite playing better for them after a while, they sent him to the Riders who never really gave him a shot. He did play in the playoffs for them in 2012 and was their best receiver that day....but he was pulling down big bucks so they moved on. Lapo knew how to use him....he should have stayed a Bomber, it would probably have been different for him if he had.

It's all about the contacts down south, which is why many of us were against the Walters hire, adding the rest of the inexperienced cast was just the icing on the cake.

I compiled a list of import receivers that we brought in over the years...  I did this quickly so I may have missed a few. 

Starting from recent

2015 -
Adams, Darvin
Gordon, Jhomo
Stoudermire, Troy
Veltung, Justin

2014 -
Bryant, Romby
Moore, Nick
Wilson, Justin

2013 -

Foster, Akeem
Kelly, Aaron
Woods, Aaron
Sims-Walker, Mike

2012 -
Anderson, Isaac
Adams, Kurt
Miles, Wallace
Matthews, Chris
Pierce, Doug

2011 -

Watson, Alex
Floyd, Perry

2010 -
clarence denmark
greg carr
chris davis
tj harris
jamayel smith

2009 -

Amey, Otis
Bowman, Adarius
Guice, Dudley, Jr.
Hyman, Michael
Luciani, Dante
Ralph, Brock
Ryan, Titus
Thorpe, Craphonso

2008 -
Armstead, Jason
Bryant, Romby
McGahee, Casey

2007 -

Atkinson, Blair
Edwards, Terrence
Foster, Willie
Johnson, Kerry

2006 -
Anderson, Scotty
Armstrong, Derick
Baker, Robert, III
Cavil, Kwame
Davis, Shockmain
Johnson, Albert, III
McCord, Quentin
Ray, Darryl
Thurman, Andrae

2005 and before:

Brazzell, Chris
Stegall, Milt
Colon, Gilles
McDonald, Darnell
McGarity, Wane
Peterson, Kamau
Robinson, Scott
Stokes, Keith
Sutherland, Vinny

 

I know I missed some guys but that's the gist of guys we recruited over the years....  Lots of years of garbage but sadly the best recruiting year I think was with Mike Kelly and the database....

Vinny Sutherland we hardly knew ye....

Shockmain is a badass name

In 2006 we were just looking for 3rd generation named players?!  Robert Baker's punch to Prefontaine is one of my favourite "only in the CFL" moments.