http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/sports/football/bombers/snappy-hed-373580051.html#st_refDomain=t.co&st_refQuery=/QmAbKLelGf

He’s got a football team counting on him.

And he’s got a city of frustrated football fans counting on him.

But it wasn’t until our discussion this week turned to the wife and three children that are also counting on him that it became clear just how much weight Mike O’Shea feels pressing down upon him right now as he heads into what is a make-or-break season for the beleaguered Winnipeg Football Club.

Make no mistake — one of two things is going to happen in 2016: either the Blue Bombers are going to make the playoffs for the first time since 2011, or the head coach — and probably a few others in the Bombers front office — are going to be looking for a new job.

And it’s that latter prospect, and what it would do to his young family, that this week brought tears to the eyes of one of the most feared linebackers the Canadian game has ever known.

Yes, you read that right: Mike O’Shea cries. And yes, it was uncomfortable to watch — and not just because it was happening in a crowded restaurant.

"I’m getting emotional now and I’ll tell you why," the Bombers head coach said over lunch this week. "I’ve got a great family. They really do a good job in making their dad feel comfortable at work…

"They’re doing more than holding up their end."

The question heading into this season is whether O’Shea can now hold up his end of a family bargain that saw his wife, Richere, and the couple’s three children — Michael, 16,  Ailish, 13 and Aisling, 10 — leave the only home they ever knew in southern Ontario in 2014 to follow O’Shea to Winnipeg so he could fulfill his dream of being a pro football head coach.

It was a bold move for a young family that O’Shea had gone to extraordinary lengths to protect from the itinerant pro football lifestyle. Indeed, O’Shea says he played his entire 16-year CFL career with just two teams in Toronto and Hamilton — turning down, he says, more lucrative offers to play in Western Canada — precisely so he wouldn’t have to uproot his family.

So moving to Winnipeg was a big thing for the entire O’Shea family. And now that they’ve finally settled in — his son is on high school football and hockey teams, his daughters are competitive gymnasts, the family spent the entire winter here, save for a week-long Bombers cruise — the idea that they’d have to move again this year because O’Shea’s head coaching dream turned into a nightmare weighs on the man of the house.

Don’t misunderstand — he says he is at peace with the fact 2016 is the final year of his three-year contract with the Bombers and there is going to be no contract extension on offer until there are first some winning results on display.

Head coaches who go 12-24 in their first two seasons don’t get contract extensions and O’Shea accepts that.

What troubles him  more, however, is that he cannot insulate his family from the uncertainty. "I’ve just realized recently that my kids really do follow all that stuff (on social media)," said O’Shea. "So it’d be naive for me to think they don’t know about the contract or lack thereof. All of that stuff — they understand...

"And that comes as bit of a shock to me — that they know more maybe than I want them to."

Now make no mistake: O’Shea is not unique. Almost every head coach in pro sports also has a team at home that is counting on him.

And O’Shea is not complaining, either. I dragged this stuff about his family out of him because it interests me to know how a guy in the spotlight copes with the vagaries of chronic job insecurity when those lights are turned off and the house is quiet and it’s just you alone in the dark with your thoughts.

The answer, it seems, is you spend a lot more time worrying about how it will affect those around you than you do about how it affect yourself.

The good news for O’Shea is that while there is no room for error in 2016, he will have by far the best team he’s had in Winnipeg with which to work.

Off-season free agent signings in Weston Dressler and Ryan Smith will make the receiving corps spectacularly better. A defensive line rid of underperformers and bolstered by some other free agent acquisitions, including Canadian Keith Shologan, will be better. The signing of all-star kicker Justin Medlock gives some much needed consistency to special teams. The Canadian content overall will be deeper, including a ratio changer at running back in Winnipegger Andrew Harris.

And, most important, with a proven backup QB in Matt Nichols behind a proven starting QB in Drew Willy, the Bombers are deeper at quarterback this year than they’ve been in a decade.

So the team around him has changed. But has O’Shea?

He admits to making mistakes in his first two years as Bombers boss, but they’re mostly detail stuff rather than big-picture. And so, for instance, O’Shea takes full blame for that blocked field goal in 2014 that cost the Bombers a win against Saskatchewan — poor scheme, he says — but he doesn’t see much in his general approach that needs to change.

He rejects a popular criticism that he should hold individual players more accountable — either on the sideline or before the microphone — and he says it’s simply not true he worries too much about players liking him and not enough about them fearing him.

"I can’t deny I still want to be one of the guys," says O’Shea,  "but that doesn’t mean I want them to be my buddies... I’d love to still be playing…

"But for 16 years, I watched what works and doesn’t work with a coach. And what doesn’t work is a lack of authenticity. I’m just not that guy who’s going to publicly display some player getting in (trouble)...I’m not going to put on a show."

And so while the team around him in 2016 will look different, don’t expect O’Shea to look different. And that includes the shorts he wears on the sidelines during games — which have filled both my mailbox and the Bombers mailbox with emails of complaint from fans.

The shorts are comfortable, he says. And they’re practical, he says. But as we’re walking out towards the parking lot, he also admits the shorts are here to stay for another reason. "If I stopped wearing them now," he tells me, "people would think it was because they complained."

You want to see stubborn? Try those shorts on for size. And then text me a picture on your Blackberry, something O’Shea also clings to.

"This phone works fine," he says. "What do I need an iPhone for?"

The man is who he is, in other words. And for all the worry about his family and his team and the upcoming season and what a very uncertain future holds, he says that, yes, he is willing to die on that hill.

"I would just die quicker," he says, "if I pretended to be someone I’m not."

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

 

Why is Wiecek focusing on MOS's family issues? Is he Ted Cruz or Donal Trump? Is "crying" a real football issue? Or is this just more headline grubbing by the incompetent, as Trump might say?

I am not sure about MOS's leadership .... he had one of the best examples of a coach anywhere in Pinball Clemons .... He has witnessed some of the best in football .... but why isn't it translating? Is he too authoritarian or its opposite? Was the team divided or cohesive last tear? I really can't tell.

Has the whole problem been (1) a lack of talent at the critical positions and (2) player leadership?

Is it (3) the lack of support from above?

Who has the diagnostic tools to actually nail down what the problems have truly been?

Yes how our BELOVED BLUE perform in the first 6 games in a very challenging early schedule is going to be the measure of MOS's  manhood, in the football sense. By game 8 we will know whether he has the right stuff.

But what his family life has to do with BOMBER-MANIA I can not fathom.

Edited March 27, 20169 yr by BigBlue

I think it was to showcase what is on the line for MOS, it's not just a nonchalant season that win or lose can or will be shrugged off.  In all honesty I didnt even know MOS had a family.  the focus has mainly been on him as a coach and him as a former player. It definitely gives it a different perspective as to what he's got at stake this season

1 hour ago, Taynted_Fayth said:

I think I'd draw the line at mu mu lol

23 hours ago, kelownabomberfan said:

I wonder how many times Bud Grant cried during an interview? That being said if Grant were interviewed by Wiechek he would probably break down in tears at how far the quality of journalism has fallen in Winnipeg since his era.  "I knew Vince Leah. Vince Leah didn't wear earrings!!"

On 2016-03-26 at 1:45 PM, TBURGESS said:

By consequences, I mean losing playing time or airlifting in players to compete for the spot or having the backup start or letting a young guy take a game to see if he can produce or demoting the player to a DI or off the game day roster or offered a PI spot instead of full salary or getting rid of them during the season.

Gotta agree with you here. Lackluster play has not led to enough time out of games for the last 2 years. Don't need MOS to toss players under the bus like Burke, and don't want the extreme of the Rider coach who benched players for every fumble, but there is a happy medium and MOS isn't there. He needs to get there. He also needs to realize this and change. I'm concerned he doesn't get it.

Burke's style vs MOS's style, happy medium required ...

Burke: Under the BUS with YOU!!!

MOS: I sent you a text ...

Edited March 28, 20169 yr by IC Khari

9 hours ago, BigBlue said:

But what his family life has to do with BOMBER-MANIA I can not fathom.

Just glad to see a Bomber related article in a slow football news period.  They used to write whole articles about Daley's dog so...  fair game.  We all read it right?

On March 27, 2016 at 10:35 PM, kelownabomberfan said:

pretty simple when you boil it down - keep Willy healthy and we make the playoffs.

Nichols with a full tc and preseason makes for a legit backup with actual games and wins under his belt.. Granted on a different squad but he is the best backup option we have had in eons..

23 hours ago, TBURGESS said:

Of course you can say he's a bad coach when he loses twice as many games as he wins. What other criteria would you use for a bad coach?

Dave Ritchie lost a hell of a lot more games than he won his first couple seasons in Winnipeg, did that make him a bad coach? Or just a guy who walked into a team with a lot of holes on it? 

Can we honestly say that O'Shea has been given the tools to succeed here? Yeah he might have some problems of his own but to my eye the problems with the talent level of the team are a far bigger problem than the coaching. 

8 minutes ago, 17to85 said:

Dave Ritchie lost a hell of a lot more games than he won his first couple seasons in Winnipeg, did that make him a bad coach? Or just a guy who walked into a team with a lot of holes on it? 

Can we honestly say that O'Shea has been given the tools to succeed here? Yeah he might have some problems of his own but to my eye the problems with the talent level of the team are a far bigger problem than the coaching. 

Dave Richie made the playoffs and won a playoff game in his second year. Even in 1999. his first year, he won 4 of his last 7 games which gave us hope of better things to come. (He also won back to back games (For Mr Dee)).

Sure O'Shea inherited a poor team, but he had better talent than his predecessor right off the bat. He had a real QB (Willy), which is the #1 player you need to be successful, a top receiver (Moore) and a shutdown CB (Randle) that Burke would have loved to have, plus we added several other FA's. He surprised some teams in the first half of the season then won a couple of games in the second half.

In year 2, we added another couple of top FA's in Bryant and Picard which was supposed to fix the O line and 5 other FA's. We got Westerman, an all star DE and Adams at CB. He got 3 of our 5 wins in the first 6 weeks then a couple more later in the season. Quite frankly, we should have done better with the level of talent we had on the field.

I don't think that our talent level is anywhere near as bad as our record shows and O'Shea has been give the tools he needed to do better than our record. His choices of coordinators has been brutal. Thinking that Etch or Bellifool were viable in his first year was bad enough, keeping Bellifool for his second year shows incompetence IMO. 

42 minutes ago, TBURGESS said:

Dave Richie made the playoffs and won a playoff game in his second year. Even in 1999. his first year, he won 4 of his last 7 games which gave us hope of better things to come. (He also won back to back games (For Mr Dee)).

Sure O'Shea inherited a poor team, but he had better talent than his predecessor right off the bat. He had a real QB (Willy), which is the #1 player you need to be successful, a top receiver (Moore) and a shutdown CB (Randle) that Burke would have loved to have, plus we added several other FA's. He surprised some teams in the first half of the season then won a couple of games in the second half.

In year 2, we added another couple of top FA's in Bryant and Picard which was supposed to fix the O line and 5 other FA's. We got Westerman, an all star DE and Adams at CB. He got 3 of our 5 wins in the first 6 weeks then a couple more later in the season. Quite frankly, we should have done better with the level of talent we had on the field.

I don't think that our talent level is anywhere near as bad as our record shows and O'Shea has been give the tools he needed to do better than our record. His choices of coordinators has been brutal. Thinking that Etch or Bellifool were viable in his first year was bad enough, keeping Bellifool for his second year shows incompetence IMO. 

I am not sure I completely believe that. Yeah Willy is better than the qbs before him, but he has been hurt a lot since he got here which does impact things. Moore is good but again, hurt a ton. Mack found a lot better american players than Walters has managed to and I think people tend to have this hate on for everything Joe Mack that they don't recognize how much he actually brought to the team. So Walters brought in Randle (who was hurt all last year) Mack brought in all sorts of dbs too, plus he found DL and linebackers and receivers and running backs. 

The biggest flaw for O'Shea is probably his assistant coaches but we've discussed that a ton too, was he handicapped by not being able to lure assistants to a coaching grave yard? Seems there's a good argument to be made for that. 

To me Walters is still a bigger problem than O'Shea is and until the pipeline of american players improves I will keep saying that. It's nice to "win" free agency but we've seen how that really impacts things the last couple years. 

All right, fair points all.  Let's give OSH this season.  He's had two now to learn.  Year three is proving ground time.  If Willy stays healthy all season and we still miss the playoffs, it's time for OSH to get the boot.  Fair to say?

It's rare that most of us can agree on something... putting aside one's opinion on whether they should have even been given a third year... we can all, more or less, agree that this is a make or break year.... if the team is not significantly better, it's axe time...

19 minutes ago, 17to85 said:

I am not sure I completely believe that. Yeah Willy is better than the qbs before him, but he has been hurt a lot since he got here which does impact things. Moore is good but again, hurt a ton. Mack found a lot better american players than Walters has managed to and I think people tend to have this hate on for everything Joe Mack that they don't recognize how much he actually brought to the team. So Walters brought in Randle (who was hurt all last year) Mack brought in all sorts of dbs too, plus he found DL and linebackers and receivers and running backs. 

The biggest flaw for O'Shea is probably his assistant coaches but we've discussed that a ton too, was he handicapped by not being able to lure assistants to a coaching grave yard? Seems there's a good argument to be made for that. 

To me Walters is still a bigger problem than O'Shea is and until the pipeline of american players improves I will keep saying that. It's nice to "win" free agency but we've seen how that really impacts things the last couple years. 

I'll take Mack's scouting over Walters and it's not even close. I'll take Walters work in FA over Mack's and it's not even close either. Every year that Walters has been here, he's signed 7 or more FA's. Some are top tier. Some aren't, but all have proven that they at least belong in the CFL. His scouting and his drafting (Except for the first round) have been poor to say the least. He is certainly part of the problem.

Lots of folks thought we were a QB away from being a good team before O'Shea. Willy is the best we've had in years and we still can't make the playoffs. Willy being hurt shifted the view to needing a good backup QB. Nichols is the best we've had in years, but that still didn't result in many wins. Blame the OC? Sure, but the HC who hired him and kept him on needs to take his share of that blame too.

It's likely that the good assistant coaches had better choices than tying themselves to a rookie HC, with tons less experience than they had, who had to turn around a bad football club. The coaching graveyard scenario is far less likely IMO as there've been tons of teams who fired their HC's more often than we have and they still manage to hire new HC's, most with way more experience than O'Shea.

Last off season I was saying make the playoffs or get fired because year 2 is the make it or break season 90+% of the time. This off season lots of folks are saying this year is O'Shea's make or break season. Personally, I'm worried that O'Shea won't make it past mid-season because of the way our schedule looks and replacing coaches during the season almost never works.

39 minutes ago, 17to85 said:

I am not sure I completely believe that. Yeah Willy is better than the qbs before him, but he has been hurt a lot since he got here which does impact things. Moore is good but again, hurt a ton. Mack found a lot better american players than Walters has managed to and I think people tend to have this hate on for everything Joe Mack that they don't recognize how much he actually brought to the team. So Walters brought in Randle (who was hurt all last year) Mack brought in all sorts of dbs too, plus he found DL and linebackers and receivers and running backs. 

The biggest flaw for O'Shea is probably his assistant coaches but we've discussed that a ton too, was he handicapped by not being able to lure assistants to a coaching grave yard? Seems there's a good argument to be made for that. 

To me Walters is still a bigger problem than O'Shea is and until the pipeline of american players improves I will keep saying that. It's nice to "win" free agency but we've seen how that really impacts things the last couple years. 

Considering we know for a fact his first choices for OC/DC were Jason Maas and Rich Stubler, I'm not going out of my way to bash him for his preference in assistants yet. I'd like to really see what O'Shea does now that he has something to work with. This staff (on paper) is solid. The talent (on paper) is the best we've had yet. If Drew stays healthy, there are zero excuses if this isn't a playoff team.

3 minutes ago, TBURGESS said:

his drafting (Except for the first round) have been poor to say the least.

To say that is ridiculous, if you ask me. What you're really trying to say is "his second round drafting has been poor", which I'd tend to agree with. But considering it's been two drafts, I'm not sure how you expect to really measure his success in the later draft rounds. Derek Jones as a fourth rounder is probably capable enough to start in the same role as Bucknor at this point - that alone makes his later round drafting a success to me. 

Let's see what Captain Hairdo aka Addison Richards does this year.  I really hope he's not Jade Etienne 2.0.  That would suck.

There are 8 guys that Walters drafted on the roster who is the last gm of this team that had that many.

40 minutes ago, Jpan85 said:

There are 8 guys that Walters drafted on the roster who is the last gm of this team that had that many.

Probably Joe Mack. GMs draft players and put them on the roster. That in and of itself isn't really a statement about their abilities to draft. 

Most he had was 6 and I included Pencer and Dunn. Walters in a two year span he has drafted 2 starters 2 guys who can come in and start. A FB of the future and 2 really good special teams guys and WR who could be a good rotational player. Mack selected Muamba.

As far as I remember Mack's draft record is not something to put out there as one of his strengths...

11 minutes ago, Jpan85 said:

Most he had was 6 and I included Pencer and Dunn. Walters in a two year span he has drafted 2 starters 2 guys who can come in and start. A FB of the future and 2 really good special teams guys and WR who could be a good rotational player. Mack selected Muamba.

OK but you know what I'm saying right? Just because you have guys you drafted on the team doesn't mean you're great at drafting, it could be as in the case of the Bombers simply that your depth is so lacking that guys you draft just walk right onto the team. 

1 minute ago, 17to85 said:

OK but you know what I'm saying right? Just because you have guys you drafted on the team doesn't mean you're great at drafting, it could be as in the case of the Bombers simply that your depth is so lacking that guys you draft just walk right onto the team. 

I get that but the Canadian depth was complete crap when Mack took over and he was not able to get any significant players on the roster on through the draft other than Muamba

1 hour ago, Mike said:

To say that is ridiculous, if you ask me. What you're really trying to say is "his second round drafting has been poor", which I'd tend to agree with. But considering it's been two drafts, I'm not sure how you expect to really measure his success in the later draft rounds. Derek Jones as a fourth rounder is probably capable enough to start in the same role as Bucknor at this point - that alone makes his later round drafting a success to me. 

I don't measure his success via his late round drafts. They're mostly shots in the dark, if they stick it's just as good a chance that we got lucky rather than we made great choices. Quite frankly, I don't know enough to have an informed opinion on who to pick in the later rounds anyway.

I don't like Walters second round picks though. IMO there were better players available, especially in 2015 where we had 2 2nd rounders. We chose Richards over Waud and Morgan over Durant.

14 minutes ago, TBURGESS said:

I don't measure his success via his late round drafts. They're mostly shots in the dark, if they stick it's just as good a chance that we got lucky rather than we made great choices. Quite frankly, I don't know enough to have an informed opinion on who to pick in the later rounds anyway.

I don't like Walters second round picks though. IMO there were better players available, especially in 2015 where we had 2 2nd rounders. We chose Richards over Waud and Morgan over Durant.

I think I actually heard Walters snort from all the way here in Alberta. The amount of time and effort that goes into research on every single player in the draft would blow your mind......just ask Rids.