Monday Morning Sentimonies: Cuts, Curses and more Cuts

Thursday was cut down day across the CFL as teams had to finalize their rosters. While the Riders weren't able to cut everyone they wanted to they did cut a lot of people.

For the most part our cuts didn’t really surprise me. Here’s how I categorized them:

Not surprising: Nuvraj Bassi, Jeff Bolen, Bam Childress, Jason Geathers, Sasha Glavic, David Patterson, Brandon Perkins, Byron Ross, Brad Peters, Jerron Wishom and Seante Williams.

Surprising: Todd Blythe, Sam Olajubutu – Both were highly touted prospects but were injured throughout camp. As the saying goes, you can’t make the club in the tub. Still thought we might stash them on the injured list though.

We Liked Your Hustle, That’s Why It Was So Hard To Cut You: Juan Woah-seph. Poor Juan.

Fumbled His Way Off The Team: Casey McGahee

For me, who was cut was not really as surprising as who was not cut. I really thought that Gerran Walker and Adam Nicolson would be shown the door but they managed to stick on the injured list. Must be because of what they did last year because they sure didn’t do much in camp. Nick Hutchins was probably the biggest surprise in camp. Many people, myself included, assumed it was a foregone conclusion that he would go back to the Rams for his last year of eligibility. But Hutchins was very impressive all camp and definitely earned a spot. Dan Clark (who I will henceforth refer to as Nitro) was a pleasant surprise on the O-line too.

I still have no idea why Perri Scarcelli made our practice roster. Even if Boreham was more hurt than first suspected, Congi is more than capable of filling in. It’s not like Scarcelli is known for his leg strength.

Speaking of things I don’t understand… why do we have 2 long snappers on our active roster? You’d think going into our second full season with both we could make a decision! Unless we plan on introducing the revolutionary concept of situational long-snappers I see no need to waste an active roster spot on a back-up snapper... although I've found it never hurts to have one on speed dial.

Notable cuts from around the league:

BC – Kyle Mitchell (I said notable, not surprising)
Cal – Matt D’Orazio, Vince Marshall (So AFL’s top QB couldn’t cut it up here… I’m shocked)
Edm – Lester Ricard (I will miss announcers talking about Retard completing a pass)
Win – Joe Smith, JF Morin-Roberge, Matt O’Meara (League’s top rusher to a Bomber reject in 2 seasons... that’s quite the tumble)
Ham – Brandon Guillory (Guillory must really suck because it’s not like the D-line competition in Hamilton was all that tough)
Tor – Tyler Ebell, Jerome Mathis (So the highly touted NFL pro-bowler gets cut… again, I’m shocked)
Mtl – Reggie Hunt, Brad Banks (I feel bad for the Reaper for having to be in the same company as Brad Banks).

If you want evidence that the Riders are cursed, look no further than Neal Hughes. He was placed on the 9 game because of a lingering issue with his broken leg. But not the leg he broke last year, no the problems relate to the leg he broke 7 years ago as a Ram!! You’ve got to be freaking kidding me! We’ve got an injury list that’s already filling up with recent injuries and now we have to start worrying about injuries from 7 years ago?! This doesn’t happen to other teams. You don’t see the Stamps losing Henry Burris to a case of chicken pox that has lied dormant since elementary school. Seriously, what’s next?! Will we loose Scott Shultz to a rare recurring case of jaundice??

Other news from around the league…

Kenton Keith has been placed on the 9-game injured list. If you have been questioning the Riders’ personnel moves of late just remember that it could be worse, we could be the Ti-cats. They seem to be going out of their way to throw large amounts of money at big names players who end up not benefiting the team at all. I guess the positive here for Ti-cats fans (assuming any still exist) is that unlike Casey Printers, KK will at least not be able to negatively affect their on field performance.

Finally, Teyo Johnson has un-retired. His brief foray into retirement lasted only 4 weeks. Coincidentally those 4 weeks happened to coincide perfectly with training camp. I don’t know what’s more surprising, the fact that the Stamps are actually letting him get away with this or the fact that Teyo is the first person to think of this ingenious scam.