CFL 2009 Thread

[Valmy]

we should put a CFL team in Buffalo

Last time you put a CFL team in the US they won the Grey Cup...do you really want to experience that humiliation again?

[Barrister]

we should put a CFL team in Buffalo

Last time you put a CFL team in the US they won the Grey Cup...do you really want to experience that humiliation again?

It wasn't humiliation - I was quite proud of the Baltimore Stallions.

[Valmy]

It wasn't humiliation - I was quite proud of the Baltimore Stallions.

Well alot of people down here were upset when the Blue Jays won the World Series.  What is wrong with you guys?  Where is the Haterade?

[saskganesh]

It wasn't humiliation - I was quite proud of the Baltimore Stallions.

Well alot of people down here were upset when the Blue Jays won the World Series.  What is wrong with you guys?  Where is the Haterade?

we save the hate on for hockey. see Coyotes, Phoenix.

speaking of which, the bankruptcy auction is apparently tomorrow.

[crazy canuck]

It wasn't humiliation - I was quite proud of the Baltimore Stallions.

Well alot of people down here were upset when the Blue Jays won the World Series.  What is wrong with you guys?  Where is the Haterade?

We have gotten used to American teams winning the Stanley Cup so you shouldnt expect any serious emotion over an American team winning the Grey Cup.

[Valmy]

We have gotten used to American teams winning the Stanley Cup so you shouldnt expect any serious emotion over an American team winning the Grey Cup.

Good point.  Canadians have no pride left to shame. 

[Grey Fox]

Go Stallions!

[Neil]

Here's a good reason why PCs are better than Macs:  If your CFL team is getting it's ass whipped so badly that you want to kill yourself, the Mac's patented magnetic release cord won't bear your weight, making it unsuitable to use as a noose.

I bet BB wishes that he had a PC around the hosue right now.

[Barrister]

Here's a good reason why PCs are better than Macs:  If your CFL team is getting it's ass whipped so badly that you want to kill yourself, the Mac's patented magnetic release cord won't bear your weight, making it unsuitable to use as a noose.

I bet BB wishes that he had a PC around the hosue right now.

If I would have killed myself because of a poor Bomber performance it would have been done a long time ago.

[Neil]

Here's a good reason why PCs are better than Macs:  If your CFL team is getting it's ass whipped so badly that you want to kill yourself, the Mac's patented magnetic release cord won't bear your weight, making it unsuitable to use as a noose.

I bet BB wishes that he had a PC around the hosue right now.

If I would have killed myself because of a poor Bomber performance it would have been done a long time ago.

I suppose that's true.  These days, there's no team in the CFL that's money every year, the way Edmonton was for so long.

[crazy canuck]

Too bad the BC defence broke down for that one play against Montreal.

Would have made the race in the West more interesting if BC had come back to .500.

[saskganesh]

Bishop has all the tools, but he just cannot put them together enough to be a good quarterback. I bet he's out of football after this year.

[Barrister]

Here's a good reason why PCs are better than Macs:  If your CFL team is getting it's ass whipped so badly that you want to kill yourself, the Mac's patented magnetic release cord won't bear your weight, making it unsuitable to use as a noose.

I bet BB wishes that he had a PC around the hosue right now.

If I would have killed myself because of a poor Bomber performance it would have been done a long time ago.

I suppose that's true.  These days, there's no team in the CFL that's money every year, the way Edmonton was for so long.

Alouettes.

[Neil]

Here's a good reason why PCs are better than Macs:  If your CFL team is getting it's ass whipped so badly that you want to kill yourself, the Mac's patented magnetic release cord won't bear your weight, making it unsuitable to use as a noose.

I bet BB wishes that he had a PC around the hosue right now.

If I would have killed myself because of a poor Bomber performance it would have been done a long time ago.

I suppose that's true.  These days, there's no team in the CFL that's money every year, the way Edmonton was for so long.

Alouettes.

Hard to say.  They tend to have their stats padded by having three terrible teams in their division.  I suppose they're usually roughly as good as the better teams in the West.

[Barrister]

Leprechaun's luck goes south
Kinda hard not to feel sorry for sorry ex-coach Kelly
By: Randy Turner

Former Bomber coach Mike Kelly's booking photo from Thursday morning.
Gotta say, I've never seen the ex-head coach of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in a police mug shot before.
But I'd have given anything to know what exactly was going through Mike Kelly's mind as he posed for the photo, with sort of a Mona Lisa smile.
Regardless, it was an ending that was unthinkable, no matter how much the endless string of controversy and confrontation that preceded Kelly's ultimate demise.
Of all the emotions that Kelly evoked during his brief tenure with the Bombers, pity wasn't one of them. So why did I find myself feeling sorry for him on Thursday, when the team's board of governors cut Kelly loose, only to find out about his arrest following a domestic dispute at his home near Philadelphia?
It's not because Kelly deserved a better fate. What happened to him was inevitable, now or later.
It's just that, no matter what your opinion of his brief body of work with the Bombers, only a cold-hearted hater would find any solace in the sorry ending to Kelly's final chapter.
Because if it's not glaringly apparent by now, he wasn't even close to being qualified to run a professional football organization, with all the diplomacy, experience and political savvy that job entails. Not to mention a basic understanding of how CFL offences work in the 21st century. This was the Peter Principle on steroids.
But even if you were leery of Kelly's skimpy resumé upon arriving in Winnipeg, no one could have envisioned his own personal dream come true would devolve into such an ugly mess.
After all, Kelly was on top of the world last December, and for good reason. Here was a guy who a few years before was canned by a small U.S. college, only to be given the reins to one of the CFL's more storied franchises. Countless of Kelly's peers would have brained their own mother for the job. And Kelly, with his previous links to the Bombers, seemed more in love with the position than most.
Yet one tumultuous year later, he's unceremoniously axed and he's holding an ID slate for the Bridgeport, Pa., police department. With what appears for all the world to be a smirk on his mug shot.
Pride goeth before a fall.
On Friday, Kelly told Global Winnipeg he was embarrassed, confessing that the charges had left him "completely and totally numb." He apologized to Bombers fans, saying they "deserved better." Fair enough. But like most of Kelly's misadventures, it was too little, too late.
So how did a dream become such a nightmare? In many ways, it's not Kelly's fault. He didn't hold a gun to anyone's head to get the job. That burden rests on former president and CEO Lyle Bauer, whose distinguished tenure on Maroons Road -- all he did was save the franchise, period -- ended with his resignation Thursday and will forever carry the caveat: Yeah, but he's also the guy who hired Mike Kelly.
Despite Bauer's stubborn defence of Kelly until the end, even the big man must have been privately flabbergasted by how his blind faith in Kelly became so betrayed. Seriously, you give a man such a gift and this is how you get repaid? Even as Bauer gracefully exited the stage, his years of dedicated service were morphed by the Kelly bombshell.
And what of Kelly's future? People often say that you know a football player is done when he's released and no one else calls. Kelly is toxic. After waiting his entire life to get the Bombers job, he'll be hard pressed to find another one in the CFL, regardless of the outcome of the charges against him. (Hey, let's see if Bauer, who is rumoured to be headed to the executive suite of the Calgary Stampeders, finds a place for Kelly in Cowtown. Yeah, right.)
How sad.
In the end, I'll remember Mike Kelly as Jeff Reinebold with a temper. Because you always have to note that, apart from a few well-publicized blow-ups, Kelly could be as endearing as Reinebold. Just never as lovable.
But then Reinebold was also a bit of a tragic figure when the end came for him, too. The job beat him up and left him for broke on a dirt road. You came to realize that it wasn't necessarily his fault that he was overmatched. Reinebold was a classic case of a great salesman and self-promoter who lacked almost every other tool for the job he was given.
Yet the lasting memory of Reinebold was the flip-flops, his Peter Pan persona, his innate ability to fill a reporter's notepad -- and above all, the adoration that for the most part remained among tortured Bombers fans who stuck by him despite some gawdawful football.
With Kelly, I'll remember a polarizing force of a man with a penchant for self-destruction. I'll remember how joyful Kelly was the day he was hired. And I'll remember the image of his mug shot taken the very day he was fired just one year later.
And I'll always wonder: Why in the world is this man smiling?