5 story lines: He who moves the chains gets the ball

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/06/2015 (3752 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

1.

Coaches wish two things with respect to their quarterbacks in the preseason: a) Showcase an ability to move the ball and run the attack, no matter who is lining up in front and around them and, b) Pray to the football gods that none of them exits the game with any part of their body wrapped in an ice bag, sporting a walking boot and crutches or, heaven forbid, being hauled away on a stretcher.

And so it will be no different for Drew Willy, Brian Brohm, Robert Marve and Josh Portis against the Argos (Manitoba Bisons product Jordan Yantz will not make the trip). The offensive line will not have the big three off-season additions in Toronto — Stanley Bryant and Marc Dile have been dinged up at camp while Dominic Picard will stay home — but it’s not like the men up front are a collection of speed bumps, either. Both Devin Tyler and Jace Daniels, the left and right tackles, started games for the Bombers late last season while Chris Greaves will be at right guard, Matthias Goossen in the middle and Sukh Chungh at right guard. Most of the expected starters in the receiving corps, Clarence Denmark, Rory Kohlert, Nick Moore and Julian Feoli-Gudino, will also not be suiting up in the centre of the universe.

The expectations for Willy are simple: get in, move the chains and get out unscathed. But what happens with the rest of the men behind him on the depth chart will be an intriguing storyline. Brohm was the No. 2 man last year, but it was Marve who had fans sliding to the front of their seats every time he stepped into the huddle. And Portis has been that ‘all-the-physical-tools’ guy for so long it will be interesting to see what he can do at the controls.

2.

No unit on the Bomber roster needed an upgrade more than the offensive line and management wrote some big, fat cheques over the winter to land the likes of Bryant, Picard and Dile, while using its first-round draft pick to select Chungh second overall. The Bombers will need import reserves to back up Bryant and Dile, but it’s what happening inside the tackles where the picture gets muddied.

Picard is a lock at centre and Greaves seems to be the same at right guard, although his name did come up around the draft in trade talks. Goossen, entering his second year, has made starts at guard but seems to be the long-term answer at centre when Picard retires — although that could be several years yet. Chungh has come exactly as advertised: he’s got a nasty streak and battles his backside off on every snap. The fact that he’s been durable through camp should have a vet like Patrick Neufeld, who has been hurt again, squirming.

Depth is critical up front, especially given the club-record 71 sacks the Bombers surrendered last year. But so, too, is the bottom line and the Bombers have a ton of dough locked up in their hogs. Something may give here as camp progresses and so every snap becomes that much more important for those battling for work.

2Paris Cotton is the incumbent tailback, but it’s not like his name is written in ink atop the depth chart like a pair of mainstays at the position earlier in this millennium, Charles Roberts and Fred Reid. Cotton has been very impressive in camp, but so have the men behind him and every single one of them — Cameron Marshall, Bradley Randle, Da’Rel Scott and Carlos Anderson — will be in the lineup against the Argos.

The Bombers have had a revolving door at the running back position the last three years with three different men — Chad Simpson, Will Ford and Nic Grigsby — having led the club in rushing the past three seasons. It will be five straight years with a different rusher getting the majority of work (including Reid in 2011) and the Bombers would kill to have one of this crew come even close to the production of a Reid or Roberts.

3.

Don’t expect the Bombers to show any kind of wrinkles on offence or defence — vanilla is always the flavour of the day in the preseason — and the collection the club has brought to Toronto for Richie Hall’s first game as defensive co-ordinator will hardly resemble the crew that starts in the opener later this month.

That doesn’t mean there won’t be some juicy positional wars to monitor at Varsity Stadium tonight. The front seven includes four men along the D-line who are trying to force themselves into the discussion about regular work: ends Thaddeus Gibson (the man the club traded Alex Suber for last year, but never took the field as a Bomb er), Deantre Harlan, Kashawn Fraser and Canadian Ivan Brown, one of the club’s off-season free-agent additions.

Seven linebackers will be in Toronto, including Canadians Jesse Briggs and Garrett Waggoner, both of whom want to step up their games so the coaching staff can feel cosy starting either Sam Hurl or Graig Newman — or the pair of them — in the linebacking corps.

Three candidates for the secondary who have been impressive in camp — Shaq Richardson, Johnny Adams and Dominique Franks — are dressing and the window for them to stake a claim to a job won’t be open for long. The Bomber secondary, after all, is one of the few spots on the roster that doesn’t figure to feature much change.

4.

The Bomber receiving corps features a collection of players who give Willy the sure-handed, move-the-chains option in Denmark, Feoli-Gudino, Kohlert and Moore – three of whom combined for just eight touchdowns. What they searched for during the off-season was a speedster to replace Romby Bryant and stretch defences deep. They believe they found one in former Argo Darvin Adams – the ex-Auburn star — and may have had another fall in their lap during camp in 21-year-old Jhomo Gordon, the Bethune-Cookman University product who showed up at the play-in camp before their free-agent camp as a complete unknown and has been dropping jaws since.

The Bombers out-passed their opponent on eight occasions last year, including just three times in their last 11 games. A deep threat can force defences to stretch vertically and could open up seams underneath for Willy and his other favourite targets. The depth of the Canadian talent also gives the clubs more flexibility with the ratio, meaning in certain sets both Adams and Gordon could be on the field at the same time.

ed.tait@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPEdTait