Stamps do everything better

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 01/11/2014 (3992 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CALGARY — Winnipeg Blue Bombers quarterback Drew Willy continued to insist Friday his 6-11 team could use a win in a meaningless game today over the league-leading Calgary Stampeders to “build momentum” heading into 2015.

“Obviously, we’re playing against a good football team and we’re doing everything we can to get a win,” Willy told reporters. “The ultimate goal is for us to get some momentum going into next season. And beating a good team could definitely help that.”

Let’s leave aside whether there is any merit to the argument a win over Calgary in Winnipeg’s final game of 2014 could somehow be sustained into next season — a full eight months from now — as anything even remotely resembling momentum.

Let’s instead discuss this proposition: If the Bombers genuinely want to spend their day trying to get better for next year, they’d be better off to forfeit the game and instead spend three hours this afternoon studying the Calgary Stampeders organization.

It is instructive — and indicative of just how far apart these two organizations are — that today’s game is meaningless to both teams for opposite reasons.

It’s meaningless to the Bombers because they squandered a 5-1 start by losing 10 of their last 11 games — including the last eight in a row — to miss the playoffs for the third year in a row and fifth time in the last six seasons.

And the Stampeders? Well, they have nothing to play for today because they are so far and away the class of the CFL this season they clinched the West Division title a full two weeks ago — with a win over the Bombers at Investors Group Field.

Home and cooled at 14-2 heading into today, the Stampeders could equal the club’s franchise record of 15 wins in a season with a victory. And they could tie the all-time CFL record of 16 wins in a regular season if they manage to win out.

It’s the second straight West Division title for the Stamps — and fourth in the seven years since head coach and GM John Hufnagel took over. It’s also the 12th West Division title for Calgary since 1990.

If that year rings a bell, it’s because it just happens to also be the year the Bombers won their last Grey Cup. Calgary’s performance since then is far and away the most consistent and most dominating by a West Division team. (B.C. is second in West Division titles during that period with seven).

So it is not preposterous to suggest the Bombers would be much better served today studying how the Stamps organization operates off the field then getting spanked by them on it.

Because the latter scenario is, let’s face it, the most likely result today. Winnipeg hasn’t won in Calgary since 2002, and given the chasm between the teams, even the most die-hard Bombers fan would have a hard time making the case today will be the day the Bombers snap that losing streak.

Stranger things have happened. But not often.

When the question was put to Bombers head coach Mike O’Shea, he had to admit, albeit somewhat reluctantly, his organization would be wise to study what the Stampeders do.

“I don’t think the Bombers should be like (Calgary), but there are pieces of the puzzle that we can look at from other organizations…” he said.

“Calgary has a great record. And they’ve played consistently good football throughout the season.”

Actually, Calgary has played consistently good football for decades. They’ve been the same decades through which the Bombers have struggled to snap what has become a franchise-record Grey Cup drought. That just underscores how much Winnipeg could learn from this organization, on the field and off of it.

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek