FIRST AND GOAL

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 10/11/2010 (5683 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Five storylines that jumped out while observing the last week of the CFL regular season and gearing up for playoff action this weekend:

 

1 It was a long time ago now — say roundabout 1994-95 — when the hysteria over the CFL’s expansion to the United States had nationalists in this country screaming about how the shine had come off a grand ol’ product and a great ol’ league.

Larry Smith was CFL commissioner then and he was widely criticized for a desperate attempt to grow the business south of the 49th parallel. Remember the Sacramento Gold Miners? Las Vegas Posse? Shreveport Pirates? Memphis Mad Dogs? Baltimore Stallions et al?

The Winnipeg Blue Bombers were the lone dissenting voice when the American-expansion idea was first broached and as franchises popped up and folded up all over the U.S., then-GM Cal Murphy bemoaned that teams shouldn’t be treated as if they were ‘Pizza Hut’ franchises. Nothing against that fine eating establishment, but you get his drift.

Now, it was upon one of the commish’s visits to Winnipeg back then when the newspaper yours truly worked for at the time crafted one of my favourite all-time headlines — it read in giant type:

Smith, you dork!

Interesting, then, to see how Smith will be viewed historically now that he announced this week he is stepping down as president of the Montreal Alouettes and essentially ending a long relationship with the CFL. There are more observers today who insist that while American expansion was an abject failure — and it most certainly was — Smith did what he thought was right to save a league that was floundering badly and that decision, indirectly at least, helped build the ‘This is our league’ brand that continues to grow today.

And there’s no question what the man has done to help transform the Alouettes into a CFL powerhouse in a Canadiens-crazed marketplace.

Debate among yourselves, but we now think that’s a decent legacy.

 

2 Some numbers to consider while the Bombers cross their fingers and pray Buck Pierce and Steven Jyles get healthy…

Ricky Ray, who may or may not be back to quarterback the Edmonton Eskimos in 2011, finished 2010 with 3,565 yards passing — his lowest total in the seven years. As well, he threw for only 11 TDs and was intercepted 16 times and his QB-efficiency rating was 82.1, second-lowest among CFL starters next to Toronto’s Cleo Lemon (78.1).

That said, he is only 31.

The question for Bomber Nation is this: should the Bombers be interested in Ray if he becomes available (Edmonton has the option to pick up his contract for 2011) or even inquire about a possible trade?

 

3 Not sure who B.C. Lions QB Travis Lulay reminds us of exactly — maybe it’s Dave Dickenson, maybe it’s Buck Pierce, could be Matt Dunigan or all of the above — but there’s something about his game that grows on a guy.

And as the Lions head into the playoffs on a three-game win streak, it looks more and more like GM and head coach Wally Buono made the right call by dumping Casey Printers in favour of the red-headed product of Montana State. All Lulay did on the weekend was complete 30 passes and throw for 424 yards in helping guide the Leos into the post-season.

“The thing that’s exciting about him is that he’s young, he grows, he learns, he doesn’t get overwhelmed — and he’s human like the rest of us,” Buono told The Vancouver Sun. “He’s confident but yet not conceited. Confident, yet he doesn’t annoy you. I yelled at him last week, and he’s okay. He understands the emotion, and doesn’t let that overcome him. Whereas I think some players, when you blow up at them, they tank. He doesn’t get too fazed by it.”

 

4 Very cool shout-out to University of Manitoba product Izzy Idonije by Chris Berman on Monday Night Football this week, singling out this province’s best professional footballer for his work in the Bears win over Buffalo in Toronto on Sunday. Good work by the broadcasters during the game, too, for saluting some of the great Canadians who have played down south and great quarterbacks who went down to the NFL. Normally we don’t give a rat’s patootie about that stuff, but this time it clicked.

 

5 And, finally, TSN revealed this week that its audiences were up 35 per cent from last year to a record high. Interestingly, the top six games in terms of viewership featured teams in western Canada:

— Edmonton at Saskatchewan on Nov. 6 – 1.35 million;

— Winnipeg at Saskatchewan on Sept. 5 (Labour Day Classic) – 1.34 million;

— Calgary at Saskatchewan on Sept. 17 – 1.22 million;

— B.C. at Winnipeg on Oct. 11 (Thanksgiving Day Game) – 1.19 million;

— Saskatchewan at B.C. on July 10 – 1.15 million;

— Edmonton at Calgary on Sept. 6 (Labour Day Classic) – 1.13 million.

That screams out a couple of things: 1. The CFL product is as robust as ever from here on the prairies to the west coast; 2. There is still a lot of heavy lifting to do in southern Ontario. And, like it or not for fans in CFL hotbeds, that is a critical region for the league.