No dancing, singing, playing violins

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/08/2011 (5400 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There’s a fable in the CFL about games not meaning much until after Labour Day, but Glenn January prefers Aesop’s lesson from The Ant and the Grasshopper.

In his own eloquent terms, the Blue Bombers’ big offensive lineman out of Texas explained why tonight’s match with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats is so important to his club.

“This is a very important game. It’s a divisional game and if we win we take the season series,” said January. “We know what’s at stake even if it is early in the season. You know the story about the ant and the grasshopper? We want to be like the ant. The grasshopper can hop around all summer but we’ll be like the ant and collecting our food, or wins in this case.”

Sometimes it takes an offensive lineman to distill a week of commentary into one 30-second sound byte. January makes it all so simple — win now and let the rest of the league scurry come stretch time.

The Blue Bombers find themselves in an enviable position with their league-best 6-1 record and if they can continue adding to the win column they can position themselves for good things in November.

A nice start is, well, nice. But the Bombers want more than nice.

More as in home field advantage for a playoff game and even more perhaps, in the form of a bye to the Eastern Final and home field in a game that sends its winner to the Grey Cup.

Keep in mind the Blue Bombers still have to face the Montreal Alouettes three times this season and no one will take Winnipeg seriously in terms of being a title contender until they knock off the Als.

But using the one-step-at-a-time theory, the Bombers can go a long way toward securing a home playoff game and a ticket to the division semifinal with a win tonight.

“This is a team in our division. We’re 6-1 and they’re 4-3. If they win, they’re just two points behind us. If we win, they’re six back. So it’s definitely an important game,” said Bombers guard Brendon Labatte. “It’s a best-of-three division series and if we get the win they’ll need to have a better record than us. There’s a lot of conference positioning at stake with this one.”

The Bombers follow up Hamilton with home-and-home games against Saskatchewan then face divisional opponents Montreal and Toronto to close out the first two-thirds of the season.

“We haven’t seen Montreal yet so we need to put ourselves in a position where we are ahead of them in the standings when we meet. But first for us is to get ahead of Hamilton and be in the top two teams in the East and get a playoff spot. The rest of it will take care of itself later on.”

Labatte looks at the season in six-game segments.

“This is an important part of the season. If we can get the second third to go as well as the first did, we’ll be in a good position going down the homestretch,” said Labatte. “The next few games will tell us how we’re going to shape up as the playoffs get close.”

Veteran centre Obby Khan says wins now are deposits that can be cashed in for playoff tickets.

“It always comes down to the end in this league. But these wins count just as much,” said Khan. “This is money in the bank and sooner or later we’re going to need to spend it. It’s up to us to determine how much we have to spend.”

The ant is getting full. Now let’s see if it can fat.

gary.lawless@freepress.mb.ca