iso_55

Wow, a wrestling promoter in our midst. That is cool. Have you ever spoken to Bruce Hart about bringing in some of his wrestlers for a show?

How did Lex get off from that murder charge when Miss Elizabeth died? Talk about being made of teflon. Not enough evidence to convict?

Were we really losing because the rookie americans weren't good enough though? I thought you guys all liked to point to lack of veterans and NIs as the big problem? Too much blind hatred going on. Maybe too much blind love, eh?

And what makes you think Reimer can't if given the chance? You have no way of knowing.

It all comes down to scouting & doing the things successful teams in the CFL do to win games & championships. Our FA camps & expanding the scouting department were all things that needed to be done by the Bombers & they did that. What we did this past off season would never have been done by Joe Mack. I have every reason to believe that we will find some hidden gems from these camps like we never had before. Hopefully enough to start building a solid team.

Not happy Chevy annointed Pavlec the starter as I said before. Make the position as strong as he can. Sign another #1 goaltender like Reimer perhaps & make it a competition where the 2 goalies push each other & the best man wins. Montoya played well for us but it appears Chevy & Maurice have no interest in keeping him. Having a so so starter & a proven long term backup helps us how as a team??

Stop it, you're blowing my mind. Like your panda bear?

And it works & it doesn't.

Two things: Flames GM Brian Burke said pro hockey players don't get paid to have fun. They are paid to work very hard & to win. Jim Barker said pro football players are not paid to play. They are paid to win. Vince Lombardi put the fear of God into his players. He was a mean SOB when the Packers didn't win & almost as bad when they won. He was a taskmaster. Jimmy Johnson cut his starting fullback when his fumble cost the Cowboys a game. Tom Landry was distant, shrewd, cold & calculating. Even players who played for him for a decade or more said they never got to know who the real Tom Landry was. He never let anyone get close as he felt he needed to be aloof to keep his players on their toes at all times in order to create a culture of winning. With fear thrown into the mix as well. Wally Buono will cut a player on a whim if he thinks he can bring in someone better & cheaper. He cut the CFL's all time leading receiver in Allen Pitts after the 2000 season because he said he needed the money Pitts would have got to pay receiver Travis Moore who was younger & cheaper than Pitts. Buono often referred to Pitts as someone he thought of as a son but when it came to money the father-son comparison ended there & Pitts was let go. Purely business on Wally's part. . The players in the CFL may not have the multimillion dollar contracts their NFL counterparts have but they are still are professionals & are still expected to put out on Game Day in the CFL. So, my point is this is a cutthroat business. Winning is everything. Entertainment is nothing. So, in closing, I say the hell with entertainment. I want wins & lots of them. I don't care how ugly or how pretty. Just wins. I don't want an entertaining defense. I want a shut down defense. Etcheverry better coach up his players to be more than just entertaining. If Etch fails he should be fired. looks like you might be disappointed no matter what team you desire wins from. Teams go in cycles...no matter who the coaches and players are. The only way to achieve your goal for wins only and not entertainment, is to keep switching to winning teams, not loyalty to one. T minus 24 years & counting.

Two things: Flames GM Brian Burke said pro hockey players don't get paid to have fun. They are paid to work very hard & to win. Jim Barker said pro football players are not paid to play. They are paid to win. Vince Lombardi put the fear of God into his players. He was a mean SOB when the Packers didn't win & almost as bad when they won. He was a taskmaster. Jimmy Johnson cut his starting fullback when his fumble cost the Cowboys a game. Tom Landry was distant, shrewd, cold & calculating. Even players who played for him for a decade or more said they never got to know who the real Tom Landry was. He never let anyone get close as he felt he needed to be aloof to keep his players on their toes at all times in order to create a culture of winning. With fear thrown into the mix as well. Wally Buono will cut a player on a whim if he thinks he can bring in someone better & cheaper. He cut the CFL's all time leading receiver in Allen Pitts after the 2000 season because he said he needed the money Pitts would have got to pay receiver Travis Moore who was younger & cheaper than Pitts. Buono often referred to Pitts as someone he thought of as a son but when it came to money the father-son comparison ended there & Pitts was let go. Purely business on Wally's part. . The players in the CFL may not have the multimillion dollar contracts their NFL counterparts have but they are still are professionals & are still expected to put out on Game Day in the CFL. So, my point is this is a cutthroat business. Winning is everything. Entertainment is nothing. So, in closing, I say the hell with entertainment. I want wins & lots of them. I don't care how ugly or how pretty. Just wins. I don't want an entertaining defense. I want a shut down defense. Etcheverry better coach up his players to be more than just entertaining. If Etch fails he should be fired.

The fact he can't stay anywhere more than 2 seasons tells me that there are a lot of red flags with Etcheverry. He either loses his players, they stop playing for him or he has communications issues with them. I can't believe that he gets that restless & likes to move on so much.

Except your asessment of Jokinen is not true. According to Paul Maurice, he very much likes Jokinen's defensive play. Maurice is the current coach. He speaks highly of everyone on his current team. If he was coming at it from his previous perch as a media analyst his tone would change significantly. I'm not saying Joker isn't a good player - but at 35/36 he's not a 4.5 million guy. Maurice has been blowing a ton of smoke since taking over for Noel. The yap about talking to his family regarding a long-term coaching contract with True North is a bit of a ruse imho. He's really thinking about whether he wants to coach a team of mostly over-performers who might still be 3 years away from a legit playoff challenge cuz the Jets roster is just NOT THAT GOOD! But a guy like Maurice can't say that......his out is the one he's been setting up for weeks - that his family has to agree! Even Clod Noel maintained to his firing day that he 'like his team', liked his players. Maurice is tremendous at setting up low expectations. Did you hear him talking about Pavelec and turning it around to a mini-lecture about total team conditioning? Nate, Maurice signed a new contract. Why would he do that for a bunch of overachievers if he didn't want to be here?. Maurice may be the best head coach the Jets 1.0 & 2.0 have ever had. We are fortunate to have him. I am extremely pleased he is coming back. Not pleased that Cheveldae announced Pavlec as the Jets starting goalie next year as that should have been Maurice. Still Chevy & Maurice must have discussed our goaltending & reached a consensus or he wouldn't have said that publicly.

That marriage was a gong show on both sides.

There are some pro coaches who never leave their office. They work & liver there during the week prepping for games. D i c k Vermeil was one of them & he burned out in Philly when he was a first time NFL head coach. Some of these coaches work crazy hours to the point of being life threatening. Heart attacks, strokes, obesity & divorces. Story I heard about Jimmy Johnson.... When he became HC of the Dallas Cowboys in 1989 he realized that he'd be ultra busy & he felt his wife would be a distraction so he separated & divorced her. Not sure if that is absolutely true but it is a story I read in the past & wouldn't surprise me. Sad, if true.

It's Gary Etcheverry. It's underwhelming. I'm hoping beyond hope this works out as I'm tired of all the losing but I won't be surprised if it doesn't. I just can't get excited about this guy as as a DC.

Depends on what kind of quarterbacking they get as well. If this was AC 5 years ago....

He'll sell tickets. I like this signing. If he has any gas left in the tank he should do well. If he had AC throwing to him he'd do better but he's now catching football from Troy Smith. Should be interesting.

There will be players who struggle with this. I'd be one of them. I like structure. I like to be able to open up a manual or text & review at work or home if I'm not sure. This guy has bounced around football teams more times than a tennis ball at Wimbledon. There is a reason for this. I doubt if Etcheverry signs a lease on an apartment in Winnipeg. It'll be hotel living for him.

Ugh!

I saw a post on facebook recently a picture of Stephen Harper's wife Laureen, holding a cat. Behind her on a wall were pictures of women who were murdered but their cases have gone unsolved. The author admitted that the pictures of the murdered women were photo shopped into the background of the photo for better effect. The poster said that the cops would have stopped at nothing to find Laureen Harper as she was attractive & beautiful & the missing women weren't.. According to the poster because these missing women were not beautiful, their murders are going unsolved by the cops because they don't care.Looks like most,if not all the women were of aboriginal descent. Not only was the picture & story sexist but racist as well. I suppose that isn't bullying then?? I think using the PM's wife in a picture like that is despicable. It's not her fault what is going on. Blame it on the cops but no, somehow it's Stephen & Laureen Harper's fault this is happening. She's too beautiful & he's a scumbag Conservative Prime Minister so naturally the fact these women's murders are unsolved is somehow their fault. Not improper police investigations. Laureen Harper was being singled out because she was Stephen Harper's wife & he is a Conservative. Think that would have happened with Trudeau's wife if Justin was Prime Minister? Not likely. Myself & others see this double standard everyday in the news media & on social media. We react with disdain because of it.

Maurice is definetly his coach.

So many other guys would have been better than Etcheverry. An old jaded coach who seems paranoid about players leaking information about his defense. Even hiring a young up & coming coach with no track record would have been better than him. Hufnagel is real high on his DL coach Devone Claybrooks as one of these bright, hard working young defensive coaches we see in the CFL. He said had he not hired Stubler he'd have promoted Claybrooks to DC. If Etch doesn't work out maybe he would be available.

Yeah, the lack of conditioning comment was disappointing. Tells me that under Noel a lot of guys in the dressing room weren't totally committed as professionals to winning. Look for that to change drastically under Maurice.

Ladd is an effective player, great leader & captain. Glad he'll be back.

Jim Ross did some Big 10 football (Oklahoma, where else) before he was culled into the wrestling biz. I remember Ron Maurier and Bernie doing the wrestling out of Vancouver. Gene Kiniski was the classic interview. Learned years later that Gene owned most of that promotion and hired a Wpg turd named Al Tomko to run it for him. Larry 'The Preacher' Updike (citi fm) did some TV wrestling in the late 80s and 90s. His classic catchphrases were "My lord!" and "O, the humanity!" Tony Chevani was a pro sports announcer before going to NWA/WCW The Coach, Jonathan Coachman did some professional sports announcing before Vince brought him to WWE. Coach left WWE a few years ago and became a show host on ESPN radio. Now, I'm told he's prepping for a WWE comeback. But the greatest wrestling announcer of all time, imho was Rodger Kent of AWA fame, based out of Minneapolis. This guy had more classic phrases than just about anyone I've seen. He was my hero. Giovani was a broadcaster for the Atlanta Braves, I believe. Roger Kent's most famous phrase was, "Larry 'The Axe' Hennig. Big enough to go bear hunting with a switch." Another one, "The Crusher. The Man who made Millwaukee famous."