Fatty Liver

If you read the full article that hasn't happened in Edm. yet, here is the excerpt. Eskimos attendance dropped by 5.9% with a very concerning average of only 31,517 fans per game for a franchise that averaged well over 40,000 the last time the Eskimos won the Grey Cup in 2005. That said, the attendance total still led the league and sponsorship and merchandise sales, along with a ticket price increase, covered the drop in the turnstile count. The challenge now is to use the euphoria about finally winning the Grey Cup again to translate into ticket sales to get 40,000 fans back in the stand again. And until Rhodes’ team on the third floor of Commonwealth Stadium does that, they ought not be taking too many bows. “Right now, we’re trending with our season seats exactly where we were last year,” said Rhodes. “We’re at 89% on renewals.” While GM Ed Hervey gets to justifiably point out his pride in becoming the first Eskimos general manager in the salary cap era to win the Grey Cup, he and his user-unfriendly team in football ops haven’t helped ticket sales. Indeed, it appears that actually winning the Grey Cup hasn’t sold a single ticket for this coming season. Rhodes suggests there’s a big announcement planned for next week to reveal a major investment in improving the experience around the game involving halftime shows with a major focus on 20- to 30-year-old fans. “There will also be more capital expenditures in the stadium which will speak for themselves,” he said. Obviously with the loss of an entire coaching staff and a significant number of players, it’ll be an interesting season on the field, but just as interesting a year is ahead off the field. Grey Cup or bust again. And 40,000 or bust, too.

http://slam.canoe.com/Slam/Football/CFL/Edmonton/2016/05/03/22629656.html Interesting article regarding the Esk. AGM, especially the following excerpt on Grey Cup expenses. It appears it is much better for the books to host the Cup rather than win it. With the Grey Cup in the Eskimos dressing room for the AGM and a collection of about a dozen former chairmen of the board of directors in attendance, the team opened its books once again. The first thing many of those former board chairmen searched for in the financial statement, for the season that ended with the Eskimos winning the 14th Grey Cup in their history, was one line. “How much did it cost to win the Grey Cup?” said one. Winning the Grey Cup is not good for the bottom line. Most often it turns a season of profit into a season of loss. This year it cost the Eskimos $2,676,929 in playoff expenses to win the Grey Cup. That involves the cost of Grey Cup rings that are almost half a million alone, the cost of flights, hotel rooms, etc. for extra players, injured players and wives and family of those in the game and bonus clauses in player contracts. The year before, under playoff expenses, to lose the Western Final in Calgary, the total was $1,041,069. Despite what it cost to win the Grey Cup, the Eskimos still made money. The revenue for the season was $24,818,793 and the expenses totaled $22,835,579. Profit: $1,567,534. The year before, the Eskimos declared a profit of $3,308,071, almost two million dollars more. You get the idea. It’s just the way it works in the CFL when you win the Grey Cup.

Couldn't understand a word of the lyrics but the video says it all, excellent.

Hope he's a good listener.

Ass-hat indeed, no need to further help him spread his message, let it die.

Hefney highlights. http://www.bluebombers.com/2016/05/03/hefney-highlights-in-blue-and-gold/

The timing of the fire is a bit bizarre being so early in the season but the fire itself is a natural occurrence that is part of the cycle of a boreal forest. Fort Mac did not follow the advisory of "fire-guarding" after the Slave Lake fire and now they're sadly paying the price.

Not sure, much of the fire-proof innovation comes from Australia, grass fires can be just as destructive, as Slave Lake proved. Safest place to live is in an igloo in the Antarctic where the only threat is scurvy bitten stragglers from the Scott Expedition scrounging for food.

Kelowna will burn again, hopefully people rebuilt with fire-proof technology and didn't clad in vinyl or cedar. I expect this will be a very bad year for wildfires.

I think Fort Mac has seen it's high point, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people decide not to rebuild after this.

Doug Brown's latest report Keeping pivot off the turf Job 1 for Bombers If there is any conclusion to be drawn from a three-day mini-camp where not all of the phases of the team participated — and plays were run against the air — it’s that the Winnipeg Blue Bombers seem to have an understanding of their vulnerability, and appear to be determined to do something about it. While mini-camps will tell you close to nothing about the quality and calibre of the team that will eventually take the field after weeks of condensed training camp, it does tell you exactly what your offensive or defensive co-ordinator has been obsessing about all off-season, and what weaknesses they have been itching to address from the get-go. Regardless of how instructional and fundamentally simplistic mini-camps are, the themes and concepts introduced first are usually a road map and blueprint of what the franchise wants its identity to be. As strategic and cunning as some co-ordinators can be when implementing their game plans, they most often cannot hide their eagerness and enthusiasm to jump right into those defining aspects of their scheme from their very first practice. Whether it was mentioned in passing, shared on fan forums or filed in accounts by those who were assigned to be there, the same observations and common phrases kept showing up and were seemingly repeated throughout the entire three-day ordeal. The first, and most common, was how the focus seemed to be on the quarterbacks getting rid of the ball early and often, which went hand in hand with a lot of "shorter passes, bubble screens and quick, short routes" being run. As amusing as it is to hear about "short" passes and "short" routes being run predominantly by "shorter" receivers, an ability to have a quick passing attack is one of the many options to successfully nullify a heavy-pressure opponent. While we may not see with any of these new receivers, for some time, the kind of non-verbal, instinctual communication Milt Stegall was once able to create with the pivots he played with — that allowed him to adjust his prescribed route and exploit the middle of the field any time a defence overextended itself with pressure — at least we now know we casual observers aren’t the only ones hoping to see the bull’s-eye taken off Drew Willy’s jersey this season. Despite the spot problems over the last two years with areas of the defence, run game, offensive line, inappropriate schemes and backup pivots, the underlying vulnerability that consistently led to underachievement was none other than the inability to keep the most impactful player on the field healthy and upright. In fact, one of the biggest frustrations in covering this team the last two seasons has been seeing the potential of the quarterback when he has time in a clean pocket, versus how quickly that promise deteriorates under siege. The fact there was such a huge discrepancy in performance between those pristine-pocket operating conditions and the stretches where free rushers were seemingly burying him at will with few consequences, had to have made selling out to get to Willy a safe gamble for most any defence that faced him. While it is far too soon to tell whether the new players, schemes and leadership will mesh well and complement one another, at least most of us can share in the optimism that comes with observing a team that is finally making an attempt to address the root of one of it’s most fundamental problems, and at the earliest of all opportunities. Doug Brown, once a hard-hitting defensive lineman and frequently a hard-hitting columnist, appears weekly in the Free Press.

Basically what this guy is describing is a fire storm, the worst nightmare imaginable if you live in a heavily forested area. Thoughts on the wildfire situation in Fort McMurray Just some thoughts from a former AB gov't wildland firefighter... Basically what this guy is describing is a fire storm, the worst nightmare imaginable if you live in a heavily forested area. Conditions pretty much cannot get worse than this for Alberta. This afternoon, temperatures soared to over 32C, with very low RH values in the mid teens. When the RH is lower than the temperature, we call this "crossover", which aids in intense fire behaviour - especially when the fuel source is tinder dry. When winds are high (this afternoon roughly 20 gusting 40km/h), fire growth occurs rapidly. The peak burning period is typically near 5PM during the warmest time of day when RH is also lowest. A worst case scenario is one like today's, when an out of control wildfire is being fanned by the wind directly toward populated areas. Wildfires are actioned according to their priority, so those that threaten human life, communities, watersheds and soils, infrastructure, etc get more resources thrown at them accordingly. The trouble is, when you have what we call "Rank 6" fire behaviour in the form of a continuous crown fire (spreading primarily through the upper canopy of a predominantly coniferous forest), with flame lengths several metres high, fire suppression is nearly impossible during the peak burning period. In short, if it seems like not much progress is being made this afternoon, it's because there isn't. Any water or fire retardant must be dropped aerially on the perimeter of the fire to stop its spread since it is too volatile for ground crews to work close to the fire during peak burning conditions. However, with such intense heat, most or all of the water vapourizes before it even reaches the flames. It is truly a desperate feeling knowing you cannot stop such a natural process. Fire suppression is more effective at night and in the early morning, when temperatures normally cool, winds die down, and RH increases. During the night, while ground crews may be able to get in, all VFR aerial support is grounded. If winds continue to blow through the night, this recovery period may not occur. Tomorrow is forecasted to be roughly a carbon copy of today being hot and windy, with less recovery overnight tonight than we'd hope. Thus, we can expect the extreme fire behaviour to continue, unfortunately. Fire whirls, pyrocumulus clouds in excess of 20000 feet, large flame lengths, and spot fires are all signs of extreme fire behaviour and we have been seeing all of these today. Compared to Slave Lake in 2011, surface winds of 70-90km/h contributed to the rapid rates of spread then. However this year it is hotter and drier overall, and still with moderate winds. http://stormchaserkyle.blogspot.ca/2016/05/thoughts-on-wildfire-situation-in-fort.html?m=1

Kent Austin taken to hospital, released Hamilton Tiger-Cats vice president of football operations and head coach Kent Austin was taken to an area hospital on Tuesday afternoon but was released a few hours later and is “fine,” according to a team source. No officials details on his condition were immediately available but sources say he suffered from a suspected allergic reaction. After a brief visit to the emergency room at Hamilton General – where his presence was noticed by a Ticat fan and made it’s way to social media – Austin returned to his Burlington home. Austin is in his fourth year with the Ticats and recently presided over the team’s mini-camp at Tim Hortons Field. In addition to his head coaching duties, Austin also served as offensive coordinator following the departure of Tommy Condell in early April. The 52-year-old Austin has three children with wife Shelley, as well as a granddaughter.

Wasn't there another N. AB. town that had to evacuated 2 years ago when grass fires raged out of control?

With the retirement of George it appears the Riders are down to Jeff Knox Jr. as the last remaining defensive starter from 2015. Now that's an overhaul.

Also released QB Anthony Boone, I thought he looked like a decent prospect in game action last year. Here is the entire list of Als. cuts. Anthony Boone QB Duke Will Brown DB Missouri S&T Jonathan Bryant WR Georgia Southern Telvion Clark LB Towson University Sharrod Golightly DB South Carolina Terry Johnson CB Florida A&M Jamahl Knowles* DB Calgary Kelvin Muamba* WR Wilfrid Laurier Kevin Régimbald* LB Sherbrooke Tommy Shuler WR Marshall

Trade them Hefney.

It appears Jones is wearing too many hats to bother with due diligence. According to some Ti-Cat fans that attended their mini-camp Austin spent the 3 days running around the field like a headless chicken trying to cover up for departure of Condell. The entertainment value of an over-stressed Austin on the sidelines....priceless. I hope TSN has plans for a full-time "AustinCam" with audio in the works.

Is it too much to ask for a member of the Wpg. media to contact this guy and ask him flat out, "What are your plans for the remainder of the season?" Hopefully Walters already does this every time Bilukidi or Mulumba get cut.

When you wish upon a star Makes no difference who you are Anything your heart desires Will come to you.

C'mon man, it's totally understandable. Every Canadian player should have the opportunity to fulfill their childhood dream and play for the best organization that everwas!!!

Ah, maybe that's why they brought in Zach.

Wow, Norwood is a beast, must be salary related. The price for re-signing Laurent is taking it's toll.

Both Chungh and Richards attended the Giants tryout camp last year. On the left of the photo below you can see Richards unsuccessfully reaching for a food voucher.