Bauer, Kelly don’t have much breathing room

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 31/07/2009 (5918 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s easy to overestimate the ramifications of one football game; for a team, for a player, even for a franchise.

But it’s safe to suggest that the future of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers — both short- and long-term — will largely hinge on what unfolds beginning Saturday at Rogers Centre in Toronto.

Look around. Players are losing their jobs. The starting quarterback has been benched. Others are getting called out by the head coach. Grumblings out of the locker-room are getting louder.

Meanwhile, the most pivotal player on the field for the Bombers, Michael Bishop, wasn’t even a Bomber six days ago.

Godspeed, young man.

So this is a team on the brink. They need a ray of hope and they need it yesterday. Momentum is a stranger wearing another uniform.

And football, unlike almost any other sport, can be a game of wild fluctuation. Just as winning feeds confidence, losing can create a toxic atmosphere of unease, frustration and instability.

Even a two-game losing streak means at least 14 days of gloom, negative press and coaches yelling at players behind closed doors. Sometimes, it’s not even a matter of talent, it’s an environment that seems to overcome even usually productive players. Losing is a virus that has its own tortured momentum where bad luck begets a dropped pass here or a fumble there.

But why is it more important than any other season that the Bombers shake the ugly off their (offensive) cleats? Because there’s a lot more at stake here than just a couple wins or losses — and it goes right to the top of the organization.

After all, it was president and CEO Lyle Bauer who cleared the decks for his old buddy Mike Kelly, who cleared the decks for Stefan LeFors. They have far too much of their reputations invested in this current team — based on their own calculated decisions — for it all to go sour.

The Bombers need to get their season on the rails if only because the alternative will be painful and messy. Both Bauer and Kelly rolled the dice on the team’s future with unproven potential and, as they say in Vegas, “Daddy needs a new pair of shoes.”

Yet here the Bombers are in July, at 1-3, with an unrepentant schedule after Toronto — Calgary, Montreal, B.C. and two doses of the Saskatchewan Roughriders. See any free passes there, considering the state of the home team?

Of course, let’s remember that the 2008 Bombers started off a horrendous 2-8, but still managed to recover to crawl into a home playoff date. So it can be done.

Even then, however, the after-effects of the brutal start probably triggered Bauer’s decision to clean house in the first place.

So Bauer can’t afford to have the hand-picked successor for Doug Berry go down the same rocky path. Because if it doesn’t turn around at a not-far-off critical juncture, what can the Bombers do? Fire Kelly while they’re either still paying Berry or having bought him out? That would be awkward, if not impossible.

Hence the desperate need to avoid a worst-case scenario.

The Bombers have to win because they bet the farm. Coming up snake eyes would be like telling the wife not to worry about losing the cows because there’s no barn anymore, either.

It would set the franchise back yet again to start over from scratch. And that could include the president and CEO who set the wheels in motion to arrive at this fateful point.

So back to Toronto on Saturday. No, the Bombers don’t absolutely, positively, undoubtedly have to win. But they need in the next few weeks to find their collective bearings against some formidable opponents.

If it was adversity the local 12 were looking for, they’ve found it waiting in the back alley after midnight.

Yes, it’s just a game. There will be one the week after, too.

But careers and reputations are at stake, both on and off the field. Just so you know.

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And don’t tell me either Bauer or Kelly aren’t fully aware of what’s been waged. Just the fact that Bishop will start is a staggering reversal that shows just how far they’re willing to go. Already.

Because it’s not just about saving the season anymore.

All bets are down. Hands off the table.

Time to roll the dice again.

randy.turner@freepress.mb.ca

Randy Turner
Reporter

Randy Turner spent much of his journalistic career on the road. A lot of roads. Dirt roads, snow-packed roads, U.S. interstates and foreign highways. In other words, he got a lot of kilometres on the odometer, if you know what we mean.

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