2016 The Year of Willy

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This article was published 07/06/2016 (3405 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Willypeg.

Remember that?

Heady days.

It was early in the 2014 season and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and their brand-new starting quarterback Drew Willy had rolled out to an electrifying 5-1 start.

There was everything to like and nothing not to like about the new QB. Long-suffering black and blue… and gold fans were giddy with the promise of it all.

Had there been an actual key to the city, it surely would have been presented it to the man wearing No. 5. But forgetting where we left our keys, we renamed this humble and hopeful prairie burgh Willypeg and began making preparations for a party at Portage and Main on the final Sunday of the November to come.

And then the wheels came off.

A team that won five of its first six games with Willy at the helm lost 10 of the remaining 12 and missed the playoffs.

And it missed them again in 2015, going 5-13 in a season in which Willy got as far as August before a season-ending knee injury.

You still see the occasional reference to Willypeg around town: a man and woman watching practice at Investors Group Field the other day were wearing matching gold Bombers jerseys embroidered with Willy’s No. 5 and “Willypeg” on the name bar.

But mostly, it seems yet another cruel joke played on a fan base that should have known better than to have thought one man was ever going to be the solution to the litany of deep, long-standing problems tormenting the organization.

It was more than a little unfair to Willy to put the team’s fortunes, the club’s future and the fans’ frustration-fuelled fantasies on his back, especially when he spent so much of his first two seasons lying on it thanks to a porous offensive line and lousy offensive scheme.

But here’s the thing — this isn’t just Willy’s team anymore. The front office did what looks from this vantage point to be a masterful job in the off-season, assembling a set of offensive weapons for Willy the likes of which would be the envy of almost any starting quarterback in the CFL.

Willy’s got two new big-play receivers in Weston Dressler and Ryan Smith, a proven non-import running back in Andrew Harris and a shiny new offensive scheme tailored to his strengths courtesy of incoming co-ordinator Paul LaPolice.

Combine those ingredients in a cocktail shaker and pour into a glass with “no excuses” printed on it. If Willy can’t move the ball with this arsenal, then there will be serious questions posed when the clock runs out on the season.

General manager Kyle Walters and head coach Mike O’Shea have held up their ends in what was an extraordinary off-season, giving Willy the tools to succeed in 2016.

It is now up to him to prove that he can do so and that all the promise of those heady days in the summer of 2014 really was a sign of great things to come.

I asked Willy during a news conference Tuesday if he felt he had anything to prove this season — to his team, to fans and to himself.

His answer took the form of a half-dozen clichés about how he feels he has something to prove every season, followed by how he’s just “looking forward to going out there and giving it everything I have.”

Really? There’s nothing special about this season after what’s gone on in these parts for the last two years?

Willy bristled when I gave him a second chance to answer the same question.

“I will give you the same answer I just gave you,” he said. “I don’t get the question.”

The question is simple and it’s the same one a lot of fans have heading into Wednesday’s pre-season opener against the Montreal Alouettes at IGF: can a starting quarterback who has started and finished just seven of his team’s last 25 games regain the form and durability that once prompted this city to rename itself in his honour?

Willy didn’t get the question, but his head coach certainly did. O’Shea heads into 2016 with no contract extension and his future hanging on Willy’s performance.

So he knew exactly what I meant when I asked him if Willy has something to prove this year.

“He hasn’t played in as many games as we all would have liked,” O’Shea said. “But the ones he’s played in, he’s played very well…

“He doesn’t have anything to prove to me.”

Maybe. But for all the changes — on offence, on defence and on special teams — this team made after last year’s disappointment, it’s almost a certainty that as Willy goes, so too will the Bombers.

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It is a rare CFL team that doesn’t live and die with it’s starting quarterback and it says here this campaign will define both Willy and this franchise, potentially for years to come.

The QB didn’t care for my question and didn’t have much of an answer, but that’s OK. The only place his answer really matters is on the field, anyway.

But make no mistake: the same question will be put to him again and again on the field — and this time, there will be no avoiding a meaningful answer.

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek