TBURGESS

if I recall, the ref was staring right at the QB and Willy clearly reacted to the hit to his face. I'd say that the ref saw it and simply felt it wasnt a penalty because of the positioning of all involved. That's not his decision to make. Helmet to helmet = penalty. Intent doesn't matter at all.

Hall's defence is like Burke's defence. Its effectiveness is predicated on above-average front-four pass rush, and above-average cornerback play. He inherited much of Etcheverry's talent, and therefore, he either doesn't have the talent, or the talent needs to get acclimated to his D. I think the talent's the issue personally, but that's just one man's opinion. Bottom line is Hall's scheme can be effective once it's got the right talent, and that talent gels. Neither is there yet, and the results are what we see on the field. Hall's defence is a problem that can be solved by modifying the defence to match the players we have. Good coaches make changes to put the players they have into the best possible situations to excel. Hall's defence would work better if we had an all-star defensive line with a solid group of LB's behind them. Everyone's defence would. We don't have that luxury and we will lose a lot of games if Hall can't figure out what to do with the players he has. I consider it a failure in scouting that we have 3 of the 4 starters from last years D line starting again this year. Anderson and Turner aren't providing much push and Peach is more of a backup than a starter IMO. Westerman just needs to be an average DE due to his passport, but he hasn't found his game and he's not there yet, but it's still early. Our LB's have been a major problem so far. Randle's a top end CB being wasted in the LB crew. He's not even up to average there. Hurl's a rotation MLB, not a ratio breaker and Bass is the best of the bunch that we brought in in the offseason. All the above leads me to believe that its both personal and coaching with some scouting problems thrown in.

Post counts naturally go up when we lose because people need to vent their frustration after a bad week.. The 'O'Shea brigade' wants to point out the good things that happened, the few plays that 'if they just went the other way' would have led us to victory and the usual complaints about the reffing. They don't want any 'negative' posting and they go out of their way to argue with folks who see the dark side of the loss. There are some 'Fire everybody' posts after particularly bad games and lots of discussion about what went wrong and if we can fix it. When we win, everyone is pretty darned happy. Most folks just post how great we were. The 'O'Shea brigade' have very few people to argue with and the analysis of what went wrong is significantly less than when we lose because it doesn't matter as much. The newbies around here will notice the trend if they stay around long enough. For me, the more fans there are around here, the better, even those who don't seem to know that much about football.

People around here want it to be one thing or another, but it's not. QB's get hit a lot in MB offenses. Even Calvillo and he was the best at pre-reading defences in the CFL. It looked like JFG didn't pick up that there was a blitz, therefore he didn't change his route and Willy threw it to a spot on his Int. MB needs to add screens, draws and quick hitters to the offence and the players need to pick up on the blitz properly to fix the problem.

0-4 week 1, 2-2 week 2. I'm sucking, but at least I'm moving in the right direction.

This is great news as long as Willy's completely OK. I just hope they aren't putting him back in the game too soon.

Having to go for 2 in OT isn't a new rule. In that case, I don't like any part of the new rules.

That's exactly what the new rules were put in for... more offence (And more penalties, but that's a side effect). The CFL would love it if all games were decided by a missed 2 point conversion in OT after 500 yards of offense from both teams. More like Arena Football or basketball than hard nosed defensive football, but that's what they want.

Best game of the year so far. Back and forth all night long. Ray vs Durant wouldn't have produced a better game. Pity either team had to lose this one. Is 450-500 yards of offense the new normal with the new rules?

The only part of the new convert rules I like is having to go for 2 in overtime. The 32 yard convert doesn't make sense. Kick from the 32 after a TD = 1, without the TD =3. FG inside the 32 = 3. I doubt we ever see a convert missed and run back for 2 the other way. By the end of the season I'll bet we see around a 90% 1 point convert rate, which means it isn't much different than the old convert. The 3 yard 2 point convert was made to make coaches think twice about going for it. From the 5 it was a very low chance. From the 3 it's closer to 50-50. It still hasn't made many coaches go for 2 unless they absolutely have to. A 3 point convert from the 10 wouldn't make me happy either. I'm more interested in seeing the team that played the best win, rather than the team that's behind having a great chance of pulling out a victory. As for going for 2 on the last play... Nope! Tie the game up and play out the mini games. Too much chance of going home with a loss if you go for 2.

I get the zero tolerance idea, I just think they are focussing on the wrong things. Hit a QB in the head and don't get a penalty. Mime 'there's got to be a flag on that' and you do. I just doesn't make any sense to me.

It's not one or the other...it's both scheme and talent.

See, thats the thing. You know it's a penalty so you shouldn't go ahead and do it. It's like going 20 KM over the speed limit then getting shocked you got a speeding ticket. While I agree with you in theory, there's no reason to throw the flag either. Talking or miming doesn't really amount to much and it's certainly not going to protect the players. A bench penalty for yapping almost cost Calgary a win in week 1. Dumb thing to do... sure, but it should never be a game changer. BLM got a penalty for calling for a penalty that was called a penalty. Changed the ball placement from the 1 to the 10(?) which could have changed the outcome.

The new rules give them more chances to throw the flag. Not surprising that the number of them has gone up. As a start, they could eliminate the chintzy 'Unsportsman' penalties for pretending to eat or pretending to go for a flag. Those type of penalties do nothing but slow the game down.

The redblacks look like a real football team this year. I was wondering what Burris would look like with some real receivers at his disposal and now I know... He looks like a good QB again. Sure he almost threw a couple of INT's in the first Q, but after that he was pretty much on his game. Everyone on the panel kept saying how great Lulay was playing. Don't know what they were seeing. His accuracy, especially on his deep throws, was off. His timing was too. Lots of rust there, but nice to see him out competing again. Was looking forward to seeing Tedfords no huddle offence. Was disappointed. Here's a hint... the no huddle shouldn't be getting the snap off with 1 or 2 seconds left on the clock. So far, we were the worst team in the CFL this week by a country mile.

1 and 1 for me, but really... did anyone pick Montreal over Calgary?

Thats a lot of talent to lose.

Wow. I'm blown away by the way Montreal beat up Calgary tonight. We're in deep trouble next week against that defence with Brohm at QB. We might be in deep trouble against Cato for that matter.

Logan... I'd have pulled Collaros in the 4th quarter to give the backup a quarter of reps and to make sure Collaros wasn't going to take any more abuse. You and 17 should start supporting Marve and start hoping he's the real deal like a lot of folks around here. Support our 2nd best QB and hope he is better than Brohm because the alternative is that Brohm is our 2nd best QB and he's simply not good enough.

So everyone seems to agree that Marve needs experience if he's going to get better. To get that, he needs reps. We had a bunch of those available in the 4th quarter last night, but some folks around here don't want to give them to Marve in case we push him too fast and break him? Huh? We should develop Marve slowly? Why? So he can become a 29 year old backup without much experience. Hint: We've already got one of those on the roster. Marve's one pass attempt was horrible last night. No argument from me or anyone else for that matter. As a reason not to play however, it's weak. Willy was 3 for 6 with an INT before he got hurt. Those kind of numbers won't win many games. I seriously doubt we win with Willy. It was obvious we weren't going to win with Brohm's 2 INT's, 3 yard dump passes and dirt throws. Why not give Marve the 4th if for nothing else than some experience.

Randle was loved last year because he's a difference maker at CB. He's not been playing well in his new spot except for the time he shot the gap last night and brought down the RB behind the LOS. I'd move him back where he's a difference maker and move someone else into his LB spot.

Could be true. It wasn't shown on TV though and O'Shea said Willy watched the 2nd quarter from the tunnel, not the rest of the game.

Marve definitely needs playing time to see if he gets better or not. He's younger, faster, more mobile, a better passer and has more upside than Brohm has. He's also a square peg in a round hole for MB and O'Shea. There was no downside to giving Marve the 4th quarter last night, except maybe taking the reps away from Brohm. It might have provided a spark or more of the same, but it sure would have been more interesting to watch.

D was a problem... but 2 pick 6 + a returned punt = 21 points 35 points against is still bad... but then didn't we also have a turnover deep in our own zone that also lead to a TD (28 points given up when TiCats actually had to move the ball.... not great, not so bad that we should be tearing our hair out) So you're saying it would have been closer if you take away 4 of Hamilton's TD's. Can't fault that kind of 'logic'.

Willy was in the back of tunnel where it's darker in the second quarter with his uniform on. My guess is he was seeing how the lights and noise would affect him and the results weren't positive. The cameras didn't show him at all in the second half so my guess is he was going through the concussion protocol behind closed doors. I'd be more likely to believe that it wasn't serious if I'd seen Willy on the sidelines in his civvies in the second half.