Blue lack identity, but so does every other CFL team

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This article was published 03/08/2015 (3959 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s OK to not really know who you are yet, when everybody else in the room is unsure of themselves, too.

The universal measurement of pro football is one is only as good as his last game. If this is standard for evaluation, it means with the way the Blue and Gold performed last week, they are now a top-tier CFL team. It also means, however, if you applied the same burden of proof to the previous week, you would have buried your face in the palms of your hands.

A third of the way through the season you are supposed to have an outright understanding of the identity of your team. The strengths and weaknesses are supposed to be clear and concise and something you can come to rely on, on a week-to-week basis. Six games in, we can say with the utmost certainty this team has a productive and dynamic offence, except for those times when it doesn’t. We can also add with a degree of confidence the defence has been fallible and vulnerable this season, except, of course, for those recent instances when they’ve been a strength. Confused yet? Good, you should be.

So while it’s fair to suggest this team is still coming into its own, and doesn’t really know who it is going to be on a regular basis yet, the good news is in this league, they happen to be in very good company.

In the West at the one-third mark, the Edmonton Eskimos lead the way and have been the most consistent at 4-1, but they were blown out by the Toronto Argonauts when the season kicked off, and are without their franchise quarterback. The defending champion Calgary Stampeders are 4-2, but they’ve already been knocked to the mat by the worst team in the East (Montreal Alouettes) and second-year expansion team (Ottawa Redblacks). In fourth place in the West, with their much-heralded QB back at the controls, the B.C. Lions have only shown an ability to beat Saskatchewan, and while the green Riders have been an unmitigated disaster thus far, that is rarely relevant come Labour Day.

In the East, Toronto sits atop the standings at 3-1 and — barring Monday night’s results — have lost only to Calgary, but have a quarterback controversy awaiting them, as future Hall of Famer Ricky Ray sits and stews and waits to see if this is still his team. Ottawa has already won more games than it did in all of 2014, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats were supposedly the best .500 ball club in the country as they hosted Toronto Monday night, and Montreal sits last in the conference, but have beaten two of the reportedly best three teams in the CFL. All of a sudden the murky waters of inconsistency that surround this 2015 edition of Blue and Gold are a much warmer and comfortable place to find yourself in.

While there is near consensus the first third of the schedule was the hardest part for this team, and an even wins/losses record is something to hang its hat on at this mark, the problem with so much unpredictability in the league right now, is, well, the next third of the schedule is no longer predictable. Going to Hamilton, games at home against Toronto and Calgary, back-to-back trap games against Saskatchewan and a trip to Montreal, is no longer a breath of fresh air and time to kick back after an up and down first third of the season.

By the halfway point of the schedule, or surely by the end of this next six-game stretch, we will know exactly what kind of chance this team has to not only participate in November, but whether they can make a few splashes. After all, Winnipeg looked really good throttling B.C. last week, and that isn’t likely to change for at least another five days.

Doug Brown, once a hard-hitting defensive lineman and frequently a hard-hitting columnist, appears Tuesdays in the Free Press.

Twitter: @DougBrown97