Blue Bombers - 2024 Regular Season - Discussion Thread

[Mark H.]

18 minutes ago, Piggy 1 said:

I just wanna see Eli at center ,see how that unfolds....

Agreed. Can't say things are fine until he has more games under his belt.

[Pete Catan's Ghost]

22 minutes ago, Mark H. said:

Agreed. Can't say things are fine until he has more games under his belt.

...and despite his collegiate career, the jury is still out.

[Piggy 1]

26 minutes ago, Pete Catan's Ghost said:

...and despite his collegiate career, the jury is still out.

He's more than proven himself.....NUFD.

[Pete]

3 hours ago, greenrider55 said:

Demski’s best role is definitely being a Swiss Army knife when he doesn’t have the spotlight. Didn’t know he was commanding such a salary though.

I think it was negotiated to be lower for ly (175) then increased for this year due to cap concerns in 2023, ave salary for three years I believe is about 205k

Edited August 7 by Pete

[SpeedFlex27]

8 hours ago, rebusrankin said:

So people keep complaining about Lawler and Schoen's salaries but both have led the CFL in receiving and are at worst two of the top 10 WR in the CFL but nobody complains about Demski making $215,000 which makes him something like the 4th highest paid WR in the CFL and he's best suited to be an excellent third option, maybe a second option. I'd rather keep both over Demski.

I guess the best explanation would be that yeah, Demski's making a lot of money & is probably overpaid but at least he's playing & they're not. Lawler has missed more games than he's played the past two seasons. The first slate of games was his fault with his DUI. The second slate are because of injuries & aren't really his fault but he still isn't on the field. That's a lot of money for a guy who has played ten out of the last 27 games... Or something like that. Schoen just takes a beating every7 game when he plays. He seems to get more beat up than a lot of wideouts which makes me question his long term durability as he gets older into his 30's. Should we be concerned about his health?? 

[Pete Catan's Ghost]

42 minutes ago, Piggy 1 said:

He's more than proven himself.....NUFD.

UFD

As a starting centre

[SpeedFlex27]

6 hours ago, Fatty Liver said:

 

Eli might be a perennial 6th O-lineman, they didn't hesitate to insert Randolph ahead of him, can't see him progressing till he beats out Kola.

That's politics with our Head Coach. Kola is "his guy".  Eli is the guy on the outside looking in. 

[Mike]

7 hours ago, CrazyCanuck89 said:

You have good Canadian Olinemen in Wallace and Eli.

Legit question - have you ever actually watched Gabe Wallace play a game of football or did you just see he’s Canadian and determine that he’s amazing?

[wbbfan]

4 hours ago, Mark H. said:

To be determined. The OL is improving but they certainly had some issues, and they still do to an extent. 

Happens with young ol and ol changes. 
 

7 hours ago, Booch said:

oh forgot about Manu....

In theory we could get him this year, not real likely though. If he gets dinged up in camp down south though the chances of him being here in camp next year is extremely high. 
 The nfl churns through ol prospects fast too. Guys don’t get a lot of repeated looks or time to develop if they don’t show out early. 

[GCn20]

10 hours ago, SpeedFlex27 said:

I guess the best explanation would be that yeah, Demski's making a lot of money & is probably overpaid but at least he's playing & they're not. Lawler has missed more games than he's played the past two seasons. The first slate of games was his fault with his DUI. The second slate are because of injuries & aren't really his fault but he still isn't on the field. That's a lot of money for a guy who has played ten out of the last 27 games... Or something like that. Schoen just takes a beating every7 game when he plays. He seems to get more beat up than a lot of wideouts which makes me question his long term durability as he gets older into his 30's. Should we be concerned about his health?? 

I expect a 225k receiver, NAT or not, to be able to step into a 1 receiver spot without struggle. Maybe I am being harsh on Demski but his salary commands the ability to do so. It is elite receiver money. Lawler seems to be brittle, and Schoen just takes a pounding at an unsustainable rate. Do I worry about their long term health? Lawler's yep....Schoen nope. I would think the Bombers have to turn the page on one of them this offseason though. The emergence of Wilson kind of makes that an easy decision IF Wilson isn't NFL bound.

Edited August 7 by GCn20

[Booch]

8 minutes ago, GCn20 said:

I expect a 225k receiver, NAT or not, to be able to step into a 1 receiver spot without struggle. Maybe I am being harsh on Demski but his salary commands the ability to do so. It is elite receiver money. Lawler seems to be brittle, and Schoen just takes a pounding at an unsustainable rate. Do I worry about their long term health? Lawler's yep....Schoen nope. I would think the Bombers have to turn the page on one of them this offseason though. The emergence of Wilson kind of makes that an easy decision IF Wilson isn't NFL bound.

I think Lawler was basically just bad luck....and a few of his injuries were from insane catches....bailing out a qb on a less than perfect throw....I not too concerned it would be an every yr thing

Schoen gets the stuffing beat out of him too from less than ideal QB ball placement...and also having balls forced to him sometimes when they shouldn't...Kudos to his ability to make the grabs....but needless abuse from it

[BomberBall.]

57 minutes ago, Booch said:

I think Lawler was basically just bad luck....and a few of his injuries were from insane catches....bailing out a qb on a less than perfect throw....I not too concerned it would be an every yr thing

Schoen gets the stuffing beat out of him too from less than ideal QB ball placement...and also having balls forced to him sometimes when they shouldn't...Kudos to his ability to make the grabs....but needless abuse from it

I agree with you on Lawler having some bad luck with injuries, but this latest one was definitely avoidable.  I think he was riding some adrenaline and lowered his shoulder on the defender, right by the sidelines.  It happened right in front of me and I said to my son…. That was dumb.  Not blaming him, but it was unnecessary and proved costly.

[Brandon]

10 hours ago, Mike said:

Legit question - have you ever actually watched Gabe Wallace play a game of football or did you just see he’s Canadian and determine that he’s amazing?

I find Dancing Gabe amazing, so therefore anyone else named Gabe must be equally as good.    

 

[rebusrankin]

So Manu, longer shot to make the Lions 53 man roster  but great PR candidate, right?

[Fatty Liver]

14 minutes ago, BomberBall. said:

I agree with you on Lawler having some bad luck with injuries, but this latest one was definitely avoidable.  I think he was riding some adrenaline and lowered his shoulder on the defender, right by the sidelines.  It happened right in front of me and I said to my son…. That was dumb.  Not blaming him, but it was unnecessary and proved costly.

Circus catches are great but I'll take a well placed ball with extra YAC everytime over a crumpled receiver landing on his head and being touched down.

[Booch]

Just now, Fatty Liver said:

Circus catches are great but I'll take a well placed ball with extra YAC everytime over a crumpled receiver landing on his head and being touched down.

AND give Lawler the ball in stride...or in space he is a yac machine and very hard to bring down

[Bigblue204]

11 hours ago, SpeedFlex27 said:

I guess the best explanation would be that yeah, Demski's making a lot of money & is probably overpaid but at least he's playing & they're not. Lawler has missed more games than he's played the past two seasons. The first slate of games was his fault with his DUI. The second slate are because of injuries & aren't really his fault but he still isn't on the field. That's a lot of money for a guy who has played ten out of the last 27 games... Or something like that. Schoen just takes a beating every7 game when he plays. He seems to get more beat up than a lot of wideouts which makes me question his long term durability as he gets older into his 30's. Should we be concerned about his health?? 

Outside of hurting the team on the field. Them not playing is probably a positive in the financial sense. They don't cost the team money when they're on the 6 game.

[bearpants]

9 hours ago, wbbfan said:

In theory we could get him this year, not real likely though. If he gets dinged up in camp down south though the chances of him being here in camp next year is extremely high. 
 The nfl churns through ol prospects fast too. Guys don’t get a lot of repeated looks or time to develop if they don’t show out early. 

I think it's unlikely he ever comes here... but if he does, it won't be for a few years...

[GCn20]

1 hour ago, rebusrankin said:

So Manu, longer shot to make the Lions 53 man roster  but great PR candidate, right?

I would think so. Unless he really stinks it up most OL get some PR time.

[Pete]

1 hour ago, Bigblue204 said:

Outside of hurting the team on the field. Them not playing is probably a positive in the financial sense. They don't cost the team money when they're on the 6 game.

The money saving as previously posted is overstated. Because of the large bonuses we gAve out to save cap space bit us, so the savings is only the prorated portion of the balance. Often it costs us more when we pay a replacement player if they dont stay on the full 6 game

[bigg jay]

1 hour ago, rebusrankin said:

So Manu, longer shot to make the Lions 53 man roster  but great PR candidate, right?

Yeah, the Lions have mentioned that he's expected to be a longer term project so they seem to be willing to wait on him.  Even if they cut bait after a couple seasons, other teams will scoop him up to take a look.  

[GCn20]

23 minutes ago, Pete said:

The money saving as previously posted is overstated. Because of the large bonuses we gAve out to save cap space bit us, so the savings is only the prorated portion of the balance. Often it costs us more when we pay a replacement player if they dont stay on the full 6 game

In the case of Lawler he received 150k of 285k upfront. That leaves 135k in salary.  Assuming that he comes back after his 6 game stint the savings amount to 45k minus 6 game min CFL salary of 23.3. We have saved a total of 22k against the cap with Lawler out. In the case of Schoen he received 105k upfront, leaving 130 remaining. However, he has 35k in team service in his contract that doesn't count against the cap. Therefore, his cap hit remaining is 95k. Total savings of Schoen being out will be around 20k after replacing him with a rookie salary. So roughly 40-50k in cap room freed up by these 2 guys being out. You are absolutely right....this is not some huge salary bonanza freed up. I would barely call it a silver lining. We did free up a bunch of cap space out of the sheer number of guys out on the 6 game that are above league minimum but it is not some huge massive honey pot that will give us all kinds of extra space next year. It maybe turns into one high end player retained/signed that we otherwise couldn't. Therefore I agree with your take on this and it is why teams often hold out a player an extra week to get the full savings. There seems to be a tipping point most of the time (with the exception of QB or a position group ravaged by injury necessitating it) that if a guy misses more than 3 games they are going to miss the full 6.

Edited August 7 by GCn20

[CrazyCanuck89]

12 hours ago, Mike said:

Legit question - have you ever actually watched Gabe Wallace play a game of football or did you just see he’s Canadian and determine that he’s amazing?

I watched him play as both a Bull and a Bomber.  He's very underrated by Bombers fans.  His nastiness is needed in the run game.

I'm a real football fan, not an occasional one like some fans here.

[JCon]

[CrazyCanuck89]

10 hours ago, wbbfan said:

Happens with young ol and ol changes. 
 

In theory we could get him this year, not real likely though. If he gets dinged up in camp down south though the chances of him being here in camp next year is extremely high. 
 The nfl churns through ol prospects fast too. Guys don’t get a lot of repeated looks or time to develop if they don’t show out early. 

I doubt Detroit will give up on him this fast.  He hasn't even played a game yet.