JuranBoldenRules

Plus OL-DL and receivers-DB's are the only guys who have meaningful 1 on 1's in a combine. Hard to judge LB's on anything but pass coverage, some combines do inside run drills for LB's, but I don't believe the CFL does.

For some reason facemasking popped into my head today as something that really should be reviewable. Either that the penalty was called and didn't actually happen, or that the penalty occurred but wasn't called. Pretty black and white in terms of penalties that could be reviewed. Why not toss roughing the passer into the mix? Camera is always primed on the QB, should have multiple angles on it. Any way you slice it, video review is going to cause more inconsistency on penalties that aren't black and white, like pass interference. Certain officials let certain things go, players play in those parameters, all of a sudden a guy in the booth is making a subjective call on possibly one of the key plays in an entire game, not going to end well.

My thoughts exactly. To this point, the "Command Center" has struggled to even get black and white calls correct. Would not want to see them making judgement calls. They really should simplify the rule, or put up a few points of emphasis, as in if this occurs, the flag gets tossed every time. Start with contacting a receiver while making no attempt to make a play on the ball, as indicated by not turning and tracking the ball at all, or tracking the ball but making contact without attempting a play on the ball. Automatic flag. That's kind of a judgement call too, but anyone who has watched 2 football games in their life can tell when a DB is trying to play the ball and when they are just taking the receiver out.

I don't think that's a huge concern if we are only talking about adding, say, 4 players to make it 46/50. One extra linebacker isn't going to kill the LB coach, same for most other position groups. We're also seeing more teams bringing in extra coaches who serve as defensive or offensive assistants. For example, last year Saskatchewan had both Barron Miles and Richard Kent coaching their defensive backs. I don't think coaching would be an issue. Meaningful practice reps are possibly a legitimate concern, but the fact is right now there just isn't room to develop enough players. Imports come directly off the practice roster and start when there is an injury. Surely it would be better for them to get into games beforehand and get some rotations on offence/defence and participate on special teams. I don't buy the argument that "Having more players who barely practice and never play won't help player development." It is better for a player to be working out with the team and sitting in the film room and learning the team's system than it is for him to be sitting on the couch at home, even if he is only getting a few real reps per practice. I don't think that teams need a huge expansion to the rosters, but I do feel like they are just a bit too small right now. Expanding to 46 active players (3 QB, 21 Imports, 22 Non-Imports) and 50 total, would give teams a little more latitude in deciding who to keep around and increase their ability to develop their young players. The 9 game IR is functioning as a spot for developmental players, particularly QB's and Canadians. Most teams end up carrying 60+ players in the regular season. They could change what the roster spots or lists are called, but I don't think teams would want to carry more than that, and if they could that would mean that players who would potentially be able to play as fill-ins on other teams due to injury are not available, unless something drastic changes to make those kinds of players available more easily. Players just aren't developed into professional talents at the top level of any pro sport, players who are good enough to be on the roster get better and adjust to the CFL and develop in that sense. They are practicing to win a game at the end of the week, not develop players and IMO it doesn't matter how many guys you let hang around, that's not changing and not a benefit to those guys unless they are ready to play pro football. If you add 5 NI's onto every team, you are adding guys who aren't, and they won't get the chance to develop, it would just be a waste of money from the team's perspective. If you create some kind of semi-pro league (they already kind of have one in Southern Ontario that CFL teams sometimes pluck guys from), that would be a better development ground for those borderline, bottom of the roster type of NI's. For imports (other than QB's), teams aren't going to spend a lot of time developing someone, if a guy is that far behind or can't figure it out they'll bring in one of the other 5000 NCAA grads/NFL cuts looking for work.

2 issues beyond money. Who coaches all these players? When do they get meaningful practice reps? Even with the current roster size, the non-starters get very limited reps outside of positional groups. Having more players who barely practice and never play won't help player development.

If I were a CFLPA member, I would run fast from a percentage of revenues again for guaranteed increases in the cap and no money held in escrow. Let the owners overspend and don't tie spending to any economic realities, the pie won't be getting much bigger in the life of this CBA. I don't see the guaranteed percentage being a good deal for the players, especially if they get a cut similar to the NFLPA and NHLPA.

http://2ndand10.blogspot.ca/2014/03/off-season-roster-analysis-special.html New blog post is up. Some people might see a lot of holes in our depth chart...I see an interesting training camp ahead.

Good stuff. The only two I can comment on specifically right now are Coombs and Gill. I'm bullish on Gill. If I'm Ottawa, I'm taking him first overall. He's going to be a great CFL player for a long time. The concern is his potential to do the same in the NFL. He's up there with a guy like Gaydosh in terms of best DL to come through CanadaWest in my generation IMO, but a much better athlete who's body will withstand the grind of pro football and he'll be able to play all over the place. For Coombs to go in the first round, someone would really have to fall in love with him. I don't believe his running style (he's sort of like the RB equivalent of a scrambling QB, and he doesn't run with a lot of power) will stand up to the CFL and he'll have a big transition to make to learn how to use blocks to get 4-5 yards every play rather than trying to bust every carry into a 20+ gain. I don't expect Coombs to impress physically at the combine either, some teams care about that, some don't. This draft is really shallow though, so it is much more possible for him to go high than any other year. Also worth noting that everyone pegged him as a CIS DB because they didn't think he could pull off what he did at Sturgeon in CIS, so maybe he's just that good.

Unburger is very hit and miss, and for a place that only makes burgers (expensive ones) I expected a little better. It's also hipster central atmosphere-wise, which can be hit or miss depending on your perspective.

No doubt starter for Ottawa....so Aaron Kelly works?

Hard to judge him as a receiver from that highlight tape. The average 40 time among skill players at that level is likely in the 4.8's-low 5's, and that's what you basically see in the video, he's just running by everyone, he doesn't have to work hard to get open. In the CFL he'll be facing equals in terms of athleticism, so he'll need to have some ability to both run solid routes and play in traffic because he won't be running all by himself.

Ottawa already paid it. His base salary is $105,000 plus bonuses for starts and performance.

It's exciting that they are rebuilding the organization, but one fear I have is that they won't stick to investing in football operations if the wins don't come quickly, within the next couple seasons, and the stands aren't full. It's good to try to do this now because they have some time before they need to start paying the stadium debt, but that pressure is coming. The way to justify the spending is to have a winning team and full stadium, I just hope the board is patient enough to see it through.

Hard to say without seeing him try it. We haven't really seen him play tight to the line and with a smaller guy there's that stereotypical worry that he'd get stuck in traffic. He is really good at playing the run coming down from his halfback spot, but he also tends to rely on hitting guys low to get them down to the turf more than form tackling (wrapping), which tends to be a less effective technique inside when guys are coming downhill at you more often than going east-west. I don't think he'd have anymore trouble in coverage than he does at halfback. My hunch is that he'd be better than Stewart was at SAM, but I don't think I'd want to find out unless we have a lot of injuries. IMO, Sears is the best SAM we have on the roster, but the damn injuries...and as we've seen the last couple years, you don't want a different guy playing that spot every week, even more than other spots.

It's more likely that Desjardins ends up having to cut Glenn and get nothing for him than get a return like that. Probably looking at getting a conditional pick in 2015 realistically, just a matter of how high it can go and what they'll be guaranteed if conditions aren't met (likely a 3rd or 4th rounder). Ottawa is going to be one hell of a bad team, and they took themselves out of the market for any free agent with options the minute they signed Burris and screwed Glenn over. Makes me wonder how the ownership feels about Desjardins already, and they haven't even opened a training camp yet.

The more coaches the better. Hopefully Bellefeuille takes Buck's feedback into account along with that of the other offensive coaches when they gameplan, and hopefully Buck is willing to give his opinions as a guy who faced live fire in the league.

Very possible. I think Sears will have more of an impact elsewhere in fewer snaps if he stays healthy. Hopefully Sears is 100% (or as close as he can conceivably be given the injuries).

Candidate for the boundary WR spot. Interesting the types of signings the new regime is making. More of a lean towards highly touted guys from big NCAA schools more than under the radar guys from smaller schools, and guys who spent time in the NFL. Watching those Arena football highlights also make me wonder why people pay to watch that but won't support minor league outdoor football in the US. Arena football gives me a migraine.

Reminds me a lot of another guy Danny McManus brought into Hamilton for a quick look, Mitch Mustain. Great athlete, big recruit, checkered NCAA career. The fact that he hasn't played a whole lot means he's likely behind the curve in his development, and each time he did get the opportunity to play he wrecked a knee. If anything he's a stash on the 9 game type of project.

New post is up. http://2ndand10.blogspot.ca/

Desjardins basically has a gun to his head now. They won't be getting much.

Old Dutch in the US is drastically different too. I always catch flak for my fascination with the difference in junk food between Canada and the US. For instance, stopped at an A & W in Wisconsin last summer, and it's a completely different restaurant from what it is in Canada, mostly hot dogs and no burger family. Apparently I was supposed to be more fascinated with the tall buildings in Chicago or the Mall of America, but this is what I still talk about.

We should start training camp early to prepare for Ottawa's 3 QB/2 FB formation.

Simply put a "three technique" defensive lineman is one who typically lines up on the outside shoulder of the guard .. Yes .. there are others .. think of it like this: Starting at the C - a zero (0) technique would be head up on the center with a 1 being on either outside shoulder. At G you have 2i, 2, 3 (2i being inside shoulder, 2 head up and 3 outside shoulder) At T you have 4i, 4, 5 (4i being inside shoulder, 4 head up and 5 outside shoulder) In formations where a TE may be present you have a 6, 7, 8 and 9 technique .. and this breaks from the convention established but 6 is with a lineman lined up head up with the TE, 7 inside shoulder, 9 outside shoulder. An 8 technique is used to describe a wide defensive end alignment (wider than the 9). Yep, the gaps for the DL are all odd numbers for the most part. You'll rarely see anyone line up head to head with a OL, and if they do 99% of the time it's on top of the centre. When a DL lines up, you split the OL into inside and outside halves as you line up to understand where the gaps are. After you've played DL for a couple years, you don't really think of it like that, but that's how you teach a grade 9 or 10 kid playing on the line for the first time. There's also a lettering system that is used more generally for the entire defence. A gaps are between centre and guard, B gaps between guard and tackle, C gap is off tackle. In a gap control defense, a DL or LB will be accountable for each of those 6 gaps. So a one-technique is on the inside half/shoulder of the guard, essentially the gap between the guard and centre. Three-technique is outside half/shoulder of the guard, gap between guard and tackle. Five-technique is outside half/shoulder of the tackle, gap outside tackle/between tackle and tight end (if one is in the formation). Outside of that, every team has different terminology, some teams call their rush end a "seven" or a "wide-seven" meaning that they line him up basically one gap wider than the five-technique would line up in against a 5 man line. It gets somewhat complicated because a lot of fronts widen out depending on the gaps created by the number of blockers the offence puts in the box, a five-technique might become a seven if the offence uses a tight end. This is done mostly to combat the off tackle run, force everything inside, contain runs from getting outside. The defensive gaps always change based on the offensive formation. Those three are the basic categories that DL are divided into. You'll hear it a lot during the NFL Draft stuff, "he'd be a first-round pick but teams don't think he's strong enough to play a one-technique in the NFL, and he's too slow to play three-technique in the NFL like he did in college." Stuff like that.

I posted it on Twitter yesterday through our site account and I plan to do the same thing every time he posts a new entry. CFL_News is a good account to spread the word too, they have over 10k followers. Thanks for that.