Relax fans, it's just one loss

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Coach Mike Kelly at the Bombers' practice Tuesday. Fans' calls for his ouster are definitely premature, after just one tight, last-second loss on the road. (MIKE.APORIUS@FREEPRESS.MB.CA )

My, this is awkward.

Defending Mike Kelly? Well, not exactly.

But it's already apparent, after exactly one regular-season game, that the Winnipeg Blue Bombers' head coach has the unique ability to attract haters who believe his firing is long overdue. They believe Kelly has ruined the Bombers, brought in a quarterback who throws like a girl and has been solely responsible for the Derick Armstrong melodrama.

Now, how a head coach has managed to take even an iota of heat for a player who, in an unfathomable display of peevishness, quit on his teammates in the heat of battle is beyond me. But that just gives you an indication of Kelly's penchant -- and he's often his own worst enemy in such cases -- to muck up even a straightforward case of a one-man mutiny.

Look, I can understand the grumbling. Kelly hasn't done himself any favours since taking over from the Doug Berry regime and setting out to gut an 8-10 team that -- how soon we forget -- started the 2008 season with a spectacularly incompetent 1-6 record.

In fact, Kelly, if anything, has been a study in how not to manage expectations. His "confidence" demanded quick results, which is a recipe for disaster when you're building essentially from scratch, with a new coaching staff and rookie starting QB. So whatever bed Kelly is lying in, he made it.

But one game? On the road? Where the visiting team lost by two points on a missed 47-yard field goal that was preceded by a procedure penalty?

Yet the message boards were rife with dissension. The phones at the Free Press sports department are akin to a suicide hotline for the distraught and disillusioned.

Then there's the call-in shows. Here's a snippet from the Coach's Show on CJOB Monday night.

"Hello, Ron, you're on the air..."

Ron: "Lyle Bauer, if you're listening, Mike Kelly has to go."

We repeat: After one game.

Hey, listen, I don't have a problem dumping on Kelly. Already have, in particular when it comes to a serial lack of humility for someone who still hasn't won a single CFL game. (Come to think of it, if I recall correctly, the names "Reinebold" and "Kelly" appeared in this space together a few months back, when the weekly public apologies were just getting started.) But at the same time, the guy deserves a chance to succeed or fail on his own terms.

Did anybody really believe that the Bombers could break every accepted tenet of sports -- dozens of new faces, unproven quarterbacks, entirely new offensive and defensive schemes, a rebuilt offensive line lacking familiarity -- and win immediately? That's not wishful thinking, that's wishful hoping.

Because it probably won't get much better soon. Up next are the defending Grey Cup champion Calgary Stampeders, who although looking rather mundane in an opening loss to Montreal, will be favoured against the home team. Good luck with that.

Of course, if the Bombers prevail, one wonders if the leash on Kelly will get any longer, or would it just mean the pitchforks will be put away for another week? Probably the latter, judging by the polar reactions Kelly has generated among the faithful.

Which is why this is so awkward. Because Kelly was just asking to be humbled. He deserved to come down a notch or two. I mean, I've got snide paper-napkin comments just waiting for ink.

You want to act like Don Matthews or Cal Murphy? Win a fistful of Grey Cups and a few hundred games first. Then you can crow, be obstinate with the media and snarky to fans looking for your melon on a platter.

But the reverse is also true. If Kelly and his master plan can't be definitively proven "the answer" yet, they can't be proven hopeless causes, either. Same goes for Stefan LeFors, who apparently started for a major NCAA program, was taken in the fourth round of the NFL draft, and was signed by the Edmonton Eskimos -- all without the ability, according to detractors, to lob a football 10 yards downfield.

After one game? Really?

Have no fear, however. There'll be plenty of time to bash Mr. Kelly. After all, the next soap opera is probably just around the corner. And he's gone, like, 24 hours without having to apologize for something.

Mike Kelly will go someday. Every one of them does. So let's be fair in the meantime.

Bottom line: We're not certain that the sky isn't falling, either. But let's see a few more rain clouds hit the ground first before anybody has to go anywhere.

randy.turner@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 8, 2009 C1