Riders help Bombers sell Grey Cup Tickets

The dreams of a push to the playoffs died Saturday night on the toxic waste dump that I call Dollarama Field in Winnipeg. The Riders showed their inexperience and demonstrated they are truly a 1-10 team with a 22-7 loss to the Bombers.

The game was decided in the first half when the Riders were unable to turn five Bomber turnovers into more than seven points. The Bombers defense under Richie Hall blitzed Brett Smith into submission, not giving him a chance to set up for most of the game.

That is what you do with a rookie quarterback and it was interesting when Smith threw a pick six to the Bombers, he went back into the game as opposed to the Ottawa game when he was benched. The Riders wanted to see how he responded and how the team responded to him and the answer came back – huh?

It would be foolish to pile on Smith and say let’s see what Kevin Price or Blake Simms can do or let’s put Kevin Glenn back in. From what I saw, if Smith isn’t able to make his first read or if he is getting pressured, then he runs. So if you throw so much pressure that not only can he not make his read, but he has no time to run, you get the recipe for a perfect defensive afternoon if you are Bomber fan.

You have to admire Smith’s moxie, but if he can’t progress to be able to make reads quickly, then his future is limited and he may have to return to the family farm. This is not an overnight process, but it is helpful to the coaching staff if he does show progress and a willingness to learn.

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That is somewhat in question considering how he responded to sitting on the bench after throwing a pick six in the first Ottawa game. Confidence in oneself is one thing, but a willingness to learn to improve is another and if Smith can’t take the coaching designed hopefully to make him a better quarterback, then maybe it is next man up.

The Riders might as well give as much playing time as possible to their younger players and find out who they want to bring back to camp next year. I would not be so bold as to trade Kevin Glenn because the Riders need a quarterback coach and from what I have seen of Glenn on the sidelines, this is definitely something he might want to transition after his playing days because he is running out of teams to play for in the CFL.

There is a lot of over the top emotion over the Riders performance, but it appears to have been a perfect storm of one coach who became a legend in his own mind and a team that was not stocked with adequate players. The Riders are paying the price for the 2013 Grey Cup by paying up salaries up front to a few players and not having enough to keep back ups around.

The Riders are also suffering from a lack of solid positional coaching. Chamblin seemed to want to surround himself with inexperienced coaches he could mold in his own image, but who don’t seem to have any idea of how to play pass defense. The rule changes in the CFL are the same in the NFL and watching a slate of NFL games yesterday, their defensive backs didn’t seem to have the problems the Riders have been.

On offense the Riders lack a back like Kory Sheets, who had quick foot speed and could dart around. The Rider running backs are big and bruisers, but once they get going in a direction, they have problems changing direction. The offensive line was at times overrun badly against Winnipeg and you have to wonder if playing young Canadians like Ron Lancaster did with Bob Poley and Roger Aldag is the way to go to go through necessary growing pains.

Unlike many other fair weather fans, I won’t stop watching the Riders this season. They are a fascinating team and if you have ever fancied yourself a fantasy football general manager, ask yourself what direction would you go with this team and what kind of team do you want to build?

The Riders 2015 season may be over, but their 2016 season is just getting underway.

So for the rest of the 2015 season, here is how things should go down this week.

BC is at Calgary and BC is coming off a puzzling loss to Ottawa. Ottawa controlled the game along the ground and basically ground BC into dust while Calgary had a whole fleet of stupid human tricks go on in losing to Edmonton in the Labour Day rematch. However, BC should be considered in a rebuilding capacity while Calgary is looking to see John Hufnagel out with a bang in his last season as head coach. BC will make it respectable, but they are lacking a spark of some kind so Calgary 27 BC 22.

Edmonton visits Hamilton in what should be the game of the week and who would have thought that Mike Reilly would look so competent in a knee brace? Edmonton is happy to get the Calgary jinx off its back, but going into Hamilton and beating Hamilton would be an entertaining spectacle. But in the end, Hamilton 26 Edmonton 23.

Then we have the Ottawa RedBlacks visiting our Riders. Way too early in the week to tell what changes the Riders would make, but seriously, does it matter at this point? If the Riders had won Sunday, This game would be sold out, but there is a subtle difference between paid attendance and scanned attendance. The paid attendance is how many tickets were sold while the scanned attendance was how many who actually showed up. The Riders may announce a crowd of 30 K but the actual fan numbers will be in the low 20K. The chance to chant Henry won`t be enough to get people out. Ottawa 28 Saskatchewan 24.

Finally we have Winnipeg go to Montreal. Montreal is coming off a bye week while Winnipeg is confident of winning the Grey Cup. That talk should end right about…Montreal 24 Winnipeg 19.