A Winnipeg Blue Bombers History Thread

Back in the days before big TV revenues helped pay for a team’s roster, Guys who could play more than one position well must’ve been gold.

Two way players are pretty much gone now. I think the exception would be punters or place kickers. They’re still allowed to be backups or starters in some other position (I think). Or maybe the players union changed all that.

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Dieter Brock Autograph Stash

I'd posted these 4 years ago, but they were lost from this site when my choice of picture host sites (Tinypic) went belly-up a couple of years ago.

All signed at the Princess Auto 2018-08-21 autograph session in Transcona.


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I have 4 or 5 of those cards, (I haven’t looked through my many boxes for years) none of which are autographed. You have a fantastic collection.

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A 13min hi-light reel of all 37 of Zach Collaros' TD passes during his 2022 MOP season.

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Pretty cool for a Bomber fan. I was impressed by the number of TD passes he threw when scrambling and on the run. No one throws better on the run than Zach.

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The Fog Bowl 1962

Deluxe, Fully-Authored, 3DVD Archival Set.

Made by fans, for fans. For historical reference & personal enjoyment purposes only.

DVD1


DVD2

DVD3

Links expire 2022-12-24.

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Here is some "bomb shell" history

To this
:eyes:

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i don’t understand what his gf has to do with it? nypost is such a rag lol.

2021 Upper Deck CFL 1/1 Printing Plates

Complaints & grievances : Somehow Upper Deck lost the yellow Zach Collaros printing plate before they could give it away in the epack redemption. Either that or it wasn't produced in the first place.

To add insult to injury, it doesn't look like they produced printing plates of card #200 in the set, the Andrew Harris / Adam Bighill checklist card.

I find all of this disappointing. There should've been another 5 Bombers plates.












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The All-Time Blue Bomber Greats 75th Anniversary Pin Collection (2005)
Click to enlarge & Read





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The 10 Greatest Blue Bomber Players of All-Time
Feel free to play along at home.
After all, opinions are no different than derriere’s — everybody’s got one.
The only rule I stuck with is NO active players. Their stories are not yet complete.
Andrew Harris is retired. If you think he’s one of the top 10, by all means, put him on your list. He almost made mine.

10 Tom Casey RB/DB 1950-1955

09 Frank Rigney OT 1958-1967

08 Herb Gray DE 1956-1965

07 Dieter Brock QB 1974-1983

06 Jack Jacobs QB 1950-1954

05 Chris Walby OT 1981-1996

04 Milt Stegall WR/SB 1995-2008

03 Fritz Hanson RB 1935-1941

1b Leo Lewis RB 1955-1966

1a Kenny Ploen QB 1957-1967

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As a 71 year Tiger-Cat fan , I certainly appreciate the Bomber tradition of excellence . :heartbeat: :+1:t2:

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Might disagree with the order but the 10 or 11 listed are the best Big Blues of all-time, NQA.

If there was room for a 7a or somesuch I’d slide Old Bud Grant into the equation. Guy was an NFL all-star, CFL all-star and then the coaching record. Yep, that coaching record.

Other Bomber honorable mentions = Gerry James (Kid Dynamite), Ernie Pitts, Dick “Tricky Dicky” Thornton, Andrew Harris, Rod Hill, Mini-Mack Heroin, Joe Pop, Sherwyn “Thumper” Thorson, Eddy Kotowich.

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My latest vintage Bombers pick-up.
1953 Grey Cup action shot.
Click to enlarge.

Tiger-Cats #88 Lou Kusserow hauls in a pass in front of Bombers #87 Len Meltzer.

A (clipped) review provided by the seller :

An original, vintage game action photo from the 1953 Grey Cup. From the estate collection of Jim Vipond, the former sports editor of the Globe and Mail newspaper.

Photo is 8 by 10 inches, white bordered and on glossy stock. It is nice shape.

The 41st Grey Cup game was the Canadian Football Championship in 1953. Hamilton Tiger-Cats defeated Winnipeg Blue Bombers 12–6 at Toronto’s Varsity Stadium in a game which ended on a controversial pass incompletion.

Hamilton had the only score of the first half, a short touchdown run by Ed Songin at 10:28, converted by Tip Logan, to cap a 53-yard drive in the first quarter. In the second quarter the Bombers’ quarterback “Indian” Jack Jacobs engineered a 6 play, 92 yard drive which was snuffed out deep in Hamilton’s end when Vito Ragazzo intercepted.

One fan death was reported before half time, that of Timmins resident Roderick Osborne who collapsed in the stadium seating area.

In the third quarter another Bomber drive faltered at the Hamilton 28 when Dick Brown intercepted a Jack Jacobs pass. Again the Bombers drove within scoring range but a field goal attempt by Bud Korchak produced no points. Finally the Bombers were able to capitalize on a 50-yard drive with a Gerry James run from the one yard line who touched down at 10:56, converted by Korchak. But the Ticats roared back. On the first play after the kickoff Lou Kusserow passed to Ralph Toohy for 21 yards. The Ticats lost a yard on the first down play, but on second down Songin made a short pass to Ragazzo. Bomber defender Geoff Crain went for the interception but missed, and Ragazzo had an open field for a 45-yard pass and run touchdown at 12:16, with Logan again providing the conversion point.

With the score 12-6 and time running out in the fourth quarter, Jacobs put together yet another long drive of 98 yards to the Hamilton two-yard line. On the final play of the game he passed to an apparently wide-open Tom Casey, standing on the goal line. But as the ball reached his hands Hamiton’s Kusserow hit Casey and he dropped the ball. Winnipeg fans claimed pass interference and Hamilton fans called it a very well timed tackle. Even examination of the game films has not succeeded in resolving the dispute. However, the officials called no penalty and Hamilton won the game.

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1959 Blue Bombers Portigal & Ayers Portrait


Jim Ausley (Manager), Buddy Alliston, Walt Bilicki,
Jerry Bilodeau, Ken Bochen, Jack Bruzell

Fred Cole, Burr Davis, George Druxman,
Frank Gilliam, Herb Gray, Bob Gunderman

Wayne Hanna, Bob Hantla, Gerry James,
Henry Janzen, Tony Kehrer, Dave Kocourek

Ed Kotowich, Ron Latourelle, Leo Lewis,
Cec Luining, Frank Macey, Ron Meadmore

Ted Mikliechuk, Nick Miller, Brian Palmer,
Steve Patrick, Cornel Piper, Ernie Pitts

Kenny Ploen, Rick Potter, Norm Rauhaus,
Frank Rigney, Gord Rowland, Roger Savoie

Carver Shannon, Charlie Shepard, Bob Stransky,
Buddy Tinsley, Jerry Tostowaryk, Jim Van Pelt

John Varone, Gar Warren, Fred Way,
Keith Webster, Gene Wlasiuk

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The timing of the hit by Kusserow looks to be well timed and had Casey caught the ball he was short of the goal line.

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Hoth - That’s a great collection of head shots of the 1959 Blue Bombers.

When compiling games played data for 1959, the CFL used the box scores published in newspapers because they contained a roster for each game in addition to scoring summary & team stats.

The box score for the August 17, 1959 game in Calgary was full of errors as 11 players listed on the Blue Bombers roster did not participate in the game. Thanks to Calgary Stampeders Classics who posted a coach’s copy of the game on YouTube, I was able to confirm these errors. The details have been forwarded to the CFL for correction.

As a result of the errors, Gene Wlasiuk, Burr Davis & Buddy Alliston, were each initially credited with a single game played in 1959. Wayne Hanna was listed as a HB in the box score but the CFL instead credited a single game played to Bob Hantla (at tackle).

A few fun facts about some of the players pictured.

Fred Cole - mid-season, he was traded to the Chicago Bears (NFL) in exchange for Ralph Anderson who was already practicing with the Blue Bombers.

Bob Hantla & Harold ‘Burr’ Davis started the season on the Blue Bombers’ injured list.

HB Frank Macey spent the 1955 season on the Blue Bombers’ injured list with a dislocated elbow. In 1955 he was known as Frank Muzychka, a local QB who had played with the Weston Wildcats & Winnipeg Rods. After his elbow injury, Muzychka (now Macey) converted to HB and played for the Sarnia Golden Bears (ORFU) 1956-1958.

Brian Palmer was another QB from the Winnipeg Rods program (1958). After his release in 1959, the Blue Bombers encouraged him to return to the Rods for further development as they saw potential in him. Palmer instead chose to attend the University of Kansas (1959-1962). Palmer would return to the Blue Bombers in 1963.

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An interesting story I came across.

A senior Ontario judge and an American Eagle will be forever linked because a brief moment of irrationality in the 1957 Grey Cup game.

Here’s the scene: Varsity Stadium, Toronto, Nov. 30, 1957. Ray “Bibbles” Bawel, a Hamilton Ticat defensive back, has just picked off his second pass of the game and is headed down the sidelines with a clear path to the end zone. David Humprhey, a spectator standing on the sidelines near the Winnipeg Blue Bomber bench, sticks his foot out and trips Bawel, preventing the touchdown, though the Ticats won the game easily, 32-7.

Humphrey was then a Toronto lawyer and became a judge in the Ontario court, general division. He is now retired and the CFL.ca could not reach him for comment.

On that afternoon in 1957, Bawel got up after being tripped, spitting mad, and started looking for the guy who cost him a touchdown. But by then Humphrey had slipped back into the crowd and got out of the stadium without being challenged. He was later identified by a CFL official.

Many years later, Humprhey explained his brain cramp. As recounted in Heroes of The Game, a History of the Grey Cup, Humphrey said that while on the sidelines he had encountered a man who had been a jury foreman (how DID these guys get on the sidelines anyway?) in a criminal proceeding in which Humphrey was representing the accused. The accused was convicted and sentenced to death.

Instead of taking out his anger against the foreman, Humphrey instead took it out on Bawel. A radio broadcast of the incident has the announcer exclaiming: Bawel “is boiling mad and no wonder!”

Years later Bawel received a gold watch in the mail with a note saying “From the Tripper, Grey Cup 1957.”

Bawel, a former Philadelphia Eagle, may have had one touchdown wiped out but he scored another one on a fumble recovery.

In a telephone interview from his home in Jasper, Indiana, Bawel relived the play for CFL.ca. “I had intercepted the ball and was hugging the sideline when this guy tripped me. He was a little bit inebriated, I think. Well, maybe not a little bit.”

Bawel, 77, confirmed that Humphrey sent him a watch engraved “from the tripper.” Bawel only played that one year for the Cats before retiring but said Humphrey always said he would try to get him in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame because no one would remember anything else but that strange play in the Grey Cup game. (Bawel is not in the hall of fame).

But he said things turned out all right anyway. The trip occurred on the Bomber 40 yard line. The referee penalized the Bombers half the distance to the goal line and the Cats scored a touchdown.

And where did he get the “Bibbles” nickname? He got it from a teammate while playing high school basketball in Indiana.

Bawel was just one small cog in a powerhouse Ticat team that year, led by the fearsome coach Jim Trimble. Under Trimble and general manager Jake Gaudaur, the Cats would go to the Grey Cup in 1957-58-59, 1961 and 1962. But they only won the first one, losing the others to the Blue Bombers and their famous coach Bud Grant, who went on to coach the Minnesota Vikings of the NFL.

Trimble had stars like quarterback Bernie Faloney and Paul Dekker in 1957 but no one as exciting as Chester ‘Cookie’ Gilchrist. Kids on the streets of Hamilton used to sing: “Lookie, lookie, here comes Cookie.” At 250 pounds, he was huge for a running back in the 1950s (he also played defence as did many of the players).

But Gilchrist was back then considered a clown, (he was the Terrell Owens before there was a Terrell Owens). He played for three teams in the NFL and five in Canada.

When he played for the Buffalo Bills, he demanded a chauffeur-driven limousine with a telephone. Instead he got a leased car driven by a rookie who was instructed to answer “Mr. Gilchrist`s car, I’ll see if he is in” when picking up the phone.

As big and tough as he was, Gilchrist was no match for Trimble (who infamously vowed before the 1958 Grey Cup that the Cats would “waffle” the Blue Bombers).

Gaudaur, who became CFL commissioner in 1967, once said he sold Gilchrist to the Saskatchewan Roughriders the day after he challenged Trimble to a fistfight after practice. “I don’t think Cookie realized how kind I was being to him,” Gaudaur said.

The 1957 Grey Cup drew 27,051 fans at Varsity Stadium but it also became the most watched game up until that time because it was the first game to be seen coast-to-coast on television, using the new “microwave system.”

No one knew back then that a microwave could have been used to get Bibbles Bawel steaming again.

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Thanks for sharing!
:+1:
For us guys that have a whole lot more past than future,
It’s greatly appreciated

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I’d heard the Bibbles Bawel story before. But not the stuff about Cookie Gilchrist vs Jim Trimble. That’s gold, thanks.