Saskatchewan Roughriders thread

[OV Argo]

Where is OV Argo?
Sir, PLEASE rip Ego-Jones on this latest pathetic roster add (NFL bust Trent Richardson)
You can do it far better than I ever could.

https://www.cfl.ca/2017/09/26/riders...nt-richardson/

Richardson is an NFL talent who will run roughshod over wimpy CFL defences = great signing by ego-Jones; the Riders were forced to start no talent NI LaFrance at tailback last game - pfft - what a joke. ;o)

[jerrym]

Richardson is an NFL talent who will run roughshod over wimpy CFL defences = great signing by ego-Jones; the Riders were forced to start no talent NI LaFrance at tailback last game - pfft - what a joke. ;o)

Richardson may well yet show he still has it as he gets used to the Rider offence, but he only gained 20 yards on five carries against the Argos while NI Lafrance's three 10+ yard runs were critical to the Rider's drive in the dying minutes to setup the winning FG.

[OV Argo]

Richardson may well yet show he still has it as he gets used to the Rider offence, but he only gained 20 yards on five carries against the Argos while NI Lafrance's three 10+ yard runs were critical to the Rider's drive in the dying minutes to setup the winning FG.

A lot of the typical, usual suspect Riderfans are convinced that LaFrance is not "good enough" as per his passport and focus on everything non-stellar he does; and Richardson is a superstar in waiting who just needs more chances - i bet he will get those chances.

Ego-Jones will still trot out Kevin Glenn as his starting QB over Bridge.

[jerrym]

In the video below HC Chris Jones states Kevin Glenn will remain the starting QB despite the fact it was Bridge who turned the game around. Jones also discusses yesterday's game.

https://www.riderville.com/2017/10/0...-we-had-to-do/

[rdavies]

The wacky fans of this Canadian football team love watermelon hats and all things green
Jim Byers/Special Contributor dallasnews.com December 2 2017

The third quarter of the football game has just finished and the crowd at Mosaic Field in Regina, Saskatchewan, rises in unison to sing.

"And it's ho-hey, hi-hey, farmers bar your doors, when you see the Jolly Roger on Regina's mighty shores."

Grown men in deep green Saskatchewan Roughrider jerseys and long, brilliant green wigs dance and sway as the tune bounces along. Men and women with carved watermelons on their heads belt out the lyrics. I can't see them in the stands, but I'm pretty sure the father and son in matching green Hawaiian shirts that I interviewed prior to the game are raising a cup of the prized local pilsner beer to the local pirates.

For folks who don't have a degree in Canadian geography, let me point out the Regina is just about due north of the North Dakota/Montana border and roughly a 1,000 mile drive to the Pacific Ocean. But this is a Saskatchewan Roughriders game, and the team's legions of half-crazed fans play by their own rules and sing their own songs. They want to be pirates, so pirates they shall be.

Things are different in Saskatchewan

In Toronto, the local Canadian Football League team, the Argonauts, is lucky to draw 12,000 fans. Election night parties are more boisterous than an Argos game. But things are different in Saskatchewan, where the CFL is the only major sports league in town (they do have minor league hockey and recently got a team in the National Lacrosse League).

So on a visit to Regina this summer I took in a game at the new Mosaic Field, a sparkling, $200 million ($300 million - elly) Canadian playground that glimmers and gleams as much as any NFL stadium I've seen.

It didn't take long to find out that prairie football fans are entirely wacky, impossibly silly, ridiculously dressed folks who decorate their entire bodies -- and often their homes -- in Rider green and that they are incredibly and indisputably dedicated to their team. It's fantastic.

Pirate pride

I made it to the first preseason game of the year, which also was the debut of the new stadium. I think the fans, accustomed to their former dump of a home across the street (Taylor Field) were more than a little overwhelmed by the space-ship shine of their new digs. But their pride was out in full force.

Steven Cormons is a retired businessman who dresses up like a green Johnny Depp, with a fluorescent green beard and green tri-corner hat and green, navy-style jacket, with his green and white-striped pants tucked into dark black boots. Cormons, who calls himself Captain Harvey Rider, is retired and drives down from North Battleford for each game -- a 250-mile trip.

"I love the Pirates of Regina song and I thought they needed a pirate in the stands," Cormons told me prior to the game. "I was wearing a cowboy hat that day and thought, 'Why not a pirate costume?' I got my wife to make one for me, and now my goal is to get everyone in my section of the stadium to wear an eyepatch."

I commented on his natty attire and Rider smiled.

"You think the costume is something, you should see our living room," he said. "The walls are green like the grass. We even painted yard lines on the wall."

A favorite fruit

Watermelon hats have been a signature of Rider fans for years. Melons are purchased a few days prior to the game and the pink fruit is carved out (and presumably eaten), leaving a green and white rind that plunks down perfectly on the head of a prairie football fan.

The story goes that when Saskatchewan journeyed to Calgary a few years ago to play for the CFL Championship, known as the Grey Cup, one of the local grocery stores had to buy thousands of extra watermelons to keep Riders' fans in their favorite fruit.

"Ideally you buy the watermelon the day before and let it dry out a little," melon-hatted fan Luke McWilliams told me as he wandered the stadium at halftime. "It's kinda gross if it's wet."

I tell a group of fans I'm interviewing that I'm doing a story for a newspaper in Dallas.

"I don't think people in the U.S. have any idea how crazy we are here about football and about the Riders," said season-ticket holder Lance Hackewich, who's at the game with his son, Nelson. They're dressed in matching green Hawaiian shirts, along with snazzy white fedoras with green trim. "But players who have come up here from the States get it. Doug Flutie gets it. Jeff Garcia gets it."

I ask Nelson why Rider nation is such a devoted bunch.

"We don't have anything else," he replies in a matter-of-fact voice.
Saskatchewan Roughriders fans are acknowledged as the most enthusiastic fans in the Canadian Football League, often travelling hundreds of miles to get to their games.

So well-loved

That's not quite true. Regina will never be mistaken for Paris or Denver or Dallas. The more northerly Saskatchewan city of Saskatoon has a prettier setting and a stronger reputation for the arts. But Regina, which is the province's capital, has a lovely lake and a nice farmers market, as well as one of the most striking provincial buildings in Canada. Better still, the people are down-home, hard-working middle-of-the-country folks who don't take themselves the least bit seriously, and they're ultra-passionate about their football team.

"A lot of former players stay here in Regina and sell cars or work at restaurants," says super-fan Nathan Clearihue. "They stay because they're so well-loved."

That list includes Don Narcisse, who was born in Port Arthur, Texas, and played college football at Texas Southern University. He wasn't a star coming out of school but latched on with the Riders, becoming the Canadian Football League's all-time leading receiver at the time of his retirement in 1999.

"The fans around here embraced me like you can't believe," said Narcisse. "These might be the best and most loyal fans in sports. They're loud in Seattle and Green Bay, but this is a pretty amazing place."

Fans are everywhere

They certainly love to wave the green-and-white flag. The store at Mosaic Field is filled with hundreds of Riders' items, everything from flip-flops to earrings to baby lotion. There are even green Rider Champagne flutes.

Lance and Nelson Hackewich have taken a bedroom at their suburban Regina home and turned it into a shrine for all things Riders, including autographed Grey Cup footballs (alas, the Riders have only won Lord Grey's trophy four times in the CFL's 100-plus years: 1966, 1989, 2007 and 2013), Roughrider cribbage sets and watermelon candies.

One of their prized possessions is a Riders cigarette lighter from the 1950s.

"They certainly don't give those away anymore," Lance said. "George Reed [a former Riders' star] tells stories of how he would run off the field at half-time instead of walk because that way he could have two cigarettes before the start of the third quarter instead of just one."

Lance takes me to their living room and shows me photos of family members holding the green Saskatchewan flag in front of the Eiffel Tower and at the lip of the Grand Canyon.

"I was in China once at the Great Wall and had my flag and someone yelled, 'Go, Riders.' Saskatchewan fans are everywhere."

Other Canadian football traditions

Ottawa: During the first time-out of the third quarter of every home game in Ottawa, fans of the Red Blacks shout "Shoe Beer, Shoe Beer, Shoe Beer." A long-time season ticker-holder then gets out a shoe that's been fashioned into a drinking receptacle, fills it with beer and gives it a chug as his fellow fans shout encouragement.

Winnipeg: Here's a fun tradition: fans at Blue Bombers games have been known to collect all the plastic beer cups they can (are you sensing a theme here?) and stack them one into the other until they form a meters-long, writhing collection of cups affectionately known as a "beer snake." One wildlife group in Canada declared it an official species of reptile.

Calgary: This being the city that hosts the annual Calgary Stampede, you know horses have to enter the equation. Sure enough, after every touchdown, a female rider named Chelsea Drake (she took over for her mom just recently) races down the sidelines on a horse called "Quick Six," six being the number of points you score on a touchdown in American and Canadian football. Alas, the horse doesn't drink a beer after his run.

[rdavies]

Canadian QB Brandon Bridge to workout for New York Giants
Justin Dunk 3downnation December 10, 2017

Saskatchewan Roughrider quarterback Brandon Bridge has a workout scheduled with the New York Giants in December, per sources.

After signing with the Riders in August of last year, the Mississauga-born Bridge has shown intriguing potential, especially in 2017. Bridge started in Week 13 for the Riders in Hamilton and guided the team to a victory with 231 passing yards and three touchdowns. Two weeks later, the 25-year-old came off the bench to lead a comeback win against Toronto, finishing 20-of-28 for 292 yards and two touchdowns.

Overall, Bridge passed for 1,236 yards with a 66.6 completion percentage (92-of-138) and 10 touchdowns to just four interceptions while adding 20 carries for 127 yards and one touchdown on the ground. He sparked the Riders offence in the East Final, completing 11-of-21 passes for 141 yards and one touchdown in the team’s defeat. The TD toss was the first by a Canadian in a post-season game since Russ Jackson in the 1969 Grey Cup.

Bridge was originally drafted by the Montreal Alouettes in 2015. That same year he attended Dallas Cowboys rookie mini-camp but was not signed.

A pending free agent in February, Bridge has been in contract negotiations with the Riders.

“Definitely, I would love to stay here, but at the end of the day, it’s still a business,” Bridge said.

Saskatchewan’s head coach and general manager Chris Jones knows the Canadian signal caller’s talents well.

“He brings a lot of really big intangibles to the position,” Jones said. “He’s a dynamic young player.”

[R.J]

Chris Jones and staff signs extensions.
https://globalnews.ca/news/3912059/c...medium=Twitter

The Saskatchewan Roughriders announced on Tuesday that they have signed General Manager and Head Coach Chris Jones to a contract extension through 2019.

The Riders also announced that front office personnel Jeremy O’Day, John Murphy and Mike Davis have each agreed to two-year contract extensions, keeping them with the Riders until the 2019 season.

Not surprised, as I would have been more surprised if Jones signed a 2 or 3 year extension.

[R.J]

Bridge re-signed with the Riders on a one year deal, which I think will be the norm this off season with the CBA ending after next season.

[jerrym]

Jeremy O'Day discusses below why the Riders released Kevin Glenn so quickly after signing Collaros:

“Once we make a decision to make a trade like we did yesterday, there’s going to be some movement that we have to do on the roster,” said Jeremy O’Day, the Roughriders’ assistant vice-president of football operations and administration. “We had time to discuss that and develop a plan moving forward and we came to the conclusion that it was probably best not to let that linger on and, in fairness to Kevin and everyone else involved, to go ahead and make that decision to release Kevin this morning.” ...
“He’s disappointed and understandably so,” O’Day said of Glenn, a veteran of 17 CFL seasons. “You come to an organization and you hope to play there for a longer period of time.“Kevin’s a true pro; he has been through it many times before. It doesn’t make it any easier on everyone involved. It’s the tough part of the business. There are a lot of good people who end up getting hurt when you make those decisions, but he handled it like a pro.”
Glenn was signed in part to help the Roughriders’ other quarterbacks, none of whom had more than three years of pro experience. Noting that Glenn is “a very team-oriented guy,” O’Day praised the veteran for the impact he had on Bridge, Vernon Adams Jr., Marquise Williams and David Watford in Saskatchewan’s quarterbacks room.
The mentoring work that Glenn did prompted many to suggest that he could succeed the departed Jarious Jackson as Saskatchewan’s quarterbacks coach. On Thursday, that didn’t sound like a possibility.
“That was probably erased when Kevin told us that he wanted to continue playing,” O’Day said. “You want to respect the player’s aspirations.

https://www.riderville.com/2018/01/0...lenn-decision/

[Argo]

This is a very nice contract for ZC.

http://3downnation.com/2018/01/19/de...ured-contract/

IMO, the fact that it is faith-based, and not incentive-and-performance-based, is clearly a mistake (i.e., an unnecessary gamble) on Chris Jone's part.

[R.J]

This is a very nice contract for ZC.

http://3downnation.com/2018/01/19/de...ured-contract/

IMO, the fact that it is faith-based, and not incentive-and-performance-based, is clearly a mistake (i.e., an unnecessary gamble) on Chris Jone's part.

Yup, very nice deal for Collaros indeed. Took less money, but I too am surprised that it's not an incentive type deal.

[Argo]

Duron Carter has signed a one-year contract with the Riders.

Good, glad to see him back playing in the CFL this year.

[AngeloV]

Duron Carter has signed a one-year contract with the Riders.

Good, glad to see him back playing in the CFL this year.

Me too. I think the Riders are going to be the team to beat in the west this year.

[jerrym]

A legend in his own mind.

I probably will go down as one of the best players ever!!! Don't comment, just remember how salty you got reading that 😂 I'm one of a kind😎

— Duron Carter (@DC_CHILLIN_8) January 12, 2018

[doubleblue]

A legend in his own mind.

Duron is definitely one of a kind. Always good to have a polarizing figure for other teams fans to hate and make headlines. Of course it takes a special person to do that. Someone who doesn't care what other people think.

[OV Argo]

A legend in his own mind.

Yeah - a real character and a legend in his own mind; but reports out of Riderville say he has been a good team-guy and no real problems ? Well liked there.

Certainly has some real talent and skills - big, fast with a huge catch radius (one of the all-time greatest CFL receptions IMO last year); and chipped in playing well at DB. Still, IMO, pretty over-rated as a receiver - mainly cause he drops too many; if there was a former CFL receiver i could compare him too = maybe Arland Bruce - a guy who could make big plays and spectacular catches, but just dropped too many passes to be considered an all-around elite receiver. Not even close to Terry Greer, Milt, Brian Kelly, Allen Pitts or Merv Fernandez as a total package receiver talent.

[jerrym]

Duron Carter's one year extension seems to be quite favourable to the Riders. While his contract went up from $130,000 to $175,000 potentially, it includes a $31,000 playing time bonus in addition to a $70,000 signing bonus and a $74,000 base salary.

http://3downnation.com/2018/01/26/co...-raise-riders/

[jerrym]

Another National, in addition to DL Nathan Shephard who is also on Hamilton's list after failing to be drafted, has been placed on the Rider's negotiation list: RB Johnny Augustine, who was ranked #17 on the final CFL Scouting Bureau list, but went undrafted and failed to stick with the Eskimos at TC last year. Not entirely surprising that a National RB went undrafted even in the late rounds.

http://3downnation.com/2018/01/30/ri...on-list-draft/

[doubleblue]

Another National, in addition to DL Nathan Shephard who is also on Hamilton's list after failing to be drafted, has been placed on the Rider's negotiation list: RB Johnny Augustine, who was ranked #17 on the final CFL Scouting Bureau list, but went undrafted and failed to stick with the Eskimos at TC last year. Not entirely surprising that a National RB went undrafted even in the late rounds.

http://3downnation.com/2018/01/30/ri...on-list-draft/

Don't know what happened with Augustine last year. Tough runner who is maybe on the small size, but did well at the combine at least on the field.
Saw him play this last fall and he looks like he can play in the CFL as a back up and ST guy IMO.

[AngeloV]

Don't know what happened with Augustine last year. Tough runner who is maybe on the small size, but did well at the combine at least on the field.
Saw him play this last fall and he looks like he can play in the CFL as a back up and ST guy IMO.

More neg list stupidity. Once a player has been in someone's camp as Augustine was, how is he not just a free agent? Why should someone be allowed to put a released player onto a neg list? Unless of course, 3DN is wrong about him being added to a neg list.