AKAChip

Good for him and great for us.

Most QBs don’t set the league on fire their first or second seasons. Streveler has looked far better than Fajardo did in his first two seasons. When you have a guy with immense raw talent, you cultivate it. Streveler’s issues as a passer are largely teachable things like not forcing throws. The arm talent is there.

If this team experiences a dark era again, it will almost certainly be because the defence and special teams take a step back. It will have very little to do with whether Nichols returns or not.

I respect that point of view, I really do, I just strongly disagree. I’m not sure at what point a QB goes from being unproven to proven. Seems fairly arbitrary. Arbuckle’s numbers last season were terrific.

And if I have, that’s not something that I currently believe. My stance on Nichols at this point in time has nothing to do with how good of a teammate he is and that isn’t something I’ve argued at bare minimum since the start of this season. The discussion at hand is whether Nichols should be given the reigns for 2020, not whether he’s a nice guy and a good teammate.

Collaros, Masoli (who I don’t love, but is still better), Arbuckle... it’s not a short list. Not that they will be signed, but they’re all at least available.

I didn’t say that first comment and I don’t believe I ever have.

For the record, saying the Bombers would be better off moving on from Nichols =\= Nichols is a bad teammate. I actually believe he provided value to Collaros and Streveler as part of the QB room. It’s more like he’s a declining asset coming off a major injury with a number of younger, cheaper and likely better options available this offseason. Don’t confuse the two.

Some would argue that other people are all too eager to overstate what Nichols has done for this team. The truth of his impact is probably somewhere in the middle.

That's just a ridiculous take. And I absolutely guarantee you if Nichols were the Riders QB and Fajardo were the Bombers QB and their numbers were identical to what they are now, you'd argue that Nichols was a bum and Fajardo was a top-5 QB in the league.

Arbuckle is probably better than Harris but yeah... hard to disagree.

It would be an interesting exercise to have a number of people rank the top 10 QBs in the league in their opinion. Maybe a good offseason activity. And even you have to recognize that returning to form from this shoulder injury is a rather sizeable "IF"

Reilly was the least of Claybrooks' problems. Maas is a pretty bad coach whose time was up and again, my dislike for Nichols doesn't mean I think Trevor Harris is any good. I've been consistent on the stance that he sucks for quite some time now. I don't think MBT is particularly good either but your point about him here is disingenuous. Franklin got a number of starts and the Argos were significantly better with him than they were without him. I'm not even sure what overarching point you're trying to make here. Nichols beat two playoff teams this year and the Calgary game was won exclusively by two special teams touchdowns. It's hardly fair to judge the records of any other QB that played for the Bombers this year when no one else played the worst three teams in the league. Do you honestly think that had nothing to do with Nichols' record as a starter? You still haven't addressed that.

What job are you referring to when you say didn't get the job done? Harris beat the same teams Nichols did outside of Calgary. MBT had an even worse team than Edmonton and didn't have the luxury of facing the pathetic Toronto defence. Beyond that, no one is arguing that either of these guys are particularly good. Just don't discount how bad BC, Ottawa and Toronto were this year and when five of your seven wins are against those three teams, it doesn't tell you a hell of a lot about your own quality of play.

This isn’t always true. Very often the top pick busts because there’s pressure to select a guy who is safe with less risk of being in the NFL a long time. That’s how we end up with the Shomari Williamses and Faith Ekakities and Shane Richardses of the world. Usually there are a number of good guys left at 9 because the desperate teams don’t want guys with high flight risk.

Forgive me if I’m in the camp that a QB of Nichols’ caliber is elevated by the quality of his team and being a “winner” really isn’t a singular player’s attribute. But that’s seemingly a fundamental difference between us. Let’s not forget when Nichols wins in the regular season, he gets credit for his record even in games where he played objectively poorly. But his 1-3 playoff record with the Bombers is scoffed at with responses like “But he was incredible in that loss to Edmonton in the playoffs!” Seems like a double standard to me.

Nobody who knows anything is clamouring for a guy like Trevor Harris either. He’s basically a more hyped Nichols.

Just like the two seasons before, Nichols regressed hard as the season went on. For all you say about people ignoring the good things Nichols does in favour of the little things, I just can’t agree. It’s been explained many times in reasonable terms why Nichols’ record as a starter is inflated and it’s insanely frustrating when those with measured criticism of him get responses like “But he was 7-2!!!” and “71% completion percentage!!” I am a huge fan of Streveler but can recognize his limitations right now as a starting QB. It feels like fans of Nichols see any criticism of him as a need to dig in their heels and make him out to be more than he is. And this is all before a major injury to his throwing shoulder. A similar injury which sunk Lulay’s career and Lulay at his best was 10x the QB that Nichols could ever hope to be. I realize that not all criticism is fair and balanced but there are plenty of good reasons to believe that Nichols was fairly poor in most games he played this season and even more reasons to believe he’s not the guy we should want starting for this team going forward. I say this with the full knowledge that he will be re-signed and handed the starting job next season and sure, O’Shea has earned the right to do things his way. It’s just not the route that I would take for a number of reasons.

What about his play specifically do you think is bad? I personally think he’s quite good as both a returner and a DB.

You’re not arguing what I’m saying in any capacity. Do you not think if you remove the 9 points per game that Nichols had absolutely nothing to do with in his starts wouldn’t drastically effect where the Bombers landed on that points per game list? What about average starting field position? Is that irrelevant to you as well? As far as completions go, when you look at that chart I posted earlier what exactly goes through your mind? The guy had 20 completions that traveled over 15 yards in the air over his nine starts. No **** his completion percentage will be high.

Not to mention that there were three bad teams in the CFL this season. The Bombers played those teams a combined six times and Nichols’ was the starter for all of them. Yes, a player can’t control the team he plays but no doubt that buoyed his win-loss total significantly.

The defence and special teams were literally averaging 9 points per game in Nichols’ starts. That’s excluding field goals. Does Nichols have any impact on that? Not to mention the field position he was given every game was incredible. Wins are a garbage QB stat and you know it so I won’t even address how ridiculous that statement is.

This is the chart I was referring to and illustrates everything that those skeptical of Nichols’ “greatness” talk about.

As an extremely poor measure of a QB’s effectiveness and I would hope you know that. Do you consider the Bombers’ 3-0 record in the playoffs in non-Nichols’ starts compared to 1-3 with him to be significant? It goes both ways.

There was a great chart posted in another thread showing how far from the LOS most of Nichols’ completions were and while I don’t want to overstate the exact number, something like 70% of his completions were within 5 yards of the LOS. The visual was staggering. Not all numbers are created equal.