Penalty-prone Willis walking a fine line

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This article was published 02/11/2010 (5452 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

ODELL Willis, come on down! You’re the next contestant to walk the tricky line between aggressive play and dumb play!

Of all the numbers squeezed out of the lemon that was Saturday’s 16-13 overtime loss to the Edmonton Eskimos, the Winnipeg Blue Bomber defensive end’s personal penalty totals were the toughest to digest:

Five flags for 55 yards — with three of those infractions counting as major, 15-yard blows to the defence. Willis was charged with face-masking, roughing the passer and unnecessary roughness, plus two offside penalties.

Suffice to say, the Bombers head coach had ‘Talk to Willis’ on his list of things to do Monday morning.

“He’s got to be accountable to his teammates, to everyone else. We had a long conversation today,” Paul LaPolice told reporters.

And what did Willis, who has taken 22 penalties this year, say?

“He said I wasn’t thinking right, and I’ll be better and more focused,” LaPolice added.

LaPolice hinted to the media that he sent the 26-year-old a warning — not just for the meaningless finale against the Calgary Stampeders Friday — but for the next season, as well, telling the player that if the major penalties rear their selfish head again, and with the same frequency, the team will have a hard time putting him back on the field as a regular.

“He has to get better just like everyone else,” LaPolice said.

Given that we’re pushed right up to the end of the season it’s hard to imagine the Bombers coaching staff bringing down any repercussions now — not that they would be so quick to remove Willis from the lineup anyway. This is the same team that watched receivers Adarius Bowman and Brock Ralph struggle with inconsistency before reluctantly making a move to other options only after public outrage started to build.

Defensive back Jonathan Hefney, who took four major penalties in his first game back as a starter (Oct. 11 vs. B.C.) never saw any real pine during his brief meltdown — so maybe LaPolice isn’t the type of coach to send a message with a benching. In the Edmonton loss, Willis did get pulled out for a few plays after one of his infractions, but he was reinserted when the Eskimos started to move the ball.

So it’s a fine line LaPolice walks, too.

He says he wants his players to err on the physical side when making a play, but how many times does a player make the same mistakes before people start to question the coach’s ability to hammer home things like discipline?

“We probably have more penalties than other teams because we’ve probably played younger players than other teams (have),” LaPolice offered. “When you have new players each week that (penalties) tends to happen. They have to go through that process to understand that. That’s been part of our issue.

“If they continue to make mistakes, we’ll have to evaluate and make change.”

Willis has 24 tackles, 11 sacks and four forced fumbles this season. He was unavailable to the media Monday.

Winnipeg has been penalized 185 times (trailing B.C. and Montreal, both with 189) for 1,654 yards (second most, behind the Alouettes). In 2009, the Bombers were flagged 184 times for 1,672 yards.

adam.wazny@freepress.mb.ca