mbrg

Crashed my dirtbike over a jump as a teen oh so many years ago. Not even very hard, it was just a bad angle and my back tire kicked out. Not really any worse for wear, definitely embarrassed, I dusted myself off, picked up my bike, kicked the starter and headed for home. That is the last thing I remember doing for about 9 hours. The next memory I have was waking up in my bed, going down the hallway, and asking my parents what day it was. I didn't have a clue. Somewhere in all of that blackness I would have to have driven across at least one highway to get home. I have many since, probably one or two before, and they definitely come easier now. It does not take much of a knock to the noggin before that sensation of the world sliding away from you comes back. I don't have any current symptoms that bother me, other than sometimes when reading stories to my son. Back then it just wasn't something we ever thought about. It's only in hindsight that those events and what happened make sense. Oh hey, that was a concussion. Back in the day, if you didn't lose consciousness you didn't have a concussion. That was the rule. Not a very good rule.

Before we get carried away arguing about Kelly, where are the other guys lining up? Watson and Denmark are in the slot. Is Moore in the slot or is he the boundary WR? Where is Kohlert lining up? Kelly is a complementary piece, not something we're building around. I have him ahead of Urrutia and am assuming they are competing for the field WR spot. I am not moving any of those other 4 guys around to fit in Kelly.

I resent the memory of Chad Plummer being forced on me so close to the weekend. That was a time when playoff losses still had huge emotional impact on me. Another loss in the dome.

If Gore ever gets a handle on his butterfingers issue I think there would be a strong case to make for him being the best NI receiver in the league. It's not as bad now as it was 2 seasons ago. Ianuzzi has speed, and that's why he does some returns. Kohlert has way better hands and runs better routes. Apples and oranges for skill sets. I'm calling it a draw.

You're listing starters, not depth, but nonetheless there are a few guys in your list that seem pretty grass-is-greener type players. Harris is obviously something we don't have, as is Westerman, even though he's not really a starter in the sense that Doug Brown was a starter. But he's better than Thomas, the guy we'll be starting. Gore? I don't have him as better than Watson. Ianuzzi? Not much to separate him from Kohlert from what I've seen. Valli? I wouldn't want him at all, and I think BC doesn't badly want him anymore either. Last year Norman would have been valuable to us, but now patience on Goossen will accomplish the same thing. Ottawa picked up a bunch of guys who were unprotected because of iffy health. Maybe they are healthy enough to go and last the whole season. Hindsight in November will give us the answer on that. But I still wouldn't put that bunch ahead of ours. That's just a collection of mystery men. We don't know what value they have until they finally get a chance to show it. The Bombers are weak weak weak when you compare them to Calgary, but compared to some of the other bottom feeders, we're kind of in the same boat.

Hmmm.... Wonder if anyone has called Messam a steal other than you? (I'd guess no one, but I'm not about to go through 7 pages of comments to find out) I wonder if any team has worse NI depth than the Bombers? Sorry, don't have time (or desire) to go through 8 pages (140+ posts...) of what must be repetitive bickering. One would consider a talented NI available on the open market a steal, no? Repetitive bickering is the best band name I've heard today. Can I use it? Can you also teach me to play an instrument? If Messam can show any kind of form like he had 3 seasons ago, then he will be an absolute steal for someone. And if you can also find a decent backup like Calvin McCarthy, you have yourself a ratio-breaker there. We don't have a McCarthy (I'm guessing after 7 pages of people bashing Volny they aren't going to start arguing he's as good as McCarthy now) and Messam simply isn't the guy he was 3 seasons ago. I'm not opposed to rolling the dice on him and seeing if we can't squeak one last useful season out of his nearly empty husk. It just doesn't fit in our current plan, and I'm growing to like that plan. I've seen the value in that plan over our last 2 games.

There we go. Concise and sensible. Exactly how I feel.

Shrug. It has less spelling errors than yours, so there's that at least. Why do all your examples feature the lowest person on the depth chart? Do you have that little faith in the argument you're trying to present? At all positions on defence. Not at all positions. Having a DI for every position on the field would be ideal. Ideal is not possible. Our team has little NI depth everywhere. Where is the most? I'll argue it's in our secondary. Where do you think it is? Of course he does. He's a basher. We don't have a basher. If we wanted a smashmouth RB on our roster, they're really not that tough to find. I suspect we would have seen one in camp if that was an element our offence was supposed to feature. Ford is on our roster, that is the only reason I've used his name. Maybe I'll use Bolton instead, since he doesn't carry any emotional baggage for Bomber fans. Messam is the best at that dimension only if you continue to list people you already know aren't as good as him. That's the third time you've done that in your pro-Messam arguments. I have complete confidence that if we wanted to have a smashmouth RB on our roster McManus could provide us with a list of 100 better choices than Messam by days end. And they would all be imports. That is the entire point. The Bombers have decided that they don't want to lower their standards on offence just to fit in a NI. If all goes according to plan, no NI will carry the ball this year, barring a rash of injuries during a game, a trick play, or a reward for good work on special teams or blocking. If our roster was constructed differently, if we had a couple of stud NI Dlinemen we can rotate, then it actually becomes easier to fit Messam in. I know that is entirely counter-intuitive, but it's about how the 44 puzzle pieces fit together, not just about 1 piece being an upgrade. I've never mentioned attitude issues. People who aren't in the locker rooms should never use that argument. They don't know, they are just pulling stuff out of their butt to justify a weak position. When Kelly traded Arjei Franklin I saw people imply he was a problem in the locker room. Arjei Franklin. Good grief. Oh ya, anyways, no, a NI who won most outstanding Canadian 3 seasons ago isn't repeatedly getting cut because he is "one-dimensional". He was always one-dimensional. I would gladly have had his one-dimensionalness on this team in 2011. Hoping we DI a DB is a personal preference. I would seldom debate a personal preference. Messam making our team better? On paper, yes. With the current plan, no. So you must not like the current plan. You must prefer our offence isn't the strongest possible offence we can field. You prefer we shift some of that strength to the defence at the expense of the offence. That is an entirely acceptable strategy. I'm sure the Bombers considered it for quite a while, even before Messam came loose. Seeing how competitive we've been in games so far, and seeing how effective Willy has looked because we've surrounded him with strength rather than weakness, I like the current plan. It's far from bulletproof, but I see what they're doing and agree that giving our young QB the best possible chance to succeed is a smart idea. I wasn't painting you in that light - I was pointing out that we all are aware that he is a talented player with a history of success. And a NI. At first glance I also thought going after him should be a no-brainer. That is why I also thought having him here was a good idea. Until I considered what the Bombers are doing on offence, what the plan appears to be, and how Messam might fit in that plan. Then I realized that he really doesn't, and it's not because of his running style, or even that his skills have obviously diminished. I still wouldn't be surprised if he ended up here. It's not like the other plan is a terrible one. With our roster every NI plan we can make right now is about picking the least bad NI choice out of a collection of bad NI choices. It's not like signing him just to have him around in case we want to change plans later is a bad default position. Until we change plans though, he would have no on-field value to this club. Maybe selling jerseys. Feeling better about ourselves. That kinda thing.

Can't really argue a personal preference. But I will point out that: - Grigsby is unlikely to be on the Bombers roster in any situation where injuries haven't occurred, so picking our weakest import RB to compare with Messam paints Messam in a favourable light only until you realize who he's being compared to, then it really paints him in an unfavourable light. - Messam hasn't been a lock to convert 2nd and 6 since 2011. That's why he keeps getting cut. - Kohlert was really the only NI receiver we all liked last year. "Watson is too injured". "Etienne is too...Etienne". Kohlert was the porridge we all agreed was just right. Not sure why you're picking on him. Nonetheless, I don't hate your suggestion. It's not totally without merit. It is still a weaker choice than DI-ing our RB and using Kohlert. In my opinion. And apparently, the coach's opinion and management's opinion. If we have him on our roster we have the option of changing our minds later. I guess there's that. And by the way, big thanks for using specific examples. You somehow managed to do THE IMPOSSIBLE!!!

I thought the calls for Messam were to address ratio woes. If we're making calls to get the best possible RB we can find, the calls I'm making all have US area codes at the start.

Vega. It's Cornish, Lulay, Durie, Vega, Bulcke, Brouillette and Reilly. I think it's Bighill. Wally wouldn't be happy if Lulay was throwing tires in the air given the condition of his shoulder. Wally would be thrilled if Lulay could throw tires. That was pretty neat.

Which looks like the plan. And having thought about the plan, I understand it and agree with it. I think the only person who would argue that is his mother. And Volny might be standing behind her going "mom - shhhhhhhh". Another Joe Smith is easy enough to get if we want him. No, we wouldn't have to DI Ford. OShea isn't DI-ing Ford because he feels forced to, he's DI-ing Ford because he wants to. At least within the confines of the team we currently have. There's the rub - all these defensive DI's don't improve our defense. Every time a DI goes in another import comes out. Every time. This is what I'm saying; Messam being better than Volny is irrelevant because adding Messam doesn't make the Bombers better. Injuries are always a wild card. Right now we have more NI depth in our secondary than I can recall in a long time. Ever? OShea is going to take advantage of that. The secondary probably does not get a DI. Not every positional group gets to have a DI backup in the CFL. You pick your poison. OShea doesn't want his poison to be an ineffective offence. He's been cut a few times now, so how good he is must be pretty debatable, no one cuts a good NI RB. Here's what adds the most versatility to the roster. - Don't sign Messam. - Cut Volny. - DI whichever RB. - Keep the best NI special teams player you can find in Volny's roster spot. - Pray our starting RB and his backup never both get injured in the same game (has only happened once that I can remember in 30some years of watching the Bombers). - Accept the Pontbriand will play the last quarter of football as RB if lightning strikes twice. It's not even a bad compromise. He has decent hands and no one covers him. None of this has ever been an argument for Volny. Why would anyone make that argument? The only argument is that Messam doesn't help the Bombers. My expectation is that the Bombers will have multiple guys handling returns as they have had for many years, but someone will see the bulk of the work. It might be Ford, but that's not the reason for DI-ing him. The reason for giving him a DI spot (or Grigsby) is to not have an impotent offence that flounders and gets it's kinda-rookie QB killed. It's to have an offence that can create and sustain drives, rather than stall over and over. How has the offence looked so far? I'm going to throw out effective as my adjective of choice. Take note of all the complaints there has been about our offensive coordinator so far this month. I can't recall one. Most of Bomber nation was disgusted when he was hired, and I'm sure they'd be pretty quick to point out all the failings of his offence. So far, no takers. Using a DI spot on a RB seems to be a pretty good plan, since giving Willy the best possible chance to succeed in this offence seems like a pretty good plan. And if we use a DI spot on a RB, which is a plan I like based on a concept I like, then having Messam anywhere on our roster is largely a wasted roster spot. If he was good enough to be a starter he would have tremendous value, just like he did when...he was a starter. Otherwise, he doesn't make any kind of positive contribution to our ratio woes. Unless we commit to having 6 NIs on offence and put the rotation there instead of on defence, a rotation featuring Messam, Goossen, and Feoli-G. That has value in terms of positively affecting our ratio, but has negative value in terms of giving Willy the best possible chance to succeed. OShea seems to be giving that the higher priority. When Goossen is good enough, they will just stick him in. No rotation. There are no points you have raised that I haven't considered. I have given them ample consideration and followed them thru to their logical conclusions. The end result comes back to Messam being better is not the same thing as Messam makes the Bombers better. Just like everyone else, when Messam popped free my thought was "Messam - I recognize that name! Sign him!". Having him back up our starting RB and DI-ing a DB weakens the offence relative to one of our imports handling the job, and this is an offence that already features starters that get bitched about all the time like Morley and Neufeld. The offence is a pretty fragile ecosystem. Give it the best possible chance to thrive. That is what OShea is doing. Also note - not showing up anywhere in my argument: - Volny's value to this team. - Messam's salary.

If a good receiver kicks loose we should grab him, but when healthy I don't hate the group of NI receivers we've assembled. Watson is really our only name guy, but as a platoon the other 4 should get some yards for us too. There's some good hands in this bunch from what I've seen so far. 4 fair to decent guys and 1 will-be-an-allstar-if-he-stays-healthy guy should be enough for this team to look elsewhere for NI repairs. We need another NI to rotate on the Dline. Oline needs are in case of injury. Dline needs are for our gameday roster in week 1. High priority. I'd add linebacker to that but I just doubt anyone good enough to play important defensive snaps is going to kick loose. Dline is a possibility.

He should be a restaurant on the Simpsons.

No one has quite figured out the "why" part of this yet.

Are Hall and Brohm not pretty much the same age with similar experiences in other leagues except that Hall has started more games in the CFL? That's why we're having these discussions because we have 2 backups at a similar point in their careers only one is slightly more experienced than the other. He may not be good enough to start, but I haven't seen any of the qbs behind Willy stand out more than Hall has yet. Marve looks promising but again the guy has only had a couple series haven't seen nearly enough of him in real situations to make any kind of statement on him. How has hall stood out exactly? During the first part of camp Hall and Willy were a clear cut above the other QBs. The practises I saw, admittedly not many and all near the start, I would not even have had Willy significantly ahead of Hall. Their performances were nearly identical. I don't have a horse in this race, other than the Bombers. Brohm improving over the last week is the only reason there is a discussion on this. 7 days ago Hall would have been the no-brainer pick for backup. Brohm did not look like he even belonged in this league. Some posters here were complaining that we used a pick to acquire him. This is why camp is more than 10 days long. Whether or not Hall or Brohm is better and should be the number 2 guy is not a factor in my opinion of what happened on that individual play. In my opinion I like going for that pass if the defence shows that coverage. In my opinion burning the other team by going deep over the middle when they blitz is the absolute best way to get another team to stop blitzing. In my opinion a good offensive lineman should have been able to get a hand on the rusher. In my opinion Peterson (?) got confused and touched nothing when facing one rusher who was never more than 4 feet away from him. If his arms are 3 feet long, and I'm guessing they are at least that, then he was unable to close 1 foot of space despite having a 1 yard head start on his backpedal. He looked very bad on that play in my opinion. In my opinion every player on the field has to play like his 11 teammates will do their jobs, and a QB should get the same grace. In my opinion if the ball goes deeper in the end zone it is a touchdown. Or another drop. In my opinion the reason it does not get there is because Hall was hit while throwing, not because of his "noodle arm". In my opinion that play is likely a touchdown if the Olineman gets a slight push on the chest of the Dlineman with just one hand. That play has me cutting Peterson, not Hall. If Brohm continues to get better with each practise, that is what would have me cutting Hall. (assuming we only have 3 QBs on our roster, which I am not in favour of)

From a human perspective I hope nothing but the best for all people everywhere. From a Bomber perspective I don't give two duckfarts about Kelly. I just want the best combination of players possible for this roster. Right now, Kelly looks like a part of that combination.

I expect financial compensation for that. Some people are saying that is a failure on recruiting…what if it's success by Kelly? Kelly gets way too much flack here (beating a dead horse), being a guy that came in midway through the season last year and looked pretty decent (in bursts, of course). I say let the chips fall where they may. He will likely be the starting WR come the first game of the season. What I like about this management team is that they are constantly looking to get better, and that is for every position. except he really didn't... he made like 3 really impressive looking catches and disappeared. He did about as much on a per game basis as Etienne did and you all couldn't wait to run Etienne out of town. Kelly making the team means the scouts failed to bring in anyone better and that is not a good thing. Not liking what he did last year should not entirely invalidate all the good things he has done this year. what a couple catches in preseason? Not like this guy is a rookie, he's a known CFL commodity and what the CFL knows about him is that he's not anything more than a roster spot filler. Well, yes. If he's catching the ball and others are dropping it, he should get the job. That's how it works. Going off of reports because that's all we have to go off of, he's had a good camp. He's played well in the games. That is his performance, so based on his performance I have him ahead of most of the receivers he's competing with for a job.

Does this list include all of the NIs currently on our camp roster, or did you make some cuts? I think I see all of the names. We're not going to land any starters, but if we can get one decent Dlineman and one decent Olineman out of other teams scrap piles, and some healthy bodies out of our injured list, our situation becomes significantly less dire. Keep in mind we were not going to be cup contenders even when Lucas and Newman were healthy. Competitive and building. Not a great slogan, but if that is what this team is in 2014, they will have achieved the goals I have for them.

Traveling back in time to when I didn't know Cotton was injured I would have predicted the following to happen for game 1. - Cotton named starter. - Ford healthy enough to play, named DI, does some return work, gets some touches at RB. OShea chooses to not release an all-star without giving him an in-game look. - Grigsby invited to join PR. - Walters actively searches for another import RB, maybe even finally signs that twitter moron who thinks he's already in the CFL hall of fame. - New guy gets chance to work way up totem, taking Grigsby's spot if he's good enough, then Ford's spot if he's good enough. How does any of that change now? Grigsby might be the starter unless Ford demonstrates he's game ready between now and the 26th, both on game day roster. New guy doesn't get chance to move up totem until Cotton is healthy, need some amount of stability at the position and familiarity with the playbook. I will admit that Ford is my second string RB because of not being on the field so far - Grigsby has been and has done nothing to impress me. Ford at least still has some decent memories left in my head from last year. No head to head comparison can be made of the two (by me) to this point.

I am reading what you're typing. I'm trying to connect the dots to where it makes us better. So you are suggesting that we have a game day roster that features only 2 running backs (Cotton/Messam) and use the DI elsewhere? Please correct this if I'm still not understanding you. I will then explain why that doesn't really make us better. expecting tburgess to justify his opinions in a way that makes sense is asking for too much. He prefers to get an idea in his head and stick with it no matter how your pick it apart. I am gathering that given asking to conceptualize a specific example of Messam on our gameday roster making us a better team got a "where's the facepalm emoticon" response, but I will continue to try. I would not be disappointed or even surprised if Messam ended up here. I have no inside knowledge of OShea's plans, but given what I've seen and heard so far, having 2 import RB's on the gameday roster fits with what I believe his plans to be. OShea has to come up with realistic game scenarios to decide who will be the best combination of 44 players to have on his gameday roster. Swapping Messam for Volny makes us better on paper only; in a real game situation Messam does not add much because he's not touching the ball much, just as Volny won't touch the ball much, if ever. Feeling good about upgrading a player for the abilities he would not be using during the game does not make this team better. I chose to ignore the part where he said they could DI Ford (using Ford in this example is tough because I know some don't care for his running style, but I want to put real names to this) behind Messam because of how ridiculous a suggestion it was, but if he really want to push the idea...sorry, I came up with 3 different scenarios that come out of this and they are all varying degrees of ridiculous. As a first string running back Messam adds tremendous value to our ratio needs. As a first string running back Messam may give us a terrible running game. In that case we're better off having a 3rd NI receiver. There's no value at all as a 3rd string running back, that's why every scenario previously suggested as realistic had him as a second string back. But it still doesn't make us better.

For realsies? That's awesome. Some people are saying that is a failure on recruiting…what if it's success by Kelly? Kelly gets way too much flack here (beating a dead horse), being a guy that came in midway through the season last year and looked pretty decent (in bursts, of course). I say let the chips fall where they may. He will likely be the starting WR come the first game of the season. What I like about this management team is that they are constantly looking to get better, and that is for every position. except he really didn't... he made like 3 really impressive looking catches and disappeared. He did about as much on a per game basis as Etienne did and you all couldn't wait to run Etienne out of town. Kelly making the team means the scouts failed to bring in anyone better and that is not a good thing. Not liking what he did last year should not entirely invalidate all the good things he has done this year.

sssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii The football gods are not rooting for the Bombers so far this year.

I called my shot months ago. 7-11 for the Bombers this year. Really a huge improvement considering they are moving into a much tougher division.

I would be inclined to agree with you about Jaymar JBR except Mike says he is a slot receiver. I don't know where the new guy lines up so I left him out of the debate.