Mike

REMAINING Duressler47 (Hamilton) Noeller (Edmonton)

I don't stick up for officials until the accusations being made against them starting bordering on the ridiculous. Are there times when I get really frustrated and angry with the officiating (in any sport I watch) - yeah, of course. The thing is officials get bashed for making the correct calls/non-calls more often than they are bashed when making a legitimate mistake. Before this season started, the officials were instructed to call certain infractions more closely and then they get bashed for doing it. It's the players themselves who should be taking a lot of blame for the increase, not the officials. Penalties are up but the ones that have seen the biggest increases are ones that the players can control. Objectionable conduct penalties are up 45% and procedural penalties (Offside, Procedure, Time count, Delay, Too many men, Illegal participation/substitution are grouped together) are up 44% - that's on the players, not the officials. Procedural penalties are up 15% not 44%, not sure where you got that from. Objectionable conduct penalties going up isn't a good thing in my mind either, the referees need to put their flags away on a lot of those. I find it very interesting that objectionable conduct calls are seeing such a huge increase while major fouls such as face masking, roughing the passer, horse collar tackling, etc are seeing a small increase if any. In fact, when you isolate just face masking calls, they're actually down nearly 20% this year.

So let's take a look, so far compared to the same point in the season last year Calgary, is taking 1 penalty per game more for an additional 8 yards per game Sask, is taking 1.25 penalties per game more for an additional 3.5 yards per game Winnipeg is taking .7 penalties less per game for an additional .1 yards per game Montreal is taking 1 less penalty per game for 2.4 yards per game less BC is taking 4 penalties per game more for an additional 26 yards per game Toronto is taking 2 penalties per game more for an additional 24.5 yards per game Edmonton is taking .8 penalties per game more for an additional 4.7 yards per game Hamilton is taking 3.5 penalties per game more for an additional 15 yards per game overall there are 2.8 penalties per game more for an additional 21 yards per game in penalties though 2/3 of this season vs first 2/3 of last season The reffing sucked last year too! Not sure where these numbers came from, but the CFL actually keeps official track of this data and their data shows that penalties are up about 18% (3.3 penalties per game) as of September 22nd. There are penalties being called on roughly 13% of the snaps. Offensive penalties isolated are up 30% from last year, which is where a lot of the hold up in the flow of the game has been in my mind. Dead ball fouls have seen the smallest increase, which again kind of supports what I'm getting at, because they don't result in a play being overturned.

No flow or rhythm to the action doesn't help either. There's no doubt the penalties are affecting this to at least some extent.

I'd keep Watson. We keep talking about CDN depth and how in need of it we are. Let's not get rid of it where we have it.

People bashing Willy remind me of the people who were bashing Reilly last year.

What can't Joey Elliott do? Joey Elliott is the Bryant Turner of quarterbacks that aren't Drew Willy.

Ottawa plays offense as poorly as Tom Higgins coaches. Wouldn't be surprised to see zero offensive touchdowns today. These are not good offenses.

It's not just the depth chart, the club has confirmed that Drew is starting.

I wouldn't be against seeing Renaud let go.

I'm very happy Sears is back in but I'm not thrilled it came at the expense of Johnson. Should be coming at the expense of somebody else for sure.

14 receptions for 154 yards 3 penalties for 30 yards - breakdown: 2 objectionable conduct penalties at Toronto and 1 illegal participation at BC. Was surprised to hear he had that many yards. Either way, although he's clearly not as useless as I thought, he's still useless.

Riders have had very good late round draft picks the last couple years. Steinheurer, Vonk, Anthony, Moore, Webster, Etc. Those aren't exactly "very good" picks. You have to consider where they were picked on the board and the overall quality of the draft.IMO Taman have been pretty average in draft performance but has shined in free agency. He certainly hasnt been the abject failure at the draft that I feared so that is a good thing. Anyway, flipping third rounders for fourth rounders doesn't usually amount to a hill of beans as by that point in the draft it is a crapshoot and usually only depth guys being picked. There are always exceptions (Getzlaf and Bagg for two) but I am more concerned about the neg lister. I'm considering everything. I'm not asking them to be stellar players, but what makes them good late round draft picks? Do they stand out in comparison to OTHER late round draft picks? Not really. They fit right in there with guys like Cam Thorn, Shane Bergman, Elie Ngoyi, Matt McGarva, Derek Jones, Michael Klassen, Neil King, David Menard, Thomas Miles, Alex Dupuis, etc etc. Nothing special, just decent young players who can fit in if necessary. And that's all you can really ask of them. But that doesn't make them VERY good. Derek Jones takes offence to that. True. Some of those names, Jones included, probably deserve a bit more credit than I'm giving them. For what it's worth, I think some of those guys (Bergman, Menard and Dupuis) WILL be very good. I'm just not sure they're there yet.

Riders have had very good late round draft picks the last couple years. Steinheurer, Vonk, Anthony, Moore, Webster, Etc. Those aren't exactly "very good" picks. You have to consider where they were picked on the board and the overall quality of the draft.IMO Taman have been pretty average in draft performance but has shined in free agency. He certainly hasnt been the abject failure at the draft that I feared so that is a good thing. Anyway, flipping third rounders for fourth rounders doesn't usually amount to a hill of beans as by that point in the draft it is a crapshoot and usually only depth guys being picked. There are always exceptions (Getzlaf and Bagg for two) but I am more concerned about the neg lister. I'm considering everything. I'm not asking them to be stellar players, but what makes them good late round draft picks? Do they stand out in comparison to OTHER late round draft picks? Not really. They fit right in there with guys like Cam Thorn, Shane Bergman, Elie Ngoyi, Matt McGarva, Derek Jones, Michael Klassen, Neil King, David Menard, Thomas Miles, Alex Dupuis, etc etc. Nothing special, just decent young players who can fit in if necessary. And that's all you can really ask of them. But that doesn't make them VERY good.

Riders have had very good late round draft picks the last couple years. Steinheurer, Vonk, Anthony, Moore, Webster, Etc. Those aren't exactly "very good" picks.

Name one team that switched out their running back for something other than an injury or a problem with ball security. Toronto You win.

Name one team that switched out their running back for something other than an injury or a problem with ball security. Sask., Edmonton, Toronto, B.C., Calgary, Montreal, Hamilton have all used more than one RB's during games to mix things up. Bombers are the only team that has relied on a single back so as to not confuse their opponents with trickery. Why are you defending the Bombers approach to running? The stats. speak. We've used Paris Cotton, Troy Stoudermire, Carl Volny and MP Pontbriand out of the backfield at certain times this season. I'm defending their approach because the impression you have is wrong.

Name one team that switched out their running back for something other than an injury or a problem with ball security.

Devin Tyler, when in game shape, is a pretty serviceable OT

Taman also gave them a neg list player, which people scoff at ... but it could be valuable. I would've preferred to only swap in 2016.

Hefty price to pay for a team that isn't winning the Grey Cup.

Why is it that you seem to be treating it that for every person that says he is tough, it ups the general opinion of how tough he is. If Noeller is the first person to say "man, Drew Willy sure is tough" and then 50 people agree with him, that doesn't suddenly mean that Noeller said "MAN, DREW WILLY COULD WRESTLE A BEAR" I haven't heard any outlandish claims. I just see a lot of people observing that he's a pretty tough son of a *****.

If he was REALLY tough he'd break his own leg and then play on it just to prove a point. What a wimp.

I never thought we'd get there so fast but it really sucks the way the rules are designed. Our junior players are too young to play in the AHL and too dominant to play junior. They need a solution. Perhaps special exemption status, like they do for underagers in the CHL. I don't think there's any argument to be made against the opinion that Petan and Morrissey would both be best served played on the Rock.

I forgot to make my damn picks and now I'm waaaaaay out of contention