TrueBlue4ever

Working at home today and had the replay of the game on in the background. Watched that last drive again, truly unbelievable how it played out. BC had 95 seconds to move 96 yards, if you run an effective 3 minute drill you can move one yard per second as a rough guideline. Lions moved 40 yards up to the last play, used 32 seconds of play clock to move those 40 yards, and wasted 63 seconds of running clock time in the huddle on 5 plays. Just completely thrown off by the noise, twice burning off the full 20 second clock to get the play off. Utter confusion. Also props to Ritchie Hall for rushing 4 all game, then dialling up the 7 man blitz to start the last drive and get the Darby sack. Total change of pace call that befuddled BC the rest of the way on that last drive.

Personally, would have loved to have seen the Bomber home blue and gold up against the Argo road whites with powder blue numbers and pants with navy socks and helmet. Best possible uniform face-off in the league IMO. But as Crash Davis said, you never mess with a streak. Now the question is, gold pants or blue, and solo helmet stripe or the double blue and white helmet stripe?

If you go to the Grey Cup Festival website, they have advice on parking. There will be a ton of free shuttles running from every Regina hotel and also the mall and the U of Regina every half hour, but there is limited parking on site. Everything this year is happening right around the stadium so if you are by there all the events are in walking distance.

Ouellette may be the bigger threat with his speed on those swing passes.

Off the top of my head, in terms of importance to the team - Ken Ploen, Leo Lewis, Jack Jacobs, Bud Grant simply because had he not played here he likely would have not coached here later (lots of you younger guys forget to look past 2001), arguably Milt Stegall for his impact if not the Cup wins. If you are merely looking at the climb to the Grey Cup this recent go-round, Matt Nichols was huge in resurrecting the team from the ashes, Willie Jefferson and Adam Bighill led the defence which is really what the team won on the back of, Zach Collaros is just as if not more important, even Justin Medlock given how many close games we won on kicking points. I’ll even consider a Speedflex argument about Don Jonas in terms of “importance”. And I haven’t even touched on the core of those 1980’s Grey Cup teams. Or the overlooked importance of o-linemen like Chris Walby and Stanley Bryant.

The case is very easy…….to dismiss.

Not even close.

Rod Hill blocked a ton of punts without running into the kicker. O’Shea said the team practices it as well taking a line that will not end up going into the punter. Just take a better angle to avoid the punter. Rule makes sense, we are in the age where protecting players is becoming more important given what we now know about long term effects of certain injuries. I have no problem with the rule.

It will be a story only because Harris will make it one. Bombers won’t care, nor should they. But if he is asked I am confident he will still talk about being surprised/disappointed/hurt about not being re-signed and using it as fuel to prove to the doubters/haters that he still is the guy. And the media will play it up because controversy sells copy, even manufactured controversy.

The spike to the groin was hilarious enough, then the shove to knock him down was the supposed cherry on top. But when the flag came out and it was Bell that got the taunting penalty after all that - well, you have the greatest self-own play in football history.

Tickets and Moose Jaw hotel booked in May. Also got tickets to the Touchdown Manitoba social already. Going to be a party!

Here’s a stat: Bombers are the 12th team to win 15 games or more in a regular season. The prior 11 are 8-3 in the division final, and have made the last 8 straight trips to the Grey Cup.

Me waking up and knowing game day is finally here:

They shouldn’t dismiss the runoff in Georgia. With Manchin as a Republican swing vote often and Dem in name only, they could use the extra seat.

In Your Eyes by Peter Gabriel I’m thinking:

Toronto social media getting in on the fun the day before the game:

Just because they are called edibles does not mean you should take them for a bedtime snack.

Good for Toronto that they sold out their original 19,000 seat allotment and are expanding capacity bit by bit by opening up sections. And they’ve arranged a pre-game hip-hop concert and sweater giveaway for the first 10,000 through the gates. Baby steps, but at least they are trying.

The notoriously inaccurate Ticketmaster is showing just over 2,500 seats left for the game. And in the East, the club opened up the east side upper deck, and Ticketmaster showing less than 400 seats available to purchase stadium-wide at BMO.

Ed Tait yesterday on the radio at 7pm said they sold just over 30,000 tickets so far.

If Sportsnet does for the CFL what they did for the NHL broadcasts, hard pass from me. Although they way overpaid for the rights, their production and panels IMO are awful. And the last thing I want is resident malcontent Arash Madani becoming the Sportsnet face of “let me tell you why the CFL is irrelevant, bring on the XFL” every time he opens his mouth when he covers the league.

3 things not mentioned that are important to consider: 1. Ratings are down in part compared to last year because Saskatchewan was not playing. Rider and Bomber games always draw the most eyeballs 2. The ratings do not account for streaming of games, which negatively affects the numbers. Actual total viewership will be higher than what the ratings reflect. And most importantly: 3. The CFL western final had better ratings than every other single sporting event on that day - including all the NFL games, and Maple Leafs game, and a Raptors game. League of course has issues, but adding some context puts those numbers in a much more positive light.

Fetter man’s win over Oz in Pennsylvania and flipping a seat gives the Dems some cushion in the Senate. But if Walker squeaks out a win over Warnock, that advantage is gone.

Didn’t think I would be able to say this at any point this season - Jets are 1st in the Central!