I can see the run for 2018 Argos season tickets once the fans find out they landed Collaros… the phones will be a-ringing off the hook, the seats will be filled and the scalpers will be having a field day each and every game. Dream on…
Who said anything about ticket sales? Certainly not me.
Isn’t Ricky already lighting it up?
And what does that have to do with Collaros going there and doing the same?
The one good thing is Collaros should be well healed from injury, knee, concussions, mental scars etc…fresh start so to speak if he is our guy moving forward as he is signed, sealed, delivered and well rested and lots of time to practice this new offence. (maybe that was the master plan?). Basically no pressure now. Playing him in Ottawa would be a good test.
Get your facts right, Ellington wasn't traded. Look back at the roster that year - who would you have released to keep a guy that couldn't stay healthy and WIN a position?
Masoli was due a big bonus due to the number of games he started - hence the Gable trade.
I never perceived Masoli as having the skill to be a first string QB. However since JJones took over the coaching and installed Masoli as his QB my opinion of Masoli has increased and, if Masoli is not under contract for next season he could draw interest in the free agent market.
Grover and Crash make a lot of sense . The Cats' team that played Friday is good enough to win in the playoffs . Complaining about players like Ellingson, Chickand Gable being successful elsewhereis silly .Ellingson and Gable were recruited by our scouts. Chick was released by the Riders . We got assets in return for Chick and Gable . That is the football business and Tillman knows it better than most people .
People are upset with the team results but the Cats, under Coach Jones, have shown real progress . We should continue to improve, providing that we don't blow up the whole thing and start from scratch . Look at what the Leafs have done recently with stable ownership and a solid front office. They appear to be a team on the rise. Change for the sake of change, usuallyresults ina team that continually misses the playoffs . The Cats have a great owner and a solid front office, too!
The last 3 games of the season are important for this team . Finishing with 3 wins would make my Christmas cake taste better and give meeven morehope for the 2018 . Remember that only one team wins the last game of the season. The other 8 teams will look in the mirror and say that we need to improve .
Pat Lynch (the old guy who is alsoa Bruin and Steeler fan ) Love the Black and Gold !
Mr62. We tried to use Ellingson that year and he was hurt. All the time. He played here 2 seasons.... 12 games then 9 games.
Also in 2015 we had Sinkfield Tolliver Watt Fantuz Tasker Grant Underwood (Banks).
So as stated... It was either Tasker or Ellingson at the time. And we chose not to sign the guy that was hurt for half the season.
Crash: Most of those wide receivers are gone too. But thank goodness for Tasker and Fantuz.
Ellingson’s total yards for each season he has been in Ottawa has increased to almost 1400. Tasker, as good as he is, has been around 850 yards. Obviously he is not getting ball enough.Check the reception stats if you don’t believe me.
The fact is the Tiger-Cats have been in serious decline for the past season and a half. It’s decisions like the Ellingson free agency that helped get us there.
Time to move on and hope some smarter decisions get made in the future.
Since you started with a typo correction … could I request that, when using the Quote function, you begin your comments below the quote box? Otherwise it makes the discussion very hard for others to follow.
(As far as being highly selective in your choice of supporting evidence, e.g. pretending Sinkfield never existed, naturally that remains your prerogative.)
Thanks
Headline from Sportsnet.ca
“Shake-up with Tiger-Cats: Tommy Condell resigns as OC”
The link:
Despitepossible differences between he and Austin, ANY person, in his position, who leaves just before training camp, abandoning, not only his boss, but the other coaches, players, management and owner is NOT someone I would want.
You do need to get current on the news…
As far as the rest of your comment. June Jones inherited a team that was 0-8 and then went 4-2. With little time to asses and made changes on the run.
You can’t put the other losses on him…he wasn’t the head coach then…
and the 2 losses were in OT and last minute or he could be 6-0 from 0-8.
Good point, BG!!!
Ex Pat: I see what you mean. I’m still getting used to this new quote process. Correction made.
Typo corrections are not much of an issue with me but when a poster is nasty and insulting, I responded by making it an issue.
Re Sinkfield… No “pretending” anything. I think you missed the word “included”.
I was only making the point that some of the wide receivers who stayed on after the 2014 season were not as successful as Ellingson was in 2013. You would think Ellingson would have been a perfect fit in Austin’s pass-happy offence. I saw this move just as one more of Austin’s bad decisions that put us where we are today. Now it appears this same chap is supposed to magically acquire the new skills required to get us out of the mess that culminated with his stepping down as HC.
The Ottawa GM who hired Ellingson made a smart move. Oh wait…that was Marcel Desjardins! The GM who won a Grey Cup last year! We fired him after the team went 3-15 in the 2007 season. Yet Austin, who went 0-8 (7-19 since 2016) this year before he quit, gets to keep his GM job as a reward.
This team is in serious trouble because of its on-field management. June Jones is the only bright light I see. Bob Young has not been served well since he bought this team. So our lack of success, measured by Grey Cup wins, is not all on Austin.
And seeing all those empty seats at the Calgary game was a huge danger sign.
Lordy, I hope there is cause for optimism before next season.
Bakari Grant: Had stayed healthier than Ellingson to that point, and was an established performer, though he eventually fell out of favor with Austin for too many drops. Grant is currently the #11 receiver in the league (closing in on 1000 yards), and if we want to argue whether subsequently letting him go has been a mistake, that’s a separate conversation. And for the record, Ellingson signed with Ottawa on Feb. 11, 2015, while Grant re-signed with the Cats on Mar. 23, 2015, so it could well be that plan A was to re-sign Ellingson, and they were simply unable to agree to terms. The signing of Grant so late in free agency, despite his clear desire at the time to remain in Hamilton, suggests that the Ticats were low-balling him, further suggesting that money might have been a major factor in not getting an Ellingson deal done.
Robin Medeiros: Canadian, so not interchangeable with Ellingson
McDuffie: Speed guy, primarily a kick returner, though he was listed as a WR. Ellingson doesn’t return kicks.
Giguere: Canadian, so not interchangeable with Ellingson
The only one of these guys where there is even a debate is Grant, and the circumstances I outlined above provide plenty of explanation why Grant was with the team in 2015 and Ellingson wasn’t.
I most certainly did not miss the word “included”. I know exactly what you were trying to do, which is why I used the words “highly selective”.
You know very well that Giguere (who LEFT IN 2015!) and Medeiros (who didn’t even sign until Aug 2015, long after Ellingson’s departure) were never going to compete for a roster spot with Ellingson, for reasons of nationality.
I think you also know that successful players typically sign for more money after a couple of years in the league. And that the salary cap constrains a team’s ability to give pay raises to everyone who wants one. Therefore hard choices must be made.
Some more fun facts:
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Banks and Tasker were also free agents that year, and both were garnering NFL interest. The team made a decision to retain them.
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It’s hard to criticize the decisions to prioritize Tasker and Banks when you look at the seasons both had in 2014. Tasker led our team in receiving and was fifth in the league that year. And Banks was … well, you can look it up.
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Ellingson was seventh on our team in receiving in 2014 - in a league where five receivers start.
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Bakari Grant had a couple more years under his belt and it was not patently insane to re-sign him as well.
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Our 2015 receiving corps actually looked a little different than the list you provided. It included, in order of yards gained, Tasker, Sinkfield (both over 1,000), Toliver, Underwood, Grant, Fantuz.
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With that receiving corps, and when our starting QB was healthy, our offence SHOT THE LIGHTS OUT! We were blowing teams away. Without Ellingson.
The real choice was not between Ellingson and Medeiros. The team had to decide which receivers deserved premier dollars. That year the money went to Tasker, Fantuz, Grant, and Banks. Sinkfield was a bargain as he was still playing on his rookie contract, and he was a major part of the offence that year. Toliver and Underwood were the up-and-comers, both signed for less than we would have had to pay Ellingson. At least one of them turned out to be a keeper.
With all that said, I remember being very disappointed that we couldn’t keep Ellingson. But the decision was made within a certain context, and I think you misrepresented that context.