Blue Bombers’ defence has issues

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This article was published 03/07/2018 (2682 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After giving up nearly 500 yards of offence in two of the first three games of the 2018 CFL season, Adam Bighill admitted Tuesday that although there are some issues with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers’ defence, it’s too early to pull the plug on the unit.

Asked whether the defence could be described as “leaky” — a reputation that has clung to this group for the better part of the past three seasons due to an inability to flush out costly explosion plays — the Bombers’ middle linebacker felt that type of assessment was premature.

While it might be hard to defend a defence that gave up 480 yards in a 31-17 lopsided road loss to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats Friday, Bighill said there were reasons for why Hamilton was able to put up such a formidable performance throughout the night.

“I don’t know if anyone noticed but we had two guys out of our lineup in the back end,” he said following a closed practice at Investors Group Field, noting injuries to corner Brandon Alexander and halfback Anthony Gaitor. “We had to shake things up and make some changes and Hamilton exposed that a little bit.”

Without Alexander and Gaitor in the lineup — a duo that has a combined experience of 42 CFL games — the Bombers dressed rookie defensive backs Marcus Sayles and Tyneil Cooper. Neither Sayles nor Cooper had played in a regular-season game and although both had impressed in training camp, the night proved to be a difficult one for the newcomers.

It was a particularly rough outing for Sayles, who despite having an interception on the first ball thrown his way, was picked apart for much of the game afterwards. On one crucial series in the third quarter, Sayles was faked out by Hamilton receiver Terrence Toliver to the point that Toliver was left all alone in the end zone for a touchdown.

Bighill said it can’t be understated the importance of having veterans in the lineup, even if there is a trust that whoever does play is capable of doing the job.

“As people get experience and you start calling them veterans, they have a bunch of unique intangibles that a rookie doesn’t,” he said. “Maybe the rookie is faster, maybe the rookie can catch better but maybe the rookie is going to waste three steps trying to go to a play when the veteran is going to get there in his first step.

“That’s because he knows what’s about to happen and what he’s about to see. From those standpoints, that’s why veteran leadership and that’s why veteran players become very coveted, because of their ability to sniff out plays, make plays, because they have seen these things before. You typically don’t see veterans hanging around leagues for a very long time that don’t have that ability because they’re out of the league, because they’re not able to perform.”

Still, Winnipeg, now 1-2 on the season, is not the only team that’s had to make last-minute adjustments to their roster this year, and instead are forced to plug in players with less know-how.

In Winnipeg’s 33-30 loss to Edmonton in the regular-season opener, the Eskimos were without four projected starters in the secondary and were forced to start three rookies. That night, the Bombers’ offence, led by rookie quarterback Chris Streveler, who was making his professional debut with incumbent Matt Nichols out with a knee injury, mustered just 315 total yards and a mere 178 through the air.

In contrast, quarterback Mike Reilly and the Eskimos torched Winnipeg for 487 yards — 408 coming off the arm of Reilly — against a healthy secondary. Only Maurice Leggett, out with an Achilles’ injury he suffered late last season, was unable to play for the Bombers. Kevin Fogg, Leggett’s replacement, was one of Winnipeg’s best players that game, including reeling in an interception in the end zone.

But as much as the defence will draw most of the blame for the loss against the Ticats, credit also belongs to Hamilton. Tiger-Cats quarterback Jeremiah Masoli continues to dominate the CFL. Friday was his eighth straight game where he has thrown for at least 300 yards. He needs just one more to tie the CFL record.

Masoli has blossomed this season behind a six- and seven-man protection scheme, which Hamilton uses more than any other team in the CFL.

“With the extra O-lineman there are so many ways you can try to play it. To create pressure you can add a blitz to that extra O-lineman on the end or you can drop a guy into coverage and try and rob it. The thing is they’re kind of recognizing what pocket (Masoli) is going to slide to, so the rush is kind of hard to get there in time,” said Bombers cornerback Chris Randle. “On the back end we just got to tighten up and understand certain formations, kind of get details on how we can jump on them. Once we get better at that, recognizing the formations and splits and our football IQ gets a bit higher, we’ll make more plays.”

He added: “I wouldn’t say it’s the plan. I would say we were highly prepared, we just got to execute better.”

Bombers head coach Mike O’Shea has been adamant during his tenure in Winnipeg that the talent in the locker room is always good enough to succeed no matter who finds themselves atop the depth chart.

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On Tuesday, he ruled out the theory his defence might be suffering from some growing pains early in the season.

“We truly believe in anybody that’s on our roster, they’re going to step in and play well,” said O’Shea.

“You’d like to iron out everything in training camp but the truth is you’re learning every single game as you go, right through until the end of the season. What we need to see is if we improve this week and the week after and the week after. I wouldn’t say growing pains and I wouldn’t say changes in the roster. It’s all part of football and every team goes through it.”

jeff.hamilton@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @jeffkhamilton

Jeff Hamilton
Multimedia producer

Jeff Hamilton is a sports and investigative reporter. Jeff joined the Free Press newsroom in April 2015, and has been covering the local sports scene since graduating from Carleton University’s journalism program in 2012. Read more about Jeff.

Every piece of reporting Jeff produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.