Game Day Thread, Nov 17, 2013 Ham @ Tor, Sas @ Cal

[sj-roc]

I loved the fact the Lions had been the only team to win the GC at home during that stretch from ’77 to ’12. It was good ammunition for those of us who defend the parity and competitiveness of the league. More than anything, I think it was just a fluky streak, and now the statistical pendulum has swung back the other way. Despite being an eight-team league (soon to be nine again) the CFL has lots of little quirky streaks like that…..……like the Lions not finishing second since ’86, and the Argos and Ti-Cats not having played each other in the East Final since ’86. It blew me away to hear that last Sunday, and I follow the league fairly closely.

Even more oddly, the Lions in their entire 60 season history have finished 2nd in their division only TWICE, in 1977 (the Joe Fourqurean last minute knockdown) and 1986 as you mention. This has always kind of blown me away as highly improbable, especially when you consider that ALL OTHER currently active franchises have each had at least this many 2nd place finishes in just the last ten (i.e., 2004 through 2013) seasons:

Mtl: 2011, 2005
Tor: 2012, 2006, 2004
Ham: 2013, 2010, 2009
Wpg: 2008, 2007
Ssk: 2013, 2010, 2008, 2007
Cgy: 2012, 2009, 2006, 2005
Edm: 2011, 2004
BC: none back through 1987

In fact, since 1987 all other currently active franchises have finished 2nd at least FIVE times each.

One of these years, we'll prob finish 2nd again and then promptly embark on a record-setting streak of most years in a row finishing 2nd (not sure what the current record for this is).

[Blitz]

They are in shock in Calgary. Cornish had 4 carries in the first half for a total of one yard...nine carries on the day....terrible game planning and play calling. I think Dickenson should join Chap at the guillotine...

Even though Hamilton's offence was miserable in the East-Semi Final it looked much better against Toronto. The Riders have to be the favorites, based on their performance yesterday against Calgary and playing at home, but I think Hamilton will play the Riders tough.

[Sir Purrcival]

Definately a questionable game plan with Cornish but in the end, you can't give the ball away the way the Stamps did. You could call the purrfect game plan and still lose with those kinds of turnovers. You can't even say it was the weather since the Riders seemed perfectly capable of hanging on to the ball. Simply horrible execution, some bad luck too and in the end, the Stamps ended up shooting their own horse.

I really thought this might be Kevin Glenn's year. He had such bad luck in 2007. I sincerely believe if he had QB'd the Bombers that year, they would have won given how bad the Riders played against Dinwiddie, a raw rookie. He had enough of a team around him this year to make it work but he came up short and so did the team around him. Much was made of the missing tackles but I think the loss of McDaniel was equally devastating. He is one of those underrated guys. A good blocker, runner, receiver. He provided a lot of options for the Stamps and when he went down, I think it hurt more than anybody has really mentioned.

[swervynmerv]

It seemed to be pre-ordained that the Riders win the GC this year. Part of me likes to use the word "fixed". From day one of the season, all the talk was about the GC in Regina and the Riders being in it.

I am sure at the end of the year we will find out that the Riders are far over the salary cap and spent on all those vets to make sure they won. Combine that with "court dates" for key players that just seemed to magically go away and the non-stop missed calls and "phantom calls" during games way out of proportion to what seems to happen for other teams and it sure makes one wonder.

I am sure the Commish will be doing a two step down the streets of Regina as he does not hide his love for the Riders. Why wouldn't he, they bring money in for the CFL.

Maybe it's just me, I do like my conspiracy theories. Hamilton doesn't stand a chance, the odds are so stacked in the Riders favor. I don't know why they are even bother to show up. That why, IMHO, the Ti Cats are going to win.

[TheLionKing]

The pressure will be squarely on the shoulders of the Riders this Sunday.

[Rammer]

The pressure will be squarely on the shoulders of the Riders this Sunday.

It sure will be, they will feel even more pressure if they get out of the gate slowly. Riders OL is healthy and they will make a difference, but Hamilton will provide much more push than Calgary did from the DT. Too bad BC didn't finish off the Riders in the 4th quarter, as I think that they demolish Calgary given their injuries from the Lions game.

[Coast Mountain Lion]

It is weird to think the host team could win the Grey Cup for the 3rd year in a row given BC was only team to do it (twice) since 1977. Not a fan of the Riders but do respect them. Their core on offence Durant, Dressler and Getzlaf have been good for a long time and were probably overdue. Sheets' breakthrough year put them over the top. Will be cheering like hell for a Ti-cat victory but fully expect Geroy to be retiring with his 3rd Grey Cup ring.

Interesting decisions ahead in Calgary starting with who is their starting QB in 2014 and who do they protect in the expansion draft. Tough day for Glenn but I had little faith in Tait and his wonky elbow leading the comeback. Can the Stamps afford to make Bo Levi Mitchell their guy as they try to keep pace with veterans Durant and Lulay in the West? Their season sure looked a whole lot like ours in 2012. Clinched early then a couple of meaningless games to close it out including a no show effort here (just like BC in McMahon last year) that cost them 3 of their starters.

If I was a Stamps fan I'd be a little concerned about their quarterbacking situation. Glenn certainly isn't the future, Tate is both injury prone and a loose cannon, and I haven't seen enough from Mitchell to think he has that much potential. It could be argued fairly persuasively that their two best QBs are on the sidelines and in the front office.

[Robbie]

Missed the trophy presentation for the West FInal. Missed the trash talk by Sheets/Durant too.

I have to admit, DOES THIS TROPHY MATTER? I mean you want to win your division, of course. But, the Riders are hosting the Grey Cup and NONE OF ANYTHING matters unless they get to win next week.

I sure hope the game is officiated well. I was happy with todays crew. Obviously I thought there were some missed holds but the cliche will be retold, to me....."You can call holding on every play".

Not sure which sport where this originated in but the Riders actually left the field entirely and Randorph conscious of air time get the Commissioner ready to present when the Rider Captains took the field and no Riders touched the trophy and stood like little kids forced to be there and acted like the trophy had a disease. That to me is a complete lack of respect to the CFL that the team who wins the West Div. Final acts like that after such an important game.

Sounding like me now, right?

I guess in the case of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, they have been so hungry for 14 years as after winning the Grey Cup in 1999 they haven't had a single GC appearance so they are willing to celebrate with a division championship and a Grey Cup appearance.


Whereas the Saskatchewan Roughriders won the Grey Cup not too long ago in 2007 and had a pair of GC appearances in 2009 and 2010 that they know that winning the division is not nearly as winning the championship itself and as a result, they've decided to do a typical NHL conference trophy presentation posing and decided to copy what the Lions did in 2011. I wonder if it will set a precendence in the CFL after the Lions and of course, the NHL. I do know that this is definitely not the case with the NFL, MLB, and NBA semi-final win celebrations as the players usual still hoist with their trophy.


It also seems like there's some but not much mention over the fact that this will be a rematch of what is definitely the top 5 most exciting and memorable Grey Cups in 1989.

-----------------------------------------

I loved the fact the Lions had been the only team to win the GC at home during that stretch from ’77 to ’12. It was good ammunition for those of us who defend the parity and competitiveness of the league. More than anything, I think it was just a fluky streak, and now the statistical pendulum has swung back the other way. Despite being an eight-team league (soon to be nine again) the CFL has lots of little quirky streaks like that…..……like the Lions not finishing second since ’86, and the Argos and Ti-Cats not having played each other in the East Final since ’86. It blew me away to hear that last Sunday, and I follow the league fairly closely.

Even more oddly, the Lions in their entire 60 season history have finished 2nd in their division only TWICE, in 1977 (the Joe Fourqurean last minute knockdown) and 1986 as you mention. This has always kind of blown me away as highly improbable, especially when you consider that ALL OTHER currently active franchises have each had at least this many 2nd place finishes in just the last ten (i.e., 2004 through 2013) seasons:

Mtl: 2011, 2005
Tor: 2012, 2006, 2004
Ham: 2013, 2010, 2009
Wpg: 2008, 2007
Ssk: 2013, 2010, 2008, 2007
Cgy: 2012, 2009, 2006, 2005
Edm: 2011, 2004
BC: none back through 1987

And in both cases in 1977 and 1986, the Lions played against the Blue Bombers and had put a huge defensive stand to preserve the win only to be then demolished in the WDF in Edmonton. And for some reason the 1977 home WDSF win seems to be more memorable than the 1986 WDSF home win even though the latter was quite exciting as well as the Lions jumped to a 21-0 lead but Winnipeg shortened the lead to 21-14 and then threatened to tie the game deep in Lions territory but the Lions defence put a goal-line stand and forced a fumble recovery to preserve the win.

While there were times when the Lions choked in the regular season finale and lost the right to finish first in the west to host the WDF (specifically 1991) there were also times when when the Lions choked and lost the right to at least salvage second in the west and host the WDSF. Specifically in 2003 when the Lions lost the home finale against the Roughriders and the three way tie forced the Lions to finish fourth and play in the crossover. The same thing happened again in 2008 although not as apparent since the Lions managed to win that WDSF.

[Blitz]

Definately a questionable game plan with Cornish but in the end, you can't give the ball away the way the Stamps did. You could call the purrfect game plan and still lose with those kinds of turnovers. You can't even say it was the weather since the Riders seemed perfectly capable of hanging on to the ball. Simply horrible execution, some bad luck too and in the end, the Stamps ended up shooting their own horse.

I really thought this might be Kevin Glenn's year. He had such bad luck in 2007. I sincerely believe if he had QB'd the Bombers that year, they would have won given how bad the Riders played against Dinwiddie, a raw rookie. He had enough of a team around him this year to make it work but he came up short and so did the team around him. Much was made of the missing tackles but I think the loss of McDaniel was equally devastating. He is one of those underrated guys. A good blocker, runner, receiver. He provided a lot of options for the Stamps and when he went down, I think it hurt more than anybody has really mentioned.

I think too much was made out of the Stamps offensive scheme being so good that they could plug and play any quarterback in there and they would be successful. The reality was that their running game was so good, especially with Cornish, rather than their overall scheme was so good and that enabled their quarterbacks to be successful until this Sunday.

We did the same thing in 2007. We started Dickenson for 3 games, Buck for 4 games, and then we had our 3rd string quarterback Jarious Jackson come in and win 9 of 11 games. The reason was simple...we ran the football so well that season with Joe Smith as our tailback, that we were able to win a ton of games as we led the CFL in scoring.

When you look at how well our offence played in our last 3 games, when we had Logan and Harris running so successfully, it made such a huge difference to what we could do. Lulay had lots of time to throw in the playoff and we were able to do so much more offensively with a dynamic running attack.

Take Cornish and the run effectively out of Calgary's offence and their scheme looks very ordinary and often bland.

[BC 1988]

I wonder if the Riders got threatened with a fine if they didn't come out to to accept the WD winning trophy. What an embarrassment. Maybe they should not have a presentation. Just give it to the winning team GM quietly for their trophy case as that was embarrassing for the CFL and the Commissioner. I know that you don't want to be too high on getting to the final so that your team is just happy to be there and doesn't really focus on winning but the Riders and Durant's arrogance in the post game - what a clown. Sheets yapping late in the game with still time stopped by Geroy.

The Ticats held their trophy up in the post game when Austin said Ticats on 3 and many hands touched it. They are a mix of young and veterans and the risk is that they get too caught up being in the GC that they play flat. Not much to do in Regina other than get on down to the clubs and fight some Riders. It is silly to think that pros can get jinxed by a trophy. Grow up boys.

It would interesting if anyone has done a study on Conference/Division winners in NHL and the CFL, to see if there is any justification to the superstition of not touching the trophy. Only a few NHL winners have touched it, but I think most of the CFL winners celebrated by picking it up. It's something I haven't paid much attention to with regard to the CFL. Was that unusual in the CFL what the Riders did yesterday?

[notahomer]

It seemed to be pre-ordained that the Riders win the GC this year. Part of me likes to use the word "fixed". From day one of the season, all the talk was about the GC in Regina and the Riders being in it.

I am sure at the end of the year we will find out that the Riders are far over the salary cap and spent on all those vets to make sure they won. Combine that with "court dates" for key players that just seemed to magically go away and the non-stop missed calls and "phantom calls" during games way out of proportion to what seems to happen for other teams and it sure makes one wonder.

I am sure the Commish will be doing a two step down the streets of Regina as he does not hide his love for the Riders. Why wouldn't he, they bring money in for the CFL.

Maybe it's just me, I do like my conspiracy theories. Hamilton doesn't stand a chance, the odds are so stacked in the Riders favor. I don't know why they are even bother to show up. That why, IMHO, the Ti Cats are going to win.

You are certainly not the only one wondering (conspiracy theory-wise). Eskimo fans seemd loudest, based on what I've read. Its kinda comforting, in a way. Sometimes you wonder if a blatant hold really was that blatant. When other teams fans concur, it was probably, at least on the surface, a puzzling call.

I'll say this, I certainly DO NOT WANT any favours done for the Lions to make it back to the Grey Cup next season just because we are hosting. I doubt anybody in Regina wanted anything to happen in their favour this season. Just call this one down the middle and let the chips fall where they may (in the salsa!).....

[Sir Purrcival]

To do otherwise is to suggest that the game we all love has been fixed. I'm not prepared to go quite there but the status quo of the last 3 years does fill me with unease.

You certainly did get the feeling that the Riders were on a mission to get to the Grey Cup this season and that their whole off season program was about where to load up. No different than what Toronto did last year. I guess if teams want to win that way they will. But if the Grey Cup becomes about what players the host team can parachute in for a given season in order to make a run at the cup, then I really don't want much to do with it. And that is coming from a life long fan.

PS. It would prove an interesting conundrum if the Riders were over their salary cap. What does the league do about a team that was over the cap (aka cheating) and who take the cup. It hasn't happened yet but it will someday and then what?

[TheLionKing]

It would interesting if anyone has done a study on Conference/Division winners in NHL and the CFL, to see if there is any justification to the superstition of not touching the trophy. Only a few NHL winners have touched it, but I think most of the CFL winners celebrated by picking it up. It's something I haven't paid much attention to with regard to the CFL. Was that unusual in the CFL what the Riders did yesterday?

No correlation. It's all psychological

[Robbie]

I wonder if the Riders got threatened with a fine if they didn't come out to to accept the WD winning trophy. What an embarrassment. Maybe they should not have a presentation. Just give it to the winning team GM quietly for their trophy case as that was embarrassing for the CFL and the Commissioner. I know that you don't want to be too high on getting to the final so that your team is just happy to be there and doesn't really focus on winning but the Riders and Durant's arrogance in the post game - what a clown. Sheets yapping late in the game with still time stopped by Geroy.

The Ticats held their trophy up in the post game when Austin said Ticats on 3 and many hands touched it. They are a mix of young and veterans and the risk is that they get too caught up being in the GC that they play flat. Not much to do in Regina other than get on down to the clubs and fight some Riders. It is silly to think that pros can get jinxed by a trophy. Grow up boys.

It would interesting if anyone has done a study on Conference/Division winners in NHL and the CFL, to see if there is any justification to the superstition of not touching the trophy. Only a few NHL winners have touched it, but I think most of the CFL winners celebrated by picking it up. It's something I haven't paid much attention to with regard to the CFL. Was that unusual in the CFL what the Riders did yesterday?

There are indeed articles in the NHL about touching the conference trophy and winning the Stanley Cup. You can look up for such articles yourself online. As for the CFL, from what I recall the only time it's been done previously was in 2011 when the Lions players declined the trophy after it was accepted reluctantly by Buono. That may have set a precedence, but it was not the case last year when the Stampeders did hoist that trophy after winning the WDF. So it remains to be seen as to whether it will set a precedence. And most definitely the man in my avatar held another trophy a week later.

[Robbie]

Speaking of trophies, did you know that there's a CFL trophy that's only awarded to one of two teams?

While the Vancouver Whitecaps FC will not win the MLS Cup this year, if there's any consolation they won the Cascadia Cup which is a trophy on the best regular season record among the games played between the Whitecaps, Seattle Sounders FC, and the Portland Timbers. Introduced in 2004, Sounders and Timbers have won 3 each and with their recent win the Whitecaps now lead the series with 4 wins.


When it comes to college football, there's some trophies that only awarded to two rival teams. In Washington State, there's the Apple Cup competed by the UW Huskies and WSU Cougars. Closer to home there's the Shrum Bowl played by the UBC Thunderbirds and SFU Clan although it hasn't been played since 2010.


It's not well known at least not in Western Canada but in the CFL there's also an intraleague trophy between Toronto and Hamilton. Introduced in 1979, the Harold Ballard trophy is awarded to the Argonauts or Tiger-Cats in the regular season series and if there's a tie, point differential is the tiebreaker. I suppose if there's any trophy that shouldn't be carried, it should be this one. But I suppose Kent Austin feels that it's too important that he won the regular season series that he's proud to carry this rare, exclusive trophy that he may not have carried before.