Friday Round-Up: Riders Sign 4 & Other News From Around The League

It’s the Friday before the long weekend so I hope you aren’t expecting much from me (then again if you were expecting lots from me you likely would have stopped reading this blog eons ago).  Since you are probably headed off to drink your face off on some wild camping expedition I’ll just give you a few quick hitters in terms of new from around the league.

Riders Sign 4, Release 1

In are import DL Mick Williams and LB Darren Stone (formerly of the Stampeders) and undrafted Canadians WR Bogdan Raic and RB Nathan Riva. Out is LB Tony Taylor. This is only barely “news” since the Mick Williams signing has been known about for a few months now and news about Raic and Riva broke a few days back (I was even timely enough in my posts to tell you about them on Monday). Cutting Tony Taylor isn’t really news since the bags they put popcorn in at home games played a bigger role in the Riders than Taylor’s brief stint (it was so short I’m not even sure it qualifies as brief).

Stone was the only new name and the noteworthy thing about him (other than the fact that his 8 games played with the Stamps make him our second most experienced LB) is that he got a DUI in 2008. Now given how much of a failure Taman’s previous recruiting attempts have been I strongly support his decision to change up his criteria this year but I’m not sure that having “has been, or will soon be charged with DUI” as the top criteria on the scouting list is the best way to go. I’d prefer if Taman was doing his scouting at football games as opposed to AA meetings. Seriously who’s next? Donte Stallworth? Manfred Joenick?

A Wall Blows Over At New Winnipeg Stadium

So apparently at the new Winnipeg Stadium they are building, a wall blew over in the wind this week. Now you would think that would be a pretty big deal but the Bombers don’t seem to think so. They even went so far as to say that it wouldn’t case a delay. A few major problems I see with this. #1 Shouldn’t they be engineering this stadium to withstand things like wind? I’m mean I can see them not engineering it to withstand hurricanes but this is wind we are talking about. It’s not like Winnipeg is famous for being windy… oh wait yes, yes it is. Remind me to avoid the new stadium for awhile just in case this wall isn’t the only thing collapsing.  

#2 How does this not cause a delay? Did the project timeline build in time for potential wall collapses?

Maybe they should have hired a non-Manitoban contractor.

 

Committing Crimes – Not Just For Riders Anymore

It always seems that its headline news across the country when a Rider commits a crime. Now I realize that outside of the crop report and debates on the downfalls of daylight savings time nothing is really as noteworthy as Rider stuff here, however... Odell Willis gets arrested and it’s a massive story inside and outside the province.

Well now players from other teams are getting in on this crime stuff. Edmonton OLDevin Tyler was arrested and jailed for beating the crap out of someone and Toronto OL (well for Toronto OL) Edawn Coughman is facing charges for having aloaded gun in his Montreal hotel room… a loaded gun! Coughman’s excuse… he didn’t know it wasn’t ok (I guess Jim Barker needs to add a section to his player orientation handbook). Not only were these 2 not headline news, they barely even made a ripple in the media. I guess crime stories about CFL football players only make it past the newsroom floor if they can put the phrase “former or current Rider in there”.

The gun thing also raises a few other questions, like how did he get that across the border? I guess it’s a product of our Canadian attitude toward security which is that its cheaper and easier to just not have anything in our country worth bombing, stealing or kidnapping rather than try and prevent the crimes.