True story: Saw a fan with a dog on a leash wearing a Winnipeg Blue Bombers hat outside Canad Inns Stadium before kickoff Friday night. The pooch was wearing a jersey, too.Speaking of dogs wearing Bombers uniforms...

Have you seen the Winnipeg offensive dozen in action lately?

What's been unfolding the first four games of the 2009 season is unacceptable. It's embarrassing. It's laughable.

Seriously, can you imagine a CFL football game where an offence records exactly one first down in a half? In 30 minutes of football?

They probably don't keep such horrifying statistics, but that could be a record in futility that stands alone.

We made a lot of fun of Jeff Reinebold and T.J. Rubley over the years. But it appears some new punchline contenders are emerging. Because last night's shockingly pathetic 19-5 loss to the offensively challenged Toronto Argonauts was a disgrace to the Bombers franchise and uniform.

Let's be clear: The Bombers' defence was up for the challenge. Again. If not for several defensive stands, this nightmare would have been in HD. Sorry, nothing short of artillery could save a defence when the offence is that putrid.

It's a testament to the Bombers' defenders that the home team still had a hope with less than three minutes left, no matter how slim.

How bad was it? Stefan LeFors finished the half (and his game) 7-of-11 for 30 yards, with one woefully thrown interception. Total net yards for the Bombers' "offence" in the opening half was 48 yards. The numbers, sadly, are almost hard to believe.

And what's up with Mike Kelly? The most troubling part of all this butchery is that Kelly was supposed to be an offensive wizard, right? Mr. Only-I-Will-Touch-the-Quarterbacks.

Because at the heart of the ineptitude is one of two things: Either LeFors isn't good enough or the game plans devised by Kelly are fatally flawed. Either way, that's bad news for Bombers fans.

After all, it's not like LeFors fell out of the sky. He was handpicked by Kelly, who spent the entire season with the quarterback in Edmonton. Kelly not only gave the Eskimos two high draft picks for LeFors, the coach jettisoned Kevin Glenn for nothing and insisted on starting the 2009 season with raw meat at pivot.

Heaven knows LeFors deserves a little patience. Every rookie quarterback does. But it was getting a little absurd, at least before Kelly mercifully yanked LeFors for backup Bryan Randall to start the second half.

(Randall was pulled for Richie Williams after a brief and unproductive 1-of-5 for six yards, with an interception. Yeah, you read that right.)

Regardless of LeFors' struggles, any failings of the Bombers fall directly on the shoulders of the head coach, who claims to be a quarterbacking guru. Because if it was any other aspect of the Bombers that was so glaringly incompetent, that would be a little easier to swallow. But the worst offence in the CFL?

Besides, Kelly promised to dumb down the offence after equally embarrassing production in a loss to Hamilton last week.

Well, we've got news: If the Bombers' offensive scheme gets any dumber, it's going to start carrying a chihuahua in a purse. If it gets any dumber, it's going to be the plot in a Rob Schneider movie. If it gets any dumber, it's going be a houseguest in Big Brother.

I'm starting to feel a little empathy for LeFors. Early in the second half, when they announced a draw for those who gave food for Winnipeg Harvest, with the winner getting an autographed LeFors jersey.

The fans booed. Loudly.

That's unfortunate, because it's Kelly who came in all boastful and cocky. Now it's up to inexperienced quarterbacks to cash the cheques written by the head coach's mouth.

When Kelly arrived, he promised to restore the Bombers' once-proud franchise to former glory.

He didn't say former gory.

Because now the Bombers are 1-3, and in four games have established a level of offensive production so gawd-awful to rival anything puked up by the aforementioned Reinebold and Rubley.

All told, three Bombers quarterbacks finished a combined 11-of-26 for 66 yards, with two interceptions.

And a grand sum of eight first downs, a few aided by Toronto penalties and one on a fake punt. All but two of those first downs, it should be painfully noted, came in the game's dying minutes, with Williams under centre.

Unacceptable. Embarrassing. Disgraceful.

This debacle (shudder) was on national television. Your Winnipeg Blue Bombers, for all to see.

Bottom line: It's one thing to rebuild. But you don't have to be a laughingstock in the process.

randy.turner@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 25, 2009 D3