17to85

Seems like the classy thing to do is not bring that up.

Nichols is like the new Kevin Glenn and I mean that in a good way. They are a bit different in terms of their mentality but I think you can win with either of them but there is always a sexier option out there.

Are we really concerned about being outbid anyway? Walters has shown he's willing to pay to get the guys he wants.

few years ago I'd have taken Durant in a heart beat and the Riders would be fools to not bring him back. As it stands now he's better than Nichols provided he can actually stay healthy enough to play but you don't toss nichols away after the season Winnipeg just had.

certainly the last part of the season. He was on a hell of a tear to start the year but then he got hurt and that's when people started to question him.

but it's not the Canadians that are really the issue. Westerman might be the best DL we have and it's the other DE spot that has been an issue which has been an American.

No ******* kidding, the CFL norm be damned our OL with 3 americans might be one of the best in the league, why in gods name wouldn't we keep that going? The amount of time Nichols had in the pocket in the playoff game was something we haven't seen in these parts in ages, just bottles the mind that people don't recognize how much that move to go 3 americans on the OL helped to turn around the season.

we have seen that Mike O'Shea trusts his coordinators to do his job. It's not that he has no input, it's that once he hires someone he trusts them to get the results he wants. I just have listened to how O'Shea talks about more aggressive defenses and you can tell he has an admiration for them.

a reliable deep threat receiver would be killer. someone who can go up and get the ball consistently and then we do need more pressure up front on D. I do wonder if Ritchie Hall is the man to build the kind of defense we need though. I just don't think a bend but don't break D is the answer in the CFL anymore. I would much rather have the swaggerville type D where the mantra is "we won't bend and we're going to break you"

if we could get all the OL back man oh man, finally built a good one, excited to see how it continues on next year.

History means nothing because it's not something that has a large enough sample size. How many kicks did Medlock make from 50 with 10 yards to spare? I bet it was quite a few. The guy has the leg strength to hit from that distance, like I said before, on that kick he didn't get the distance he needed and that's all she wrote but it's not like it's impossible to kick the ball that far in a dome. If they'd gambled on 3rd and 4 and not made it we'd all be sitting here going "Y U NO KICK?!?! MEDLOCK HAS TEH LEG!!11!!!"

We've seen Lapo with better qbs and he's the same guy. conservative. That's why we ran him out of town when he had Khari Jones. And really the way Nichols was playing in that game was way better than average, his receivers don't drop some passes on him I bet he was over 500 yards too. Lapo is who he is and he ain't changing.

That's because the only time you actually try a field goal from that far is when you have to score the field goal to win with no time left so the situation doesn't come up too often. Some kickers don't have the leg to do it either but we know that Medlock has the leg to put it 60 yards, he didn't on that particular kick but he has kicked it that distance plenty of times before so it's not like it's a can't be done thing, it just didn't happen this time. The way the offense was sputtering to end the game third down was no guarantee either and then we still have to most likely kick a long field goal anyway. O'Shea gave the best kicker in the league a chance to win, it didn't happen and we move onto next year.

one more completion and we probably are talking about playing it safe, just we have the "we got away with it" tag on those comments. This isn't even about this one game either. It was close and close games ultimately come down to making a play here or there, but both Lapo and Hall are notorious for trying to not lose rather than trying to win and I for one do not subscribe to that philosophy.

I would say the goal is to never keep an entire team together, you pick your core pieces and keep them together and rely on your recruiting to support them.

This is how I feel too. They really built a solid foundation this year and with some good offseason moves can only strengthen it. I'd like to see them be more aggressive in their play calling but that's something I've been saying since they hired the coordinators they did. I like the OL they've got now, they gave Nichols tons of time and Harris lots of room, the DL has some good pieces and just needs to be more consistent, DB remains a strength, linebackers I think are better than they showed in that game and we have a decent number of options at receiver. Upwards and onwards next year.

we only got 6 points in the 2nd half, I gave him praise during the game at one point but facts are facts, the offense and the defense both didn't keep up the pressure and I for one blame our coordinators well known tendencies to play it safe when up.

Honestly the way Arceneaux regularly uses his size to abuse defensive backs he's gotta expect that when there's a chance to hit him he's gonna be hit.

you go across the middle looking for a pass you should also be looking for the hit coming cause you know it's going to be there, especially with a guy like Loffler who has shown a willingness to be the hammer.

yeah the D wasted a pretty good performance by him.

the bottom line is that if the defense gets any kind of stop in the back half of the game and doesn't let the Lions march back to take the lead then we're not sitting here talking about a lose-lose decision at the end of the game. Would have liked to see the offense keep running up the score more in the 2nd half as well, but Hall and Lapo did what they do best, get conservative and piss the game away. I like O'Shea, he had that team coming out of the gates on fire but our coordinators and their passive approach to the game sewered those efforts.

BC Sucks!

I dunno Hervey could maybe bend Jones over a barrel and show him the 50 states in a trade and **** up the Riders long term, after all, you can't win without canadians but Jones seems like he's the kind of guy who would happily trade away draft picks and such if he thinks getting his qb will help him win.