When it’s played at that level it’s on fire for those moments . Now I know some who loved the CFL big plays and others who hated the lack of actual drives . I love sandlot football moments with Flutie but others hate it .
On November 17, 2006, Flutie was named the greatest Canadian Football League player of all time
Problem isn’t it never has been it has had those moments .
Flutie last played in the league almost 25 years ago .
Doug Flutie is like a Gretzky or Bobby Orr to the NHL .
He is/was not the norm today or for some time . The three down game is a harder game to play for some .
My belief it’s a combination of lack of practice time , lack of preparation for some , lack of coaching design plays for the QB’s ability ,and lastly the QB themselves who may not have the arm strength for the field size so the defence feed on that fact .
Funny how we can watch the same league and have such a difference of opinion.
Michael Reilly number one, no question.
I would not put Dane Evans, who I’ve seen be wildly inaccurate, in the second group. Maier may not be quite experienced or consistent long enough yet to be in the second group. Not sure which Bo you have in this group? The one the last couple weeks or the one before. I would put Collars and Fajardo in this second group.
I think Dom Davis and Nichols are on the bottom. I don’t think we’ll see them in the league as starters anymore.
As for VA, I like his style of play. I think his shots downfield suit this league where even after an interception, you can have the ball back in 2 downs. He’s got a strong arm and is the only current QB that can resemble any of the great CFL QBs from the classic years where CFL QBs were known for their scrambling and elusive play and making something out of nothing more than their QB rating.
Schiltz had a good game last week. I’m willing to give him another look. Same for MBT. I think the competition with Arbuckle is making him more careful with avoiding mistakes.
Arbuckle is a dink and dunk QB that doesn’t have the arm strength and doesn’t suit how this league is designed - for big plays.
Harris is better than he is recently. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was playing hurt. Some of his passes were uncharacteristically lame duck throws.
Masoli could make a come back. He’s average right now. But serviceable and I think has more upside (not in age but productivity this year) than Evans.
Forgot to mention: Cornelius. Problem with him and his upside is his poor mechanics. They mentioned it on his first outing. I think it was Jim Barker. Throws with only his arm too much and doesn't lead with his legs.
Anyone who's ever played golf, a racquet sports or thrown a baseball know it's not just your arm.
He has the size and arm strength. He has to get some more coaching to reach his potential. I'm cheering for him to get there.
One real life experiments is the 2014 Redblacks and the 2015 Redblacks .
In 2014 I was ready for four downs it was awful ball . It was accepted because of a break in period because it was the first year .
In 2015 with the same QB and HC but the addition of a new OC Mass and key receivers and boom they were lighting it up and going to the Grey Cup .
Coaching and play calling with better receivers and the game was entertaining to watch .
They had the same QB Burris .
The high tempo offence played by the same experienced QB was entertaining as it created drives and had great flow to the game .
The year before the same QB and HC and the three down game league itself looked tired , non professional and uninspiring .
The next year they are lighting the league on fire with some great entertainment .
I think that’s the 83rd time he’s dissed Adams…I’m not completely sold on the guy, he looks like a rookie one minute, and a superstar the next.
Area 51 seems to REALLY dislike his performance.
The 90s was a totally different era. We saw wild offensive numbers because teams were blowing all of their budget on a big name quarterback, a stud left tackle and a deep threat receiver or two and the defenses were neglected.
It was fun at times, but 56-38 every week got old pretty quickly. It was for the most part cheap sloppy football. By the late 90s as the league stabilized financially and stopped trying to be little more than a circus, the focus returned to a well-rounded solid roster in each facet.
The quarterbacks have not gotten worse in the last 25 years. The defenses got better.
No amount of practice time or coaching is going to turn Matt Nichols into Matt Dunigan.
Not sure if you watched many CFL games in the 80’s and early 90’s but high scoring shootouts were a regular occurrence.
It all comes down to QB talent.
Back then there was an unwritten rule in the NFL that QBs could not be black or shorter than 6’2.
That’s how the CFL ended up with guys like 5’9 Flutie, 5’11 Dunigan, 6’0 Jeff Garcia, 6’0 Danny McManus, 6’1 Kent Austin, 6’1 Tommy Clemens, Warren Moon, Condredge Holloway, Danny Barrett, Damon Allen.
Now imagine if the NFL was still stuck in the dark ages - - guys like Lamar Jackson, Kyler Murray, Pat Mahomes, Russ Wilson, 6’1 Baker Mayfield.
Do you suppose there’d be any problems scoring points in the CFL with those guys at QB?
This is a hard question to answer since a lot of great CFL QBs spend their prime in the CFL before they’re recognized.
If the NFL recognized and brought up a player like Fajardo from the get go, I suspect he would have been a Pro Bowler for example.
When I saw Bo play live 5-6 years ago I actually said in stadium that he was going to jump ship to the NFL. He would have had a chance. That’s gone now but it highlights how the timing will always be a bias against our QBs. If given a chance many CFL players would have made an impact in the NFL now and in the past. It takes an opportunity and someone who believes in you.
Someone like Garcia needed Bill Walsh in his corner. Without that you might have labelled him as another CFL QB that couldn’t make it. You would have been wrong just like you are with today’s group.
I do agree for awhile CFL gained big time from NFL biased stubborn thinking . Now it’s our league which needs to evolve with the times .
Yes the NFL changed with their talent inclusiveness but they also changed with style of football as well .
Don’t forget Flutie had a chance in the NFL before coming north .
He himself admits he stunk . He developed in the CFL game and the NFL changed their game that suited those smaller QB’s as well .
They most likely got some of that from the CFL . But you saw how some older NFLers hated that style Flutie represented when he played for the Bills . Now they love it .
The NFL was big then and bigger now as they have evolved .
The CFL has stopped evolving in so many ways .
They need to overhaul everything from entertainment value , invested infrastructure , grass roots and partnering with aligned interests while not forgetting about the base that supports them . Tough decisions trying to balance them out .
If the game itself requires high end flow of HOF QB’s who can play. in the NFL as you say the CFL is lost those days are gone and not coming back .
Imagine the NFL if the rules of play had never changed:
A quarterback can’t throw a pass unless he’s at least 5 yards behind the line of scrimmage. The offense begins some plays just a yard from the sideline and is penalized for throwing more than one pass during a series of downs. Player substitutions are prohibited. No communication from the sideline is allowed. Players from both teams grab their opponents’ facemasks at will.
Of course, that’s not how professional football is played today. Throughout the history of the NFL, the custodians of the game not only have protected its integrity, but also have revised its playing rules to make the contests fairer, safer and more entertaining. Time and again, the league has shown that it is open to ideas generated by any source or circumstance — or even by new technology — if it believes that the changes will improve the game.
Cody Fajardo was signed by the Raiders immediately after college. All he had to do was beat out trash like Christian Ponder or Matt McGloin to be the 3rd stringer. Or even look remotely competent to get a PR spot.
But Fajardo was horrendous. Six pass attempts with nearly as many INTs (1) as he had completions (2).
Not surprisingly, Fajardo would never get another sniff from anyone in the NFL.
Bo Mitchell wasn’t even good enough to get a training camp tryout snuff from the NFL.
As I’ve explained numerous times, Mitchell has a laughably weak arm and has no ability to scramble. ZERO surprise the NFL has never been interested.
I would push for the league to keep finding ways to present the game more in the fashion of soccer or F1 and less like the other North American sports.
More concerted efforts are needed to squeeze revenue out of in-game sponsorships such that we can reduce or scrap commercials save for pre/post game, the quarters and halftime.
At the amateur level the game takes 2 hours to play… that brings it in line with most movies and makes the game easier to schedule for paying attendees and broadcast viewers alike.
Why? “other” North American sports are highly successful, NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and they all have 3 hour games and have huge TV contracts that are driven by sponsors paying for ad time.
Young people are watching the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL.
The CFL has been trying to figure out for years how to attract the younger demographic, it’s hopeless in Toronto/GTA where the Argos are not seen as major league.
What does that have to do with young people not identifying with the ARgos? Look at the young people that flock to the Raptors and TFC, they love basketball and soccer.
Bassett and Godfrey were 30 years ago!! I remember at the time people saying that an NFL franchise would kill Argo attendance. Argo attendance died without the NFL.
The move to BMO was going to do great things for the Argos, the 25k average at the RC would look great at BMO but less than half of that at BMO. The old Argo fans retired and young people didn’t buy in.
Just be happy that MLSE is sticking with the Argos, paying the bills and putting up with the small crowds.