CFL Week 9: What Did We Learn?

Well, happy Monday here everyone, Monday, August seventh. Hope everyone had a great weekend, coming off a little slow moving today, coming off at Dorothy and I celebert that our seventh wedding anniversary last night, but still going strong here. Appreciate it. We have Andy Murray hopping in here, Jason under the weather today probably due to the taecast performance and you'll make that joke

here. And we have the now a new nickname here. We have the professor Andrew Murray, and now we have the director here, Evan Wilsmurre. Evan. We can probably get into that more once Andy hops off the stream later. But how are you doing? Congratulations Evan first and foremost. Yeah, man, I'm doing great. You know, it was an exciting weekend of football here. Obviously, you know, we've got plenty of things to talk about me personally and this slate of games. But yeah, man,

ultimately I was impressed. You know, maybe it was a bit of a slower week. You had some blowouts, you had some closer games, but you know, honestly, I mean, yeah, there's a lot, there's a lot to get into this week. I'm excited. Yeah, Evan announcing over the weekend. He's now the assistant director player personnel for the Vegas Nighthawks here in the IFL. Very exciting Andy hopping on here last minute this morning.

Andy, How are you doing, sir? I'm doing great. I love swooping in and just you know, stealing other people's thunder and I hope Jason gets better, you know, but I am always happy to fly in the last moment. But as far as Evan goes, congratulations sir. That is a fantastic honor, great distinction. I have no doubt you were going to absolutely rock it when you do that. I'm really excited for you, very stoked. I know we've talked a little bit about your involvement as far

as like scouting and all the work that you put in. You have impressed me from day once I met you with all the work that you put in, so I absolutely cannot wait to see what you do with them and the new role that you have. So congratulations, sir. I appreciate it. Man, That's that means a lot. Really, Yeah, it's cool.

Just you know, with we we've seen Jay here right, you know, come from the new Said family, go to you know, work with the Brahmas, here and obviously Evan like I just like so, you know, because some of like I just kind of do this for fun, right, have my own thing that I do. But it's cool to see guys that are passionate about this right and work and Evan earning this and kind of really stepping into this role. You know, we're years ago, like what are

we going to do? And you're still so young, But it's cool to see this you're working towards something. We can talk more about that. We have James here checking and Monday Mark cast let's go, and then we have Jeff here. He says. Yeah. First, I'm teen in live usually listen to Rod. I guess Rob Peterson's off today. So I said, you like to subscribe ibe you're here, Um, I have some Newsy stuff to fill. We can talk about you the Darnel sank and everything going to

the XFL. Do we want to do that at the top or at the bottom. Do you guys want to talk on that now or do you want to do the games first? Well? I think I think we have to talk about it now. Yeah, all right, So we had over the weekend Darnell Sanky Right, going back up, he said, he you're leaving the XFL going back up to the CFL. I'll pull up the tweet Evan thoughts on this that you know, you you know, covered him as part

of the renegades and everything else. Let me get the tweet up. Yeah, I mean, you know, I had followed thank you story a bit. You know, him and um cam Kelly came down too, from Hamilton to San Antonio. Not a lot of people talked about that. Sanky was definitely the big CFL acquisition. And I remember last year when people were kind of up in arms at least the CFL come he was about that, you know, Sanky leaving and go into an American league, you know, and

I don't. I haven't read I mean, look, we're gonna get into this. I kind of skimmed over that article. I didn't really read it fully. So you know, I'm interested to see his true opinion. But you know, like ultimately, I can't blame him for this. And I honestly think, you know, as much as I. You know, maybe I'm pro XFL or whatever, like you know, I think Sanky, I mean, he had a great run there in Saskatchewan, and you know, if he can go back there go to another team or whatever. I mean,

Look, he did his job in Arlington. He won the championship, Like he kind of hit the pinnacle there, I think you'd say, so now he can go back to Canada and just kind of resume his career the way things were. Plus, there's also that familiarity aspect there. He came into the XFL not knowing anything, not really knowing anybody. But now he has the opportunity to go back to a place where he has, you know,

all these established connections. You know, the fans probably have a better idea of who he is, because, let's be honest, like the average American fan isn't going to who Darnell Sanki is NFL or XFL, USFL whatever, I mean, you know, unless you're a fan of the college he went to, which I'd have to check on what that actually is. But anyway, yeah, ultimately, I think, you know, this is probably a good move for Sanky and honestly, it gets him back on the field

sooner. I mean, if he signs, you know during this season, I mean we just wrapped up what week nine, you know, he'd still have so many weeks to perform and have an opportunity to win another championship, and then you get into the story of you know, how cool would it be for him to win a championship in the United States in May, go back to Canada and then have a chance maybe win another one in November, which you and me will be there for. Read possibly, Yeah, I

just didn't like Annie. Let's hear your thoughts, because then I got a little piece. Look, I don't blame him for taking the risk to go down south and play in another league. We've seen that with several players, namely we had him, We obviously had McLeod Bethel Thompson who went south and play at the USFL. Until further notice, he's still trying to get into

the NFL. It doesn't seem like he's going back to Canada anytime soon, despite how how badly people tried to will that into existence after Ottawa's quarterback injury peril that they went through for a couple of weeks. So, you know, look all the power to say, mister Saki, I think he explored an option, it didn't really work out for him personally, and he decided to come back. I read the article in full, and let me tell you the tone of it does not match really what people make it out to

be. As far as reading the headline, I think the main point that Saky was getting at was that he personally did not find what he was looking for in the league that he played for. But if you go and look at some of the quotes in the article and some of the pieces that were

pulled out, he clearly recognizes the viability of something like an XFL. And he said it himself basically that the level of competition was pretty much almost equal in terms of yeah, this quote right here, the competition level was very

equal in that matter. And so I think for him, like it's it's an important comparison to make, of course, and if he seems like he loved his time in the CFL so much that he wanted to go back to it, and a lot of people who've said they have established themselves in the CFL do hold it in high regard, and you know, it's a league that's been around for so long. You know, the XFL is in a

lot of ways, it's still an experiment. He makes that point as well, like there's still a lot of things that they are figuring out, he said, you know, he mentioned that the travel aspect in the Hub thing was a little bit weird for him and some of the players in terms of like going back and forth between the home cities, playing in the homes and

then going back to Arlington. But you know, that's what comes with this whole thing with trying to start up the league in But overall, the tone it seems to me is that it just to me read as to each their own, like it didn't work out for him specifically for certain reasons. But he's not dogging and saying that it can't work ever, or that it's inferior in any way, shape or form. But other people want to take that context out of that article. That's all on them, because I do not

get that sense at all reading that article. Yeah, that's what That's just my piece. And you know, we've had Hodjohn and I love three down for what they do. I just wish they weren't so like, oh oh see see see he said something bad about the you know, the the XFL here we can you know he wants to come back like you know, we had the quote like you know, and he said I would argue that in terms of competitional and I think it's pretty much the same. I said,

that's a lot less sexy quote than like, well the XFL. This wasn't for me. That's fine, And I have argued on here for the last you know, year and a half. Now that we've seen this new XFL, I think it relies way too much on like, we want this to be so you know, a platform four players, as opposed to like, we want you to be able to work here for five, six, seven years and earn a paycheck. And I think that's kind of art Arnell. But you know, I did see where was the quote? And you know,

Andy, of course, you know, cores balls. He chiming in. I could have told him that before he left, And I said, why why would that be? Why would that be? He came to the South, he made you know, fifty five thousand plus dollars, worked twelve weeks, won a championship, and now he's back up and he's probably gonna be able to jump on the team and make you know, like and he

said another deep run here, like what was so bad about him? You know, even God forbid, you know, thinking about going south and playing in the exit valu. I just I don't get that this tribalism. I mean, I know, Ballsy like works for the right, you know, the Riders, so I think he's got a little bit more skin. But like three Down, I think if I think three Down is a little too

tribal for their own good. Sometimes when it comes to like well this is you know, we gotta we gotta protect this, and God forbid anyone speak ill about the CFL. So that's that's kind of my two cents on that. You guys have anything else on that before we want to get to the games. Well, I mean I decided to put some of those specific quotes in his points in his in his post there because I just wanted to sort of illuminate how Sachy was really spinning it versus how other people would spin it.

So I just wanted to make that clear as far as you know, look, I just want to make sure he's doing his homework. You know, I gotta make you make sure you read read the article. You know, as we always say, we keep hanging on about that. So I think that's a really important part to consider. And just yeah, like again,

it's they're all different leagues, they have their different mindsets. I watched the IFL championship game on Saturday. I'll be honest, I have not really watched a lot of IFL, and so for me it was it was a good experience just for me to get more acclimated to other players who potentially who who knows, might make their way to the XFL or some of these other leagues, and to sort of be more familiar with the style of the game.

I mean, we have, as our comrades, Sam Shady will tell you there's a bajillion different arena iterations out there, so it seems to me like it's important to get familiar with some of the bigger, higher end ones like IFL, which I mean it was on CBS Sports Network, it was on a decently syndicated feed there on Saturday. So for me, like I enjoy all of it, I don't really care for tribalism. I've said that

from day one. I really don't. You know. I'll make my points and i'll make I'll say what I want to about all these leagues, but I really don't care for all the pitchforks on the fire. Yeah, so let's get into this. We have, you know, kind of an interesting slate of games here. I as previously mentioned out last night. I watched the other ones over the weekend. Here Andy up in arms about this Ottawa Saskatchewan, lots of I saw lots of coaching and miss cues and everything.

Evan initial thoughts on this, and I asked them tweets I can pull up as well. Yeah, so the game last night, right, Ottawa Saskatchewan. So it's interesting because I didn't mention this one last week as a game to watch. You know, my game that I was really talking about was you know, BC in Winnipeg, which started reading. I know, we

have to get to that later. It's unfortunate, but anyway, Yeah, so the Saskatchewan Autawa game, you know, this, to me, I really thought Ottawa was gonna win this game, just given the way that Saskatchewan has been playing lately. I didn't think they had things you know, figured out, and there were some you know, questionable decision making in this game

for sure. You know, maybe we can get to that later. But you know, again, this I felt winnable for Ottawa, and now it kind of feels like, you know, there was all this hype a couple of weeks ago, you know, Dust and Crum, everybody coming in but now it's kind of fading away again, and especially in this game, I felt like, you know, if Ottawa doesn't win this one, they're kind of right back to that, you know point of I don't want to say

concern or alarm, but you know that they need to do something again, right. They got to you know, pick things up, you know, get things going, you know. But ultimately, this was a good win for Saskatchewan and it puts them I mean, Calgary one against Toronto this week, which was surprising, but for different reasons. Another game will get into But Saskatchewan with this win I think is kind of you know, really put themselves. I mean at four and four, you know, they really do

kind of control their own destiny. You know, there's not I mean, there's many ways, in my opinion, this could go. They could lose. I haven't looked at their schedule. They could lose another you know, three games in a row, or they could win another three games in a row, and then you know, then we'll have a really good idea of where they're at. I mean, because to be honest, even last week, I didn't really know where Saskatchewan was, you know, what they were

doing, where they were going to go. I had a lot of questions and some of them I think were answered this week in this win. For sure, Andy, what do you make here? I've seen a lot of you know, we're calling for the Mason fines of it at all? What did you make of Saskatchewan the win here? Late? Listen, man, this all goes on the coaches in this game. This was abominable. I'll get into the players in a second, but I need to talk about the

coaching decisions in this game for a second. This fourth quarter was maddening as a football fan who was absolutely maddening to watch. So Ottawa offensively really was not doing much this entire game, and I think people have figured out dust and crumb to a degree, and his passing numbers have been low. He

was sacked six times. Ottawa didn't get any sacks whatsoever. So their ability to protect him or his ability to just sort of throw the ball aways something he needs to develop if they're going to be able to move the ball consistently. They were pretty pedestrian on offense overall, but as far as some of the decisions that were made in the fourth quarter, Ottawa was driving down the field. They had this long the stained drive in the fourth quarter, and

it looked like they were going to take the leave. They were down down, they were down twenty three to twenty one. And they get to around the thirty yard line and it's about a second and two and they decide that they're gonna take it. They're gonna throw a deep pass to see if they get you know, a big player or a touchdown. It doesn't happen to go falls in complete. This is Tyler pig Roam, by the way, Tyler big Roam is in because they look they're gonna fake running short yardage.

Mind you, it's second and two and the CFL everyone plays a yard off the ball, so getting the third and one or second and one is almost automatic. Right, Well it's second and two. Now it's third and two. They decided to run a sneak with the pig Roam in the next play, they don't get it, so they get no points. Mind you, they could have kicked a field goal and they could have gone up. At that point, they would have been up twenty four to twenty three. So

there you already have a pretty questionable decision by coach Bob Dice. Later on Saskatchewan in their own territory, decide instead of punting the ball away to an offense that really hasn't done much all day. Look, you can argue all you want about execution and process. Some people would argue that the process was correct. I disagree. If the other offense, Patrick Mahomes, is not on the other side of the field, do you really fear that they're going

to move the ball that much? I would have taken my chance and said, let's see you move the ball again, crumb. And I think in that case, Saskatchewan I mean a horrendous air. They went forward on third one their own territory, they didn't get it. Now they've given a clear opportunity for Ottawa. Ottawa takes the ball to get all the way down to

the one yard line and they don't make it. On second and second this is when they get down to the one yard line and instead of going forward and getting a touchdown or just giving themselves giving Saskatchewan a really long field to potentially give the ball back, then you go for the field goal and it's like, okay, well you're up now, but now you've given too much

time to scatch one. And then and then on top of all of this, After all these decisions, they decide that it would be best for them to kick off to Mario Alford, who, in my opinion is basically the Devon Hester of this league. He is dangerous. Do not let him have the ball, like, do not let him have any free reign, free

kick, any sort of space to work with. And they kick it right to him and he gets it near midfield and possibly they have broken it even further, and then they kicked that long field goal and take the lead and win. I Bob Dice look afterwards, I said, he needs to apologize to the team for what he did. Well. He apologized not for the field goal decision. He apologized for kicking it to Alford on the side of the field. I think you should apologize for all of it. He made

three really horrible decisions in the fourth quarter that costs his team. I think that this was just a really bad breakdown in coaching this entire quarter, And it really was maddening to watch the football fan because I think that it did a disservice to the players in a lot of ways. So now I look overall, I like Bob Dice, but he let his team down here. He was not good in the fourth quarter. Yeah, well, it's really

the first time we've kind of seen him collapse like that. That's why I just I had this three I think, like like only week in Poop Poo the CFLs he fans his I only we only three down because like we can criticize, but otherwise it's not it's not very good. Evan, what did you make of this right down? Because I had a lot of tweet safes kind of calling for both Dickinson and Boddysis heads Hereah. Yeah, you know,

it's a weird ending. And every time I see a team, you know, get extremely confident about kicking one of those you know, field goals with like over a minute left, I'm just like, no, I think in the moment, there's certain people who forget that, like it's not that hard, like you know, if you're I mean, unless it's a field goal, like let's say, if it was you know, twenty Like I don't know if if that was a field goal, like if Saskatchewan was to

tie the game instead of win it on the field goal, I would get why Ottawa would take a field goal there, but the fact that they knew that if Saskatchewan got in the field goal range and kicked it that would win them the game. I got doesn't make any sense, you know. I mean, I get a field goals a safer option, but like they were right there, like even if you don't get the touchdown, you know, then you know you have to drive all the way down the field. And

like Andy said, that avoids the whole situation with Mario Alford. You don't even have to worry about him because it just turn it turns over on down. So yeah, I agree, it was definitely a weird ending. And I think in the moment again, people just get too confident that they think we're just gonna hick this field goal, and it's all about the defense.

The defense were gonna stop, defense, We're gonna stop. Well, it's not really about the defense getting a stop if the returner takes it halfway up the field and then you've already eliminated after the field, Like the defense can only do so much in that situation, you know, like they have nothing to do with Mario Alford because that's a special team's play. So yeah, I don't know, definitely a weird ending, and I agree. I think, you know, Bob Dyce should have taken a bit more credibility. Now.

The fact that he apologized it all really does say something, because you'll get a lot of coaches that, you know, will just keep pounding the table. No, I'm right, you're wrong, Like we thought this through. That was not thought through. In my opinion, that was just a weird, a weird way to finish a game. And to be honest, like, I mean, you know, it's great to see it, you know, a team win on a field goal, that's obviously one of the

more exciting ways to you know, finish the game. But it doesn't feel as good when you knew that the other team made a silly mistake and they could have just had to win right then and there. Yeah, I don't know if that last minute in the CFL game just last forever. I mean, if you can if you can make completions, and I mean there's the whole debate about the three downs and you know you miss one. You know

you're trying to maintain momentum going down the field. But if you can get those little completion yeah, those a little short, little out whatever route thing you can, you can go the whole length of the field, and so this debate about that. I had a quote here not to make this Michael Ball show here, but Andy, it's based find the best quarterback to in

the sea. He is so high on Mason find right now, I do feel like it's just this Saskatchewan homerism, right and I saw that right well with that, I love our Vanstone, but you know, a lot of the codey for Jardo's last year, so he you know a lot of we got to defend our quarterback here. What do you make a Mason find for and for rough riders as Harris out well, if he thinks one touchdown in four interceptions is qualifies for a QB two, then I'm really worried about the

health of the rest of the league. That's all I'm gonna say. Because I don't think Mason Finds got it. He's I would call him Mason fine, Mason, Okay, Mason whatever, because he I don't really care because he's average. We've seen it, we understand who he is right now. This is who he is. I guess say, better matchup in Ottawa, which wasn't you know, the same level of defense that he saw against BC in Toronto. He still looks fine, but again, he just wasn't spectacular.

I think this is who he is, and this is what he is. He's not the best second quarterback of the league. Okay, I'll take Dan Evans over here him many day of the week. And I know that's saying a lot. I get what we just saw this past weekend, but I would still take Dan Evans in a lot of cases. There's a lot of better quarterback twos than Mason. Fine. Sorry, mister Balza, You're

gonna have to take a hike on this one. Go find someone else Where's Dola Gala Like, I want to see more of Dola Galla two rather see more of him getting burned than Mason. Fine, because I don't think there's really much mystery left here. I think gold Gala is somebody that needs to see more of the field and have more opportunities. If a writer's look, I don't know if it's a survival game for them at this point. They they've been some crazy games this year, also that Calgary game they almost came

back in at home and then lost ultimately on the long field goal. I mean, they've they're they're kind of living on the edge here. They got to be careful because them and the Stampeders are going to be sort of knifing each other until they tell the finish line to see which one gets in. I mean, this bottom tier over the playoffs, and it's it's looking grizzly.

Man. Like I said to everyone on the chat, I think on Friday night or Thursday night, I said, look, it's argos, it's bombers and lions, and everybody else is just like basically in a giant tussle in a ditch somewhere trying to get out of it. And I think this is really there's not really much to write home for for Scatch one. They have a decent enough defense, decent enough special teams, their offense, it's it's uninspired. Evan, How did how did our boy crem Sandity do here?

You know, he said, figuring him out? You know? Is is the mystery gone? Right? They last last week as well, near the end of the game. Oh yeah, definitely. And it started last week really and I was hoping maybe this week, you know, you you you kind of swing that momentum back. But no, I think teams are starting to figure out, you know, his his game plan and you know, he's he had a he had a peak, but that peak again is

gone and I think it. I don't want to say it's gone with the rest of the team because I still have hope, I still have belief, But I do want to talk about some other players in this game, um, you know, transitioning off of you know, well, I mean we already talked about Mason Fine a bit. I agree with everything Andy said. I mean, if you think Mason Fine is the best QB two in the league, oh boy, I don't know. I mean, either you're a

really big Saskatchewan fan or you just haven't watched enough CFL football. And look, Mason Fine at this point. I think this is his third year in the league. It's nothing against him, it's just you know, I mean, he has like, yeah, this performance was better. This was definitely his best performance as the starter. But like the past couple of weeks, I mean, it was hard to watch him. And I think it was maybe last week or the week before I was saying, you know, one

of the weirdest quarterback performances I'd ever seen from a guy. And that's not necessarily a good thing, or I didn't really mean it in a good way, but I agree with everything Andy said. The two things. You know, I would take Dane Evans over him any day. And yeah, what about Jake dol Galla, because he actually looked good in a touchdown Atlantic game, So don't know what happened to that. But the one guy really want to talk about here, at least on the Saskatchewan side, is Jared Stearns.

Now, a lot of people don't know that Jared Sterns actually signed in the CFL, and he was a really big XFL target. I remember Max was singing his praises a while back during the XFL draft. But yeah, I mean Jared Sterns, you know, signed recently with Saskatchewan, like during the season, couple weeks ago, I don't remember which week it was, but signed up there. And this was the first game where I think he really saw action and you know, led the team and catches. It looks

like they kind of got a steel here. And you know, I was pushing for Sterns to be signed, you know, during the XFL season with a couple of teams, and that was probably the top receiver on my list. So good to see him up in the CFL. Definitely not where I thought i'd be watching him play, but at least he's kind of kickstarting his

pro career. He was with the Bucks for a bit, and then with the Rams last season, and then just looking on the Ottawa side, I think there was somebody here I was going to talk about m Maybe not maybe I was looking at Saskatchewan. Um well, maybe maybe I was gonna talk about Sean Bain because he had another nice game and I've really liked his progression this season. But outside of that, I think I just really wanted to

talk about Jared Stearns because everybody knows how much I love Jared Stearns. Andy, What do you make I just I don't know. I think I tied him. You know, four and four Riders. I don't know what to make of this team. It doesn't feel like they have any identity. I know Trevor Harrison really pulled for it. I just I worry here. You know, two seasons kind of back to back, missing the playoffs. What

do you make of this team overall? Well, like I said, I think their defense is commendable and they get a lot of pressure on the opposing team's quarterbacks. Like I said, they got six sacks in this game, and they really caused hell for Dustin Crumb. Their past defense was pretty good. I mean they only gave up one hundred and seventy four passing yards and overall, I mean, you give up two hundred and twenty two total on

defense is pretty good. You're doing your job. The only things that really kept him in was turnovers on offense and just this inability to really understand situational football, like again with with Dickinson deciding that he was going to go for it his own territory just was a disservices to that defense. And they still held their ground and they managed to keep Ottaway out of the end zone somehow. And they actually, and that's the biggest thing. Ottawa had three chances

inside inside the red zone. They didn't convert any of the touchdowns. So they clearly have been able to stand up tall against them form formidable situations. I mean, they did a good job against the Argos last week. Actually, I really have to say they managed to keep Chad Kelly in check and that was a really big deal for them. Again in touchdown Atlantic, it's just there at some point it just fell apart for them on the other units. But for their offense. Again, it's kind of a shame that their

receivers don't get more burned because I really like the receiving corps. It may not be like the top end in the league, but I really like some of these guys. Sean Baine has been excellent, Samuel l and mlyss has a great skill set. I just love the way that he comes out of his breaks when he catches the ball. I like Jake Wennicky. I mean he was really nice in Montreal, really good third option there. I like the receiving corps a lot. And Jamal Morrel is a solid back. He's

a solid CFL running back. But it just doesn't feel like they can really

get a lot of this to mesh. Their off of the line obviously, is still you know, it's influx because of some of the injuries and some of the early retirements that they had, Jason Labatt retiring two years ago after COVID because they hadn't played for over a year, a couple of the other guys that they had a sorry Brandonabat, excuse me, Brandonbat who their tackles who retired from the team, And so I think it's unfortunate because they just

have a lot of skill position players that I really like, but they just don't have the consistenty. They just don't have the quarterback. They haven't had the quarterback for Gerardo, we know just famously did not pan out after last year, just at some point just broke down and you couldn't really do it

anymore for Sakatchewan, I think that's where it all stems from. And again with the coaching decisions, I mean, Dickinson's had some really questionable decisions in some of these games, and especially in that BC game as well, So I don't know, I just don't trust them. But in a game US survival, I mean, they might be able to just kind of etch their

way into a playoff spot. That's really what they're trying to do. But as far as contenders go, no, they don't really have any staying power as far as making a run or having any thing that they can do in

the playoffs. But even when you talk here and we'll get off of this game because we gotta get trucking here on the couple other ones here, even when you look at this receiving corps, like you said, it's fine, it's fine, But I mean, look at look at BC's receiving corps, look at Winnipeg, look at you know, Toronto, and this is this is fine, this is a finally built team. You have Mason find as

a quarterback. I don't see anything spectacularly. Yeah, Sean Baine's really good, right and when he gets the ball, But you don't know, you don't have a quarterback that can elevate any of these receivers. We've seen you Edmonton try to elevate the quarterback with better receivers. I just don't see anything here meshing at all. I think that there's going to be a lot of

turnover here in the off season. We already saw that, you know, going into this season, and I think it's gonna go even further up and down. But I just I don't see anything exciting to f I'm a Saskatchewan fan. I don't feel excited about this win. And I don't feel excited about either beating Ottawa, like, oh, the game came down to the end again, like gets excited, you know, kind of this whole CFL

thing. I don't know. I just feel like there's not a lot of faith I would have insin Scatch one and kind of the leadership there if I'm a fan, Evan, do you have anything else on this? We'll get to the the the whether we got the tie Cats game, Evan, No, nothing else? No, all right, so let's get over to this.

I watched this CB I was out or I had weddings both Friday Saturday, so I watched this on the CBS Sports Network on demand, Aaron that demand, like record here, codey ferjar though here, uh faltering at the beginning, like Andy said, kind of having his best, believe Mitchell impression here coming back winning, really rough first half for Cody coming back Hamilton kind of following apart. I have some notes that we'll go to. Evan.

First, What did you make of Taylor Powell everything else with the tie Cats? And like I said, yeah, maybe this is why why Jason's out today. Yeah, definitely. I you know, I thought Hamilton might sneak away with a win here. I was a strong believer in Taylor Powell and James Butler had a pretty nice game, even if it was on limited carries,

you know, a big game in the receiver department. But yeah, I don't know, it was just a really you know, yeah, first half, like Hamilton looked like they had some momentum and then Montreal just like exploded in the fourth quarter and you know took the thing, you know, like right out of Hamilton's hands and that was it. You know, that was all she wrote. So I don't know. I mean again, I don't know. Hamilton is just in a you know, I don't I mean,

I know they've been in the rebuilding spot for a bit. I think that's safe to say. It doesn't help the quarterback that they brought in to be the franchise guy has only played in you know, so many games. Like even Matt Schiltz looked better than him before he got injured. Right, I'm talking about BULLIEVI Mitchell. Now you have Taylor Powell, you know, a similar situation here to like Dustin Crum, a guy who's never played before

coming in and has asked to start multiple games. Now, I don't know what the timeline is for Um, what's his name Schiltz, But you know I expected I can't say I expected a bit more from Taylor Powell because he's only played in so many games. But this was I don't know, this left definitely some things to be desired. Now look through for two hundred yards great, you know, completed twenty pass is great, Like it wasn't all

bad. But to be honest, like I might, you know, I would take Cody's performance over him in this game, despite that first half. But let me just get into some of the players here, because that's where I really shine, and I'll, you know, quit rambling on about things that I don't don't one hundred percent know about. But um so if I

look at you know, William stand Back, will stand Back whatever. Um you know, we had talked about him last week as finally kind of coming on, and I think he had eighty something yards last week or whatever, and now he had one hundred yard game. First time in forever that I can remember, he's had one hundred yard game. You know, it didn't score but average five point six, so, you know, good, good

for him. It's it's really nice to see him finally get going because I mean, you know, two years ago, this guy, in my opinion, was one of the better all around players in the CFL, not just at the running back position. But I was a big will stand Back fan and I still am, you know, nothing against him. Austin Mack. I mean, how many times have I said his name on this show before? Um continuing to shine, you know, being at the top of the

you know, receiving leaderboard. Tyler Snead, No one's really talked about him a ton, but he's kind of come on in recent weeks. Him and Courtney Davis are starting to have larger roles. I don't think Kayon Julian Grant played in this game. Um, I believe was he on the sixth game? I don't know, but I think he's out. Yeah, yeah, he's I know he's out. I read something about that, but I can't exactly remember it. Um, but yeah, and then Tyson Philpott coming back.

I think that was a big, you know addition, And I mean you talk about I'd said many times before, you know, Montreal lost so many receivers, but now it's almost like they have not not more that they can handle, but they just have so many guys that they can go to. And I don't think it's necessarily like on the same level as BC obviously, just because a lot of these guys aren't as experienced. But I mean, you know, Tyson Philipop coming back, you know, he had four

catches. And then I'm still waiting to see what happens to Greg Ellingson because that was the other guy that we had mentioned for a while. And I get he's a veteran now, so probably gonna have a limited role one way or another. But you know, I love Greg, He's a great guy and I've had an opportunity to talk to him before, so hopefully see him back up back in the lineup at some point. And then with Hamilton. Yeah, Terry Godwin another name I had mentioned previously who was a draft pick

in the NFL and twenty nineteen. Forget which team he went to. I want to say Stealers or maybe Panthers, but he was. He was with one of those teams at some point. You know. Nice to see him catching on, you know, having a larger role again, one of these guys, you know, first year in the league. It might take, you know, a couple of weeks. I mean, here we are in week nine and he's finally kind of breaking out. So good to see him

on that front. And then on defense, you know, I feel like we never talked enough defense on this show, or at least I don't. I love, you know, offense is my thing. I like talking about offensive players. But h Simony Lawrence not a name that I've brought up on the broadcast this year, but back when I covered Hamilton, I mean it was Simony Lawrence everything. You know, him and Brandon Banks. Really it was those two guys that I was talking about all the time, you know,

singing the praises whatever you want to call it. But yeah, Simony Lawrence in this game. You know, this was kind of vintage. And you know he's getting up there in age. I mean you're talking about you know, he might be in his you know, final season or a couple of seasons, whatever you want to call it. You know, and especially just given the state of the Hamilton team. Uh, you know, is he gonna want to move forward in a rebuild? Like? Who knows?

I mean that the CFL is a nowadays at least it's a short term league where everyone is kind of on a one year deal. Um, you know, some guys might be on two year deals if you're really good. But that's another conversation for another day. But yeah, it really was impressed by Simony Lawrence in this game. I'm really good to just see him out there,

you know, kind of at full force. Um, just given his age, and you know, like it's just been such a long time since I feel like I've been able to, you know, mention him in a broad cast. I guess, Andy, how do you feel here? If you're a taie Cats fan? How are we approaching this? Because they're in the bye week now right there by? And I think I saw, do you the JC Abbott had an article, yeah, that the elean they're gonna dress the elephants in the room during the bye week. What do you make

here? It's a tack Cats fan. These are gonna be some big elephants, and I don't think they're gonna like what they see. Look, I think Jason would be the first one to tell you, are Jason not that Jason there are Jason would tell you that it's not happening. This Hamilton team just doesn't have it. Unfortunately, they don't have the horses they've needed to rebuild for a while. They kept trying to push all their ships in the middle of the table. They need to blow this up. It's not happening.

Taylor Powell, He's okay, He's fine, nothing remarkable, nothing to write home about. James Butler. I mean, I like James Butler a lot. I wish they would run the ball more. I can't believe they keep trying to make fetch happen with the pass game. It's absolutely maddening that they don't try to run the ball more, especially with Tyreek McAlister. How is this guy not getting the ball at least ten times a game? He

is explosive. I saw him come out of the end zone and they kicked it deep and it was in his own end zone and he ran it out to the thirty yard line. I mean he almost had like an equivalent of a fifty yard return out of the end zone to switch up field position. I mean, he really needs to be dualized more often. Somebody's got to get this guy the ball in his hands. So for Hamilton, it's not going to happen. And it's unfortunate because they took a big swing on bow

leave by Mitchell. It didn't work. He got hurt, he didn't play well when he was on the field. Obviously, they've had Matthew Schiltzby hurt as well, which I think would have helped some of it and mitigate some of the problems. But their defense has gotten worse and worse they gave up four hundred and twenty two yards to Montreal and it's just not happening for Hamilton. I think for them, they have to take a long, hard look

at a lot of the roster and they might haven't got it. If Orlando Steinhauer is going to be able to stay around, he's gonna have to gut the entire roster, which I don't know if he will at this point. If it's going to continue like this, I don't know if he's they're gonna be walking around these hallways much longer. So for Hamilton, it's Bob Young,

I'm sure is immenseally disappointed. Obviously. He keeps putting it in resources and money into this team expecting to win and break their great cup less streak, and it's just not happening for them this year in the East. As far as Montreal goes, yeah, Fjardo started off really rough. He threw just two really bad picks in the first quarter and then he kind of got over it, but he played much better. He's not taking as many sacks

finally, they finally kind of figured that out. That was a big issue early on. He's not taking as many as those now as the season progresses, I think the biggest takeaway here from Montreal is William to stand back. He's finally looking like himself and that's great because we were not sure about him last year after his injury. He started to kind of slip away. But

he's looked fantastic for them this season. Really happy for him, and I think that's a huge key for them going forward, just to have some sort of stability and offense, because Jardo Canna be expected to do everything, but he's played well enough and probably better in a lot of ways than needed last year. But with what he has, one guy that I just absolutely still love and this Montreal team is Austin mac His run after the cash ability is

fantastic. He had a little turnaround in the first quarter and he just ran away from a bunch of the defenders. I really like him a lot. This receiving corp is really interesting. It's just kind of an amalgamation of like a bunch of random guys that all kind of get done. I mean, Tyler Sneed had that huge game against Toronto and that back and forth that they had that one game a few weeks ago, and I think they have enough

on offense to get it done. Obviously they want to, I think put more emphasis on their defense and having that be the calling card for this team. But offensively they can just I guess for me, their threshold is like, you can score twenty points. I think he got a good chance to win your game. So for Montreal, I could clearly see them being the second team in the East coming out and probably matching up with Toronto again, maybe in like the Eastern Conference finals. Again. We'll see, but I

think that's kind of what we're destined for again. This Montreal team has enough resources, whereas you know, the rest of the division just doesn't have it together. Ottawa. I really want Ottawa to start stepping it up again,

but they're going through a lot of their own issues. So Montreal I think has pushed the right buttons so far this season, and they played pretty well even in situations where they're you know, offensively not getting it done, or if they just don't seem to have enough on one side of the ball, another side of the ball kind of makes up for it. We got Tim Cavert check it in here, go als go. He's gotta be happy. You gotta be happy. You know, we're winning, winning, record here.

I had a couple of notes they had Coat had a couple of bad chanks for aulettes. He's normally pretty reliable. Milt Steagel was kind of calling for his head at the halftime, like, well, you know, if you have a figure, they can't kick. I like that. He was kind of a chippy game. I mean felt kind of you know, felt really high stakes in that regard, felt very you know, kind of divisional right, kind of felt that way. They they had Jason Moss's keys to

quarterback success. He need to be tough, smart and accurate. That is what he says. Andy, is Cody Fragardo tough? Because they said they basically said Cody Fajardo was tough, which means he's not smart nor accurate. That was a sideline reporter that was mean, what do you make of that? Is Cody Fgardo? He need a tough, smart, accurate quarterback. I mean, you know, meat loaf song is two out of three ain't bad, not one of three ain't bad. So I guess that's not really

voting well for mister Fraggardo. But I look, that guy does get beat up. I cannot believe he has not sustained more injuries in his career. That guy takes a licking every time he goes out there, whether he's thinking

of sack or not. That that man just keeps getting body blows. But yeah, maybe mister Moss wants to rephrase that that wording a little bit first quarterback, But look, I don't know what else he's gonna expect to have out of his quarterbacks besides Frigardo. Like, compared to the rest of the league, I think they're actually pretty a standing considering what we've seen this season. I think they should be thinking they're lucky stars that he's out there and

he's performing in the level that he is. So for them, I mean he's Yes, he still makes some bone headed decisions, but he overall is able to make enough plays on offense for this team to be competitive in every game that they play. I haven't seen them really be out of a game. I've seen them be a little bit inefficient, sure, but I haven't really seen them be completely out of a game. I want to see them play, you know again, play play teams up to the standard like Toronto

Winnipeg BC. They're not quite in that tier yet they're not. They're just they're below that tier, that echelon of of really really outstanding teams in the league. So they're right below that. I'm not sure what their secret ingredient would be to get to that level. I don't think they quite have the roster for it, and I don't think they have the playmaking to really match

any of those three teams. But again, like Forgardo, for what for what it's worth is going to get you a certain plateau of wins in a certain floor of performance. You may not have as much of a ceiling as you would hope, but I think as far as floor goes, it's gonna be better than guys like Mason Fine, guys like Taylor Powell, guys like probably probably Crumb. I hate to say that, but Crumbs still figuring out all this stuff. He has a lot of upside, but I think his

floor is still a little bit low. Whereas Jardo is going to be consistent enough that he's not going to get you into a lot of trouble most of the time. Obviously his first quarter was not good, but after that he settled out and figured it out. Evan anything else in this one will double time the lob. But I want to get to the Chack Kelly something on I know, and he's got to head out here soon. Anything else on

this one, Evan, Yeah, I don't think so. I want to get to this Toronto game though, because that one one I think might be

well maybe the most to talk about outside of the Saskatchewan Outawo games. Andy, do you want to give your two cents on this, because I know you gotta jump off here and then we can Evan and I can tackle this and then the BC game as far as the Toronto game goes, Yeah, yeah, Look, I just hope Chack Kelly comes back as all right like that is really unfortunate that he got hurt in this game, and obviously their offense just completely sputtered. And I have to say this, I got to

eat micro Mike Mitchell, you were right. This team knows how to play Calgary knows how to play Toronto. This staff knew Dinwittie, they knew his offensive scheme, they knew his style, and they took him to the woodshed, especially after Chad Kelly got hurt. It's real shame because I thought Toronto was going to play much better. They didn't. Calgary, I still think has a lot to figure out. But I mean this was a prime time matchup for them as far as to get right game, and they clearly took

advantage of it. So I have to give Mike Mitchell's regards. I thought Toronto was just going to straight up out talent this team and completely blow them out of the water because I just thought they had way too many resources. Clearly there's limitations to that, especially when your star quarterback gets hurt. So there you go, all right, Andy, appreciate it. Gets your meeting

that Evan and I will talk about this. Evan insane stat line here, Jake Mayer and you know the efficiency coming back here, we had the Chad Kelly's et all, what did you make it? This? This was not what I was expecting. I was at a wedding and been following this along. Was not expecting the twenty to seventh victory over with Calgary. Yeah. Well, let me put it this way. I think a lot of people are gonna say, well Calgary one, you know, because Chad Kelly got

hurt for Toronto. Personally, I think even if Chad Kelly stayed in that whole game, I think Calgary would have still had a pretty good shot. I'm not gonna say they would win out right or by this much, but I think they would have definitely been in the running and probably could have pulled away because like, I mean, yeah, Calgary knows how to play Toronto. Mike Mitchell was saying that, and it was just true. I mean, this was you know, Toronto. I mean, you want to talk

about coming back down to earth. I mean, you know, this made Calgary look I mean, I don't even think Calgary was that impressive in this game, but it made them look extremely competitive, like they could, you know, run with the top guys in the league. And personally, I still don't think that. I mean, look, I'll talk about the Calgary

side first, that we can get into Toronto. So you know, I'm looking at like Jake Mayer, I mean, yeah, at you know, completed twenty two of twenty four passes, great, but only through four one hundred and forty nine yards. Didn't have a touchdown. I mean, yeah, you didn't turn the ball over, but still pretty pedestrian. Like this kind of shows me that, you know, you were being very reserved kind of short passes. Now, this I didn't watch a ton of this game

outside of the first quarter. But I will say, you know, Dedrick Mills, we had talked about him at the top of the season a bit. You know, it was kind of one of the you know, bigger names. I mean, he was the one who really carried the offense in this game more than anybody. I mean, yeah, Like, you know, there were a couple of guys being worked in the receiving corps, like Tommy Lee Lewis obviously, who we've talked about two but like, nobody really

had an impressive game on the statute in that department. I mean, outside of Dedrick Mills, you know, like Jake Mayer didn't really have to do a lot, is what I'm really trying to get out here. And I don't know, outside of that, I really don't think there's much to say for Calgary. They just kind of, you know, got the job done. That's all. It's they didn't. It didn't take a lot for them

to pull away in this one. You know, again once the Kelly injury set in, and I mean just all out a really slow day for Toronto too. I mean outside of well, I mean, the most beautiful play in my opinion of probably the whole CFL weekend. Was that Cam Phillips touchdown? That was just I was gorgeous. I mean, yeah, I'm biased, you know, I get it. You know, I watched cam Phillips in twenty twenty whatever, But I mean, come on, how can you

not like that? I mean, that was vintage right there. I say vintage cam Phillips, even though it was only like three years ago that he was doing that stuff. But hey, I mean it feels like a long time with the way the world's been, and you know how so many different careers have branched off for certain guys. But no, I think the real I think that the big, big elephant in the room here is Chad Kelly. I mean, we can't, you know, talk about this game without

talking about what happened to him. I actually didn't get to see his injury, but you know, clearly it was enough to where they you know, kept him out of the game. And I think the more surprising part was that they put Cam Dukes in the game over Brian Scott. Now we'll get into the you know, my new endeavors later, but it's been known that Cameron Dukes used to play for the Vegas Nighthawks and that springboarded his opportunity to the CFL. You know, Cam has been very good in short yardage this

yere um, there's no doubt about that. But I was just kind of surprised to see him, Like, I just don't know if he was ready for this type of, you know, opportunity where he had to come into a game and start throwing the boat. Now. I wish things were different. I wish Cam went out there and threw for you know, one hundred yards, two touchdowns, whatever, But you know, the reality is there's

gonna be some growing pains. And I think Naylor was the one who said, you know, the one thing nobody talked about during the preseason was you know, the like who's behind Chad Kelly, it's um, you know, it was Cam Dukes and Brian Scott and then you know, the other guy that had was Reid's best friend, Ben Holmes, but that didn't work out either, so you know, yeah, no one really talked about that.

And then in this game, I think there were a lot of fans like, oh, you know, who's this, who's this Cam Dukes guy? You know, we've only you know, seen him on short yardage A couple of plays this season. Um, I was surprised that they didn't put Brian Scott and I don't know if it was just you know, maybe Dukes has done a bit more for them, maybe he's more like I don't know,

Like again, Brian is Brian's a great guy. I'll pull for him any day, and I thought this was his chance, but you know, maybe right now there's just other things they want to see and they wanted to give Cam his fair shot, and that's great, Like he really deserves it. I mean Cam is at a pretty quick, you know, rise to the

top here. And to see a guy you know from the Naia level, you know, who went through indoor football to get to the CFL and is throwing passes, I mean, you know that that's a story I really want to hear about. I don't care if you know he threw a pick or whatever, you know, only completed half of his past is like I think,

you know, his rise here is pretty impressive. And that was my positive takeaway from this game because like, if you're Toronto, I mean you're walking away from this one thinking, geez, you know, we were on top of the world. Now things are kind of you know, coming crashing down and obviously, I mean, look, Toronto's fine, They're in a fine position. This isn't saying there's seasons over anything like that, but it just, you know, I think we can use the term humbled here.

You know, they got humbled real quick, and that's just that's the way the game is this time now. For Calgary, they absolutely needed this win. I mean, if you're losing this game, regardless of whether Chad Kelly's healthy or not, I mean you're sitting to what two and six, and

by that point, you know, Saskatchewan. I mean I was saying earlier they kind of control their own destiny, but like hell, I mean, Saskatchewan would have been in a really nice spot had Calgary you know, lost this weekend, sitting there at five hundred, you know, and they got their win against Ottawa, so yeah, I mean, you know that, then it kind of becomes a numbers game. But all around, I think that's what made this game interesting. It wasn't necessarily the play for some of

it. I mean, you know, my obviously strong point is talking about players, but for this one, it was really about more about you know, standings and kind of you know, like where guys are and what this means long term, if that makes sense? No to Like you said, I had the standings here, like yeah, if you if you're going, if you're a Calgary here and you're two and six, it's terrifying, terrifying

here, you know, especially in the West and everything. A couple of things and then we'll pull the band aid off here and talking about BC. This was interesting. I had saved and like you said, you know, the stat line could be misleading because it was only for however, wait, what was it? How many yards was it? You know, for one hundred and four that yards? But Jake Mayer had the fourth highest completion hating

in CFLA history, insane, insane. Why I didn't know that? I mean, hell, I mean honestly, that by itself, I will say, like, yeah, I mean I think people are going to focus more on the yards, but completely twenty two passes, it is not easy. And if you're only throwing twenty four of them, I mean yeah, like it doesn't I don't want to say the yards don't matter, but like, I can't discredit Jake Mayer. Again, I've gone on record being a huge

Jake Mayor fans. So if anything, you know I'm going to support the guy here and root for him. And it's nice to see Nathan Roark on that list too, I will say. And I'm pretty sure I don't know if that was the game I was at where he went thirty four thirty seven, but he remember he had a pretty high completion percentage while I was there last year in Edmonton. And the last thing I'm bringing up about this game actually has to do with next week, because I'll be seeing Calgary live next

week in BC UM, so looking forward to that. And again maybe that's why I also found this game more interesting and well, I was paying more attention, kind of like a you know, what, what should I expect going into next week's gain? Yeah, this is anytime we see Nathan mark On, we still exist, Nathan, Yeah, I'm still here if you want to talk to us. Uh. The other thing, Yeah, we're looking at the schedule here when it pum what is it? Uh? Toronto? Here? If you want to have a bounce back, I think here

Ottawa at Toronto. I think that would be good. I think that's gonna be rowdy. They're going to be motivated with all that. Hopefully you have a motivated a BC team here coming into that do I guess we need to rip the band aid off? Here? Are we ready to talk about this? Blad, I'm ready. I just don't know if you are. Yeah, so this was, you know, and this is so I think this happened last year too, and I need to doing these. It was one of the game. It was the game where Nathan Wark got hurt. And

I think we did the same thing. I think we did like a pre game. I'm like, oh, this is the big like Thursday, and I like, we're getting all excited and then I get Dorothy. We go sit downstairs. And that was a game with Nathan Wark got hurt and we didn't know at the time, you know, like at the time that doesn't look very good, ended up being very poor. Let's get into this. I had tweeted, and I had many angry tweets. I'll pull up.

I needed Evan, my director of therapist here of this. I just don't I'm fine being a fan, you know, because I'm not like, I'm not the Danny Austens of the world. Danny, I'm a reporter. Like I don't cheer from my team. I cheer. I'm a fan. I just don't want to be embarrassed, and everybody big put up fifty points against BC. I finally I had my split screen and the Mariners took priority because at least we came back and won with a grand slam. Kaid Marlow in

the top of the ninth. Heer to win that one. But this was a terrible, no good, very bad game. Evan. What did you make of this one? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot to talk about, and there's also not much to talk about, depending on which side do you want to take. I mean, I remember I was out with Andy a couple days ago and he was saying, yeah, I think Winnipeg's gonna you know, you know, beat I beat maybe beat the Brakes off

BC. He definitely said they were gonna beat him, and I, yeah, I read I agreed with that statement, just because you know, I feel like, you know, BC was kind of due for one of these games. Now, maybe I don't know, like they went from you know, get they went from pitching a shutout to giving up fifty points, So maybe I wasn't expecting that part of it. But they were due for a game like this. And I say that because, you know, the reality

is I mean they've been they've been a good team. They've been a really good team. They've been holding momentum for a long time. But every team kind of has this, and you can just sense like, okay, like at some point, like you know, things are gonna give out. Look at Toronto. I mean again, as I said before, like you know, Chad Kelly, whether he gets hurt or not, maybe doesn't matter because Calgary has them, you know, figured out, probably more than maybe any

other team in the league at this point. But yeah, ultimately, you know, I'll start with the Winnipeg side, you know, the more positive side of this game, at least if you're a Winnipeg fan. Um, you know, so I was really impressed. I mean, you know, look, everyone's gonna talk about Zach Claros, you know, three hundred and sixty nine yards, three touchdowns, but we're used to that at this point.

That's like just a good Zach Claro's performance. Like I don't really think you need to discuss that much, you know further, and I mean even Drew Brown came in two of two seventy eight yards and a touchdown. I mean, yeah, Brown, I know, like I you know, Drew Brown another like you know, short yardage kind of guy, like you don't really hear about him, and I, you know, not a player I'm extremely familiar with. I think he was at Hawaii and then Oklahoma State something

like that. Um. But then, yeah, what I really want to talk about here is the run game, because as weird as it sounds, I mean they had like even Dakota Preucop had two carries for twenty one yards in this game. Like they just had. I mean, if you look like they had, you know, Britty Oliver at their top rusher average seven point four yards per carry, had two rushing touchdowns, now again only on nine carries, but still extremely efficient. And then you had two guys blow

that, Nick Demski and Dako to Prukop. Like I said, you know, both those guys averaged over ten yards of carry only two carries, but hey, like you know those are still you know, big runs in themselves. And then you know he had a couple of guys after that, nothing too much. Greg McCray maybe had you know a couple m one eleven yard

run. It looks like then you get to the receiving corps and this is where it just explodes I mean, I don't know if I had mentioned Kenny Lawler at all on this show prior to now, or maybe prior to last week. But Kenny Lawler, I mean, has immediately come in. And if you thought that this offense already wasn't explosive, I mean, Kenny Lawler

was just the icing on the cake. Not that they even needed him, but my god, I mean this guy, I you know, I honestly thought he might have lost a step and it was going to take him maybe a month to get up to speed. Clearly not clearly, the pre existing connection is still there. You know, this is where he wants to be. I mean, I just that was a phenomenal. I mean, you can't two hundred receiving yards in game on seven catches. I mean that does

not happen very often. And you know that. I don't he man, just just hats off to Kenny Laller. I won't, you know, salivate over him for too long. But um, you know, Dalton shown another one. You know, he was extremely good last year. Dalton Shone was kind of everyone talked about Nathan Roork last year, but Dalton Shone was kind of another you know, breakout star m still doing it here in year two and then you know you had a deep Rashid Bailey touchdown. Shout out to

Rashid Bailey. Man, that guy's been doing it for I don't know how long. He was a Division three guy too, and he's crafted. I mean, he's probably making like so rare to see a guy from that level, you know, have like a long pro football career. But the reality is that can happen in the CFL. I mean, Jake Serezna is another D three player up in this league and those guys are killing it. So shout out to you know, uh, Rashid Bailey. Any any D three

players up in Canada really looking at the defense? I don't know, I mean their defense. You know, they only gave up fourteen points. But I don't really think there were any players that stood out out too much. I mean, Damario Houston had an interception and he's been Damario Houston has been a very kind of steady contributor I think for that Bomber's dum But now now I'll get into the BC side of things, they're not so great the side

of things. I won't be too critical here because again, like I said, I think this game was just kind of bound to happen at one point. And again, you know, BC, the reality is like without Vernon, I mean, they're they're dealing with some issues. It's not like they're still a good team, but they're not exactly complete right now. So Dan Evans um. You know, we had talked about Dan Evans last week. I said, you know, he had a very solid performance. You know,

would definitely take him again. But then Dan Evans has these things where you say that and then the next week he goes out and you're like, Okay, well maybe maybe I need to take my word back on that. Now. Again, I still think Dane's a good quarterback. I would take him over Mason fine, but yeah, this one just you know it, it really left a lot to be desired. And you know, Dane, I think this is the reality as to why he's not starting in the CFL,

just because there's so much inconsistency. Now, again, it doesn't mean he's a bad quarterback. That's something he can easily work on. And it's hard when you're not getting game reps all the time, Like it took the Vernon injury for BC to even consider playing him because Vernon was playing so well,

and we had talked prior to the season. You know, it was like, I mean there was a time where you know, Dane Evans and Vernon like, I think that battle was closer than a lot of us may be expected, or you know how it turned out whatever, And then you had Dom Davis come in and Dom Davis won eight of eighteen for seventy six

yards. Not a whole lot better, Like, yeah, he didn't throw any interceptions, but I mean, you know, he didn't necessarily complete a lot of passes, and I just I don't know, one of those games where you just kind of feel defeated, you don't really know what to do. The receiving corps they did what they could. I'll say that it definitely wasn't a great day for them, just because I mean the quarterbacks were only

thrown for so many yards. But you know it was I mean, what are you gonna expect, right, Like, it's when when you're down, I mean, when you're giving up fifty points and then the BC defense, well, there's not a whole lot to say. Biseco la combo. What was good in this game? Despite the team giving up fifty points. He had a nice outing, but yeah, outside of that, I mean, just not a lot to talk about. I think this is a game. If you're BC, a fan, player, coach, whatever, onto the

next one. Just onto the next one. Don't even think about this because the reality is I mean, you are going to be running with Winnipeg for that spot probably in the Great Cup in the West. And I've been saying that for a while now. You know, you can't let this affect your play for the rest of the season, Like this is a game you absolutely need to move on from immediately. It's embarrassing, it sucks, whatever, move on, get on with it. It's like that's football, you know.

I mean you could say that about a lot of teams, but I'm saying this is really important here, this kind of ideology or whatever you wanna call it, because you know, again BC in Winnipeg, like those are the top two teams. I think those guys are gonna be in the Western Final and there's not much of a question about It would take a huge upset for maybe Saskatchewan, which I don't see happening unless you know, injuries depleted

a team or something. But it would take like a really big upset, you know, for it not to be BC in Winnipeg playing in that game, and the reality is BC can beat Winnipeg. They did it earlier in the season and it was almost the opposite of what we saw, where Winnipeg was on the side of like, we shouldn't forget about it, you know, we need to move on, you don't get rid of it, and then they met. Winnipeg's had a couple games like that this year, the

Ottawa one. Definitely it came to get off the slate. But yeah, you know, I think if you're a BC, I mean you just really have to you know, you go on to Calgary, you go on to you know, the rest of the slate, and you just you worry about this again when it's time not you know, why do we play so poorly? You know what do we need to do better? I don't really think, yeah, like, obviously you need to play better. Okay, you give it fifty points, But it's less about you know, them changing the

strategy. I just think it's you know, getting back to full health. You know, maybe you need to recharge again. You needed to be humbled. Just like I said about Toronto, It's it's about being humbled, you take a step back, you look at things at the bigger picture. I have no doubt BC is gonna go out next week and beat Calgary. I don't know about how much I'll say ten right now. I don't want to. I'm gonna be there at that game. So dare I say anything you

know, too extravagant? But um, yeah, no, I think that's kind of where I stand on that game as a whole. And you know a lot of people are gonna look at that and be like, geez, like what happened to BC? You know, thinks we're going so great? Well they are still great? You know, yeah, maybe I'm biased whatever, But I said that about Winnipeg when they lost to Ottawa. Okay, yeah, they had a bad game, So what Winnipeg's still gonna be a great Cup contention. It's not the end of the world. Well, I

yeah, I got a couple of things. Heis. I had to this out because back wh back when we had lost you know, that quins a collapse and I did that wassentially if they had lost it, So, you know, revisited that I because like I said that, Yeah, I'm a fan here you taught you know you talked about not um wanting to live with this too much. Hey, you know this is I'm straight up not having a good time. This is what bothered me was It's one thing if you're

VA's out day. We love Dane. There's a reason why there wasn't a hot market. And you know, we I think beat like CFL fans tend to like hype, like, oh, you know, like Dane, you know, play decently last week. Okay, like Dane's here and we have bather we you know that you could trade Dane and he could go there, you know, Ottawa or like come back. Dave Evans is still Dave Evans, we know at this point. But my problem with this was our defense

was this atrocious. I don't care if Dane you know, throws two of fifteen and get sacked and like this is Ryan Phillips defense. And these guys were just wide open running down the field when BC when they when they won the toss, opted to keep the ball at the beginning and I said, you better score right now. They didn't. Winnipeg came out where I say, write two completions through down the field scoring I'm like, oh my god, like we are in for a nightmare here and the last thing, um,

I don't want to play this. But Rick kind of addressed the room and he said, what you said, like, we need to move on, don't take to get anything away from this. And I just I don't like that mentality. I don't like that mentality in baseball where it's, oh, there's five hundred games and we law, like, I think you need to take away. And I understand that you Winnipeg was coming off to buy and they were able to game prep for a week and a half of this

BC had just played and there a short week and traveling there. But because something was wrong there. I don't know if the defense is tired, but I did not like that that kind of this hallmark, you know, trademark of the of the BC Lions here as their defense and given up that much. I just thought it was kind of disappointing. Yeah, well, I mean you're definitely not using the donut Boys nickname this week. That's definitely. Yeah. What happened to the donut Boy? Yeah? Well, quite quite

the opposite. I mean they had I mean, hey, the score on the other end finished with the zero. There was just a five in front of it this time, you know, yeah, maybe five donuts. I don't know. We're jomping anyway. We'll get out of here soon. Not good BC. Like I said, looking to remounts back with Calgary Evan had, you know, exciting news we talked at the time. Anything else you

want to share about that now before we get out of here. Your new director position, Yeah, I mean alto about it briefly, you know, just go over some things that maybe I didn't initially say in my tweeter or announcement, whatever you want to call it. Um yep, I got position assistant director of player Personnel for the Vegas Nighthawks. You know, this type of thing personnel related has been in the works for a couple months now.

I've definitely you know, I'm trying to trying to excuse me transition a bit, I think out of media, not that I'm that doesn't mean I'm giving up anything right away, you know, don't don't get too excited. I put right after I put out this tweet, I said, look, before anybody says anything, this doesn't stop MAXFL coverage, doesn't stop anything else I'm

currently doing. It might shift some things I'm gonna be putting more time into different things now and this is going to keep me extremely busy through the next year. You know, we got to start building the team pretty soon, you know ifl season starts in March. But yes, so just to clarify some things. You know, this is a remote position and I'm working in school. I'm gonna be out in Vegas at some point, but I'm not

living out there while I'm building this roster. You know, this is all done you know, through databases and just remote virtual work and things like that. I'm not going to go into too many details, but yeah, man, I mean I'm really excited. You know. Again, this was something in the works for many months, and you know, I think just I've always had a great knowledge of players. That has been my one thing that I think has separated me from certain people in this space. And you know,

having the opportunity to get players together and build a team. I mean, I think this is what a lot of people dream about. I mean, you know, if you're a kid and you're playing Mad and you're building your franchise, you know on the Madden Game. You know, I'm doing this, but it's it's in real life, and you know, I don't really care what league it is. I mean, this is just you know, I was out in Vegas at the IFL XFL combine and I won't go

too much into that either because I've already done. I've already talked about that a bit. But you know, I think you know, I was out there and you know, just kind of finalized everything. You know, I talked to a couple of teams about this sort of thing, I believe it or not, you know, I was. I was talking to some CFL

people at one point. I won't name names or teams, but you know, I was talking to some guys in the CFL and kind of maybe I really I wanted to step down a bit and you know, just kind of have a you know, position with a different league where I could you know, maybe do more because the reality is like, right now, I have the title of assistant director of player Personnel, you know, in the CFL. I probably would have just been a regular scout, which is fun,

you know, Um, but the opportunity really wasn't there anyway. So um, this is gonna be awesome. Man. I'm really looking forward to this. And you know, again, there might be some things you know that I have to you know, keep quiet about nowadays and whatever. But I mean, yeah, I mean it's time to get to work. Like I was saying earlier, you know, if I wasn't working hard before this,

um, I'm definitely gonna be working hard now. So this next year, while it's gonna be fun, you know, I'm putting my head down and we're really you know, we're really doing a proper evaluation of a lot of things. I guess, well, I guess at the top, it's exciting, and I think it's cool that you know, people and this is all these leagues cfl X, l USL, it's it's you know, guys and girls covering this. They're passionate about it. That's why we choose do it.

And it's cool to see you people that want to take a step into this and it's always kind of been your interest to be able to transition. So I think that's exciting. Obviously we're all super excited for that than anything you need to do. But that's great. Um, Like I said, you couldn't say enough how proud and everyone is and just kind of seeing you know what, it's been two three years of this you know, journey and kind of all of us on together on our group, and so we're very

excited for that. I will get out because I'm sure Evans got stuff to do as well. Go Scout players. Big week here. I think we have a you know, Elks to the slaughter hopefully, I don't. I don't see that that would be the story if the Elves. If the Elks reverse that, what would it be twenty two games losing streak on that. But it's exciting. It's an exciting week. We'll see anything else of it.

Before we got I gotta figure out what we're doing. I don't think the Elks Winnipeg deserves the pregame show this week, like the Yeah, I mean yeah, I don't know what. Yeah. I'm definitely looking forward to the Calgary BC game because I'll be there, um and I don't know, I don't know if it's the most intriguing matchup of the week. I'm definitely interested to see how BC bounces back. I think is the key thing over

everything, really the game I'm looking at. I know you had mentioned Ottawa Toronto, but honestly, I think Saskatchewan Montreal is kind of one of these underrated ones that might slip under the radar um, you know, just given you know, Saskatchewan kind of finally pulled through this week, and we'll see. I feel like either this is gonna be a really close game or one of these teams is going to pull away early. I think that's kind of my take on that, but definitely one I'll be having my eye on,

you know. Out of that slate. Pat has a funny comment here. Yeah, because we have Trey Forward now getting you know, getting to play. I think Morley Scott reported he's going to be starting trade Forward, going to go four TVSA we' got masterclass taking the victory away for the Yeah, this is the tray Forward season here hashtag you know, free tray Forward justin Duncan all of that. I really appreciate it. Evan, that should be a good week. I gues said, like and subscribe. We'll figure out

what we're doing. I got some emails to send here, but that would be it for me and mister director here. We'll check check you that time. And I hope Jason feels better than bouncer prayers Jason and with his yeah, you know, under the weather, so I'm sure he will bounce back. But you know, maybe just a poor tiecast performance. So anyway, I will see you guys next time. Th