BigBlue

Can Ambrosie fix Toronto's attendance problem: http://www.tsn.ca/cfl/video/how-will-ambrosie-tackle-argos-woes-connect-with-younger-generation~1161077

If Jones had not made the personnel changes he did this week I would have bet on Regina not Hamilton in the upcoming game .... but i expect the changes will give the Cats the psychological edge that will make all the difference in the game .... it would not surprise me if the game is close early but Hammy will pull away and maybe explode in the 2nd half

What is this prediction based on; what has changed since the last time he was our starting MLB when he seemed to always be out of position and a step slow and behind?

Rather than debating whether we should concede a safety or not, maybe we should be discussing the boneheaded circumstances that led up to being pinned deep in our own end - - that is what really matters

We love to bash and crash the green machine next door west to us: no depth, no Canadians, mongrels with mish mash of talent filled with has beens ... no end of disrespect and disparaging jokes But the facts are that in spite of losing Jones and company came very close to winning and could be sitting in first place right now ... they were at least competitive The chances of going 0 & 18 look more and more remote .... the probability of going 9 & 9 are going up As much as we love to hate and ridicule Jones, he has done some things in his career and we might be seeing the early signs of a turnaround... Or is this complete foolishness? "The Riders are going to implode as soon as the injury bug hits!" some will shout with pride. So is Jones talented or a lucky pretender?

So I keep hearing Calgary is not as good as last year; most teams improved, how has the Stamps retrogressed or degenerated? The o-line. the whole D. coaching.... what specifically has changed?

what about joe zaleski?

I hope you are right... I just believe we are going to be outcoached this week

What I don't like is the agency fees ... they seem too high and too easy for too little work ... hurts the walk up business for sure .... only escape is buy season tickets ... pure greed and lack of competition Toronto continues to suffer from P**** envy .... they are trendy, extreme trend followers and want to pretend they could be as good as a classy American city: the blue jays suffer from this band wagon effect ... Toronto could develop its own niche of fans but they have to develop that crowd with lower priced tickets that makes them attractive compared to other competitive venues ... many real fans wouldn't go to Rogers centre because everything was too expensive, refreshments, parking, driving time ... it was more fun to just visit the local beer store, order a pizza and watch the game on TV .... and your wallet wasn't $200 lighter the next day If you can get decent seats for $35-60 each all in, things could change ... when your fan base gets above 20K then slowly start to raise prices on the best seats but keep the cheap seats around for developing fans I wonder how pricing for soccer compares to football tickets at BMO

east to say, hard to do .any idea HOW to do that ... how to make the blitz effective, how you keep contain on blm, how to stuff messam before he gets up a head of steam? I don't think Lapo changes much of anything until he is suffering real pain and that might be in the form of Saturdays 1st quarter turning into 4 quarters of being shut down by a real defense this coming weekend We can fix the ROC hole we saw but blm has habit of making our DBs look silly even when we are at the top of our game .... messam vs hurl is no contest ... I am expecting Calgary will blow us away this week and LAPO won't respond until the game is out of hand ... we have the makings of a good team but this week our two coordinators are going to go through a reality check (I fear) and only after eating some serious HUMBLE pie will they begin to make necessary changes to our general strategies and specific schemes Our only hope is if we can contain blm and keep him in the pocket AND if we can blitz through messams gaps before he does .... tall orders indeed and I don't yet see the will to do so ... its going to take some pain to go from talented newbies pursuing individual aspirations to real team work where everyone is working collaboratively I just hope when we are next licking our wounds we start realizing how to use all this talent and that means making changes currently outside our comfort zone I think this is realist not pessimist ... we are still going to finish first this year but we are not going to do it by out muscling our opponents .... we are going to do it by going beyond our current mindset and stretching to do what actually needs to be done to beat the individual weaknesses of each particular enemy

Its a long boring list ...

where do you get these stats from?

I don't know what you all saw today bur Regina's blitz seemed to exert a lot more pressure then the Bomber blitz .... in my view I thought our blitz seemed mostly well handled and I just feel like its anemic Are we scheming as well as we can when we blitz?

Not claiming any guru or prognosticator status here today but my best judgment seemed to work out today ... here was my forecast as I started this thread: "I think we manage to eke out a strange squeaker by the tiniest of margins and I would rather be lucky than good (even as we make our own luck).... I don't believe the Blue are ready to blow anybody away just yet; but by labor day who knows..." So it's a double great feeling for the victory and the forecast .... yippee !

Anybody got a calculator? In Calgary tonight 3 missed converts by Paredes ..... Maher was having trouble too with a miss and blocks or deflections of his kicking ... of course it was an unusual night, but it got me thinking about an old topic here on this site: Why are teams not going for a 2 point convert more often .... right now teams are doing them only (more or less) when they have momentum, or, when they can tie the score or change the differential to 3 points How much worse off would a team be if they tried all 2 point converts (except if at games end they just needed that single point)? Another point from preseason: last play of the game, just scored a TD; one coach tried the 2 pointer to win instead of the "safe" play of tying it up with the single point convert ... and he lost the game when it failed. But in real life, not preseason, if on one play you can win with a two point convert, would you not want to keep control of your own destiny? Anything can happen in overtime, right? So if you are confident of your offense why not put it all on the line on one short conversion play? (Coaches wanting to keep their jobs or needing to preserve their reputation need not answer.) Who has that kind of conviction and courage?

One of your most impressive Diatribes Mike

Administrative role By 1992, Ambrosie took over as the secretary of the Canadian Football League Players' Association(CFLPA). He played a role in monitoring the 1992 NHL strike as the CFLPA and the CFL renegotiated their collective bargaining agreement that year.[34] Ambrosie was also part of the CFLPA board that oversaw the CFL's expansion into the United States.[35] During the expansion, Ambrosie took a strong stance against lowering the import ratio which requires each team to carry a certain number of Canadian players. He also took issue with a proposed expansion or dispersal draft intended to be held in early 1993 to provide players for the San Antonio Riders and Sacramento Gold Miners.[35][36] The CFLPA and Ambrosie threatened legal action over the import ratio issue, but no legal action came to pass.[37] Business career After retiring from football, Ambrosie became the North American head of sales at HSBC Securities. In May 2004, Ambrosie joined AGF Management Ltd. as their head of sales and marketing.[38] The president of the company reportedly hired him to "shake things up".[39] Ambrosie's leadership brought several changes to AGF Management Ltd., including new fund managers and the launch of new products.[40] In June 2006, Ambrosie was appointed president of AGF Funds Inc.[41] Due to another managerial change in 2008, Ambrosie left the firm.[42] In October of 2012, Ambrosie joined Canada's oldest investment firm, MacDougall, MacDougall & MacTier (3Macs) as president and CEO and guided them through a period of significant transition and growth. In 2016, 3Macs entered into negotiations ending in the eventual sale of the firm to Raymond James.

yeah like all hall of famers

So he is more a tight end than a slotback type receiver from what i saw in the video .... no idea about his speed

One of my biggest regrets is when Geroy Simon tried to return to the Bombers after his flirt with the NFL ... we couldn't find room for him Stupid is as stubborn does

that is precisely what we didn't do last year - no blitz no stunts no heroic pass rush

So says Dave Naylor on 1290 today .... its a great way to start the season he says Personally, I don't think Saturday's game this week is going to be any cake walk: Regina has a game under their belt and has already started to make adjustments .... we are still getting organized Neither do we have psychology on our side in this stadium opener ... Regina's strength (receiving) is going up against our biggest weakness from last year as borne out by the stats (passing yardage yielded) Jones is going to focus on exposing Hurl ... trapping him until he won't even realize whats going on What we do have going for us is the game in the trenches and that should show up by the fourth Quarter We also have the Kevin Glenn choke factor where a seemingly competent QB gives one up at this worst possible moment I think we manage to eke out a strange squeaker by the tiniest of margins and I would rather be lucky than good (even as we make our own luck) I don't believe the Blue are ready to blow anybody away just yet; but by labor day who knows...

Remember this isn't a "knowing" thread, its a forecast thread .... the ability to make a best guess prediction with some judgment and acumen

Now that we have all seen one real game, let's take a moment and revise our predictions for this season, just in case any of us need to save face or develop our ego: Mine Winnipeg 13 - 5 Calgary 11-6-1 Edmonton 11-7 Vancouver 10-8 Ottawa 8-9-1 Toronto 8-10 Montreal 6-12 Regina 5-13 Hamilton 3-15 The wild card to all this is which QBs will be injured for how long: Winnipeg & Edmonton followed by Ottawa have the best depth but that could be debated Winnipeg IMHO will be amongst the most improved teams in the league ... the games we will lose will be about Sam Hurl and defensive coaching decisions ... we will do well this year because we have improved an already decent team showing up with better depth and maturity Calgary doesn't have quite as much talent as last year but they still have a lot ... and Messam is better .... Bo Levi Mitchell will have to face his ego .... Calgary has been on a roll for a long time and every once in a while your luck runs out Edmonton carries over a lot of talent and has new stuff .... still a few holes and the loss of Sherritt is massive .... a top 3 contender I would rank Vancouver and Ottawa as the next most talented .... with QBing not as good as expected: maturity woes but definitely not awful Toronto is going to be the most improved team in the league because of talent assembly and coaching ... no depth at QB is what will keep them mediocre ... if anyone can over achieve this year its Trestman Montreal has improved its QBing but its central core seems to be past its prime date ... the transition to new talent will be a process In Regina Jones's scissors and duct tape will get them some wins against over confident rivals .... somehow Jones provides enough hope to keep his job another year Hamilton has not done enough to improve its talent base .... management could lose faith in Austin and fire him after Collaros disappoints Another charming season ahead for all of us gurus

I often feel alone in my opinion of our CFL Refereeing .... I just wonder hpw many of you share my feelings about the zebras and the review panel in Toronto