This week, the Saskatchewan Roughriders are ranked 19th in a 9 team league. How? you ask. Find out by reading— this week’s CFL Power Rankings right here at Discombobulated! In the meantime, how about a few pointless observations following a fairly dull week in the CFL.
- CALGARY STAMPEDERS
Does anyone else think that Bo Levi Mitchell looks like that guy in that truck commercial that plays every game on TSN? Does anyone know what I’m talking about? The close-up of some guy with the weak blond moustache? The commercial with the Ric Flair-esque yelp and something about getting things done or doing things right or something? Nothing? Titan? Ram? Who knows. Trucks all look the same to me and I don’t know why anyone buys them unless they’re a farmer or an 18 year old male from Yellowgrass, Saskatchewan buying his first vehicle after high school but just before knocking up his 16 year old girlfriend. “But I love him, mom!”
That took a strange turn.
- BRITISH COLUMBIA LIONS
TSN’s Scott Cullen ranks Edmonton second after they beat Saskatchewan. Just let that sentence sink in. After. They. Beat. Saskatchewan. You know, that Saskatchewan, as in Roughriders. Mr. Cullen has a lot of credibility here at Discombobulated, but come on! Saskatchewan? And Edmonton almost screwed it up.
You don’t get ranked second by beating Saskatchewan (unless you are the Winnipeg Blue Bombers after this week’s Labour Day Classic).
The “Staff” at CFL.CA got this one correct. The Lions probably belong in second. Nice job. Now beat it before I call the cops!
- WINNIPEG BLUE BOMBERS
Matthew Cauz at CFL.CA has his doubts about Winnipeg, although he seems to spend most of the article sucking up to all things Winnipeg, including a very kind word for Gary Lawless, which struck me as akin to saying “Nice Dog” to a glaring growling Rottweiler while you quickly walk past a stranger’s front lawn. That guy scares me.
Anyway, whether or not the Blue Bombers are for real, it’s still fun to watch a potential powerhouse rising out of the ashes of futility. We’ll find out what Winnipeg is made of this weekend, won’t we? I don’t like their chances. It’s Labour Day, after all.
- HAMILTON TIGER-CATS
Both TSN.CA and CFL.CA rank the fellows from Steeltown fourth. Correct. Next week, third. First place in the East awaits.
- EDMONTON ESKIMOS
Edmonton beat Saskatchewan last week. So… yeah, this fifth place ranking seems right. The way the Roughriders are playing, teams are gonna start losing a spot in the Power Rankings just for beating Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan is the equivalent of some kind of football black hole, where all matter, energy, light and good teams get sucked into oblivion.
- OTTAWA REDBLACKS
They should have Henry Burris #CFLWIRED up for the next game so we can listen to him mutter about where he put his keys, why hasn’t the city fixed that damned streetlight yet and how many times he had to chase those damned squirrels out of the birdfeeder this morning. And where is my paper!?
- TORONTO ARGONAUTS
Quarterback Ricky Ray will be back this week for his annual second-half-of-the-season season-ending injury. That should put him out until July of next year, just in time to blow out his hammy or some damned thing. Cripes. Wouldn’t it be cheaper just to bump him into an Assistant Coach position? He’d get just as much playing time and you wouldn’t lose all that football knowledge.
- MONTREAL ALOUETTES
Duron Carter is going to jail! Finally, justice has been served. That’ll show him for belly-bucking an innocent and defenceless Coach Campbell. The poor man has children for godssake!
- 2008 DETROIT LIONS
Winless, but at least they had Calvin Johnson. He was pretty fun to watch.
- 1976 TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS
Didn’t win a game, yet ranked higher than the Roughriders.
- 1985 NEW COKE
Personally, I liked it. I also liked Pepsi Clear, the Apple Newton, Radio Shack and I have a ton of Sony Betamax tapes and HD DVD disks. If anyone is interested in buying them, they’ve been on Kijiji for about five years. None of it is porn, so don’t get your hopes up. Just a lot of cheap World War II documentaries and original Battlestar Galactic episodes. Original Battlestar Galactic.
- 1912 TITANIC
On the one hand, the maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic was arguably the worst maritime disaster in history. On the other hand, the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
- 1997 TITANIC
I don’t know which is worse, that damned Céline Dion song, or… nope, actually, it’s the Saskatchewan Roughriders. No contest. Sorry to disturb you Ms. Dion. Go back to screaming your head off and thumping your chest like a gorilla with a bone stuck in his throat.
- (Tie) 1986 CHERNOBYL NUCLEAR PLANT/1937 HINDENBURG
I just could not decide which way to go here. Chernobyl was a nuclear meltdown that spread a cloud of radiation across Europe that caused decades of suffering for millions of people, but the Saskatchewan Roughriders really suck this year. I mean really suck. Geez.
My hope is that Glen Suitor will work “Oh the humanity!” into his colour during one of the Roughriders’ remaining games this season. Actually, any of the boys at TSN can use it. One of the Rods, maybe. But not Jock Climie. He seems perpetually irritated about something he just can’t mention out loud for reasons that irritate him even more. Maybe Matt Dunigan’s aftershave: “It’s in my contract; I can wear as much as I want!”
- 1812 NAPOLEON’S INVASION OF RUSSIA
There are two rules of warfare: do not march on Moscow, and Saskatchewan Roughriders will be lucky to win more than two more games this season. Actually, the second rule of warfare was supposedly something about invading China, but that was before the 2016 Roughrider season.
- 1941 HITLER’S INVASION OF RUSSIA
Those who forget the past are doomed to accept the position of General Manager and Head Coach of the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
- 1997 OTTAWA ROUGH RIDERS
The Ottawa Rough Riders folded in 1996, so, yeah….
- SASKATCHEWAN ROUGHRIDERS
I can joke about the Roughriders because I am a brainwashed lifetime lemming-member of the sticky horde of zombie-like automatons known as Rider Nation. You don’t get to make fun of the Roughriders unless you are one of us. It’s like what Mark the Welshman told me this last Friday at the Edmonton game as we incapacitated ourselves drinking in the Quarterback Club in Commonwealth after sitting through the first quarter of that debacle (yes, that’s a run-on sentence). He said that there is nothing more violent than Irish brothers fighting one another. Terrible. However, if an outsider were to insult one of them, these same brothers would close ranks and descend upon you like a pack of starving hyenas.
(By the way, it looks like they are quietly changing the name of Commonwealth to “The Brick Field”. What is going on? Brick field? That sounds like the surface at Taylor Field during the first 25 years it had artificial turf. I played on that stuff; I still have carpet burns.)
Anyway, back to the Roughriders. Despite everything, I actually think that Roughrider General Manager and Head Coach Dark Helmet is correct: this is a good team. He is building a young and hungry team that I think will dominate the league starting in about one year. In the meantime, we have to put up with this, uh, “football”. However, I believe the following quote from the immortal Rocky Balboa is appropriate, not only with regard to the Roughriders right now, but the entire Province of Saskatchewan throughout its entire history:
Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place, and I don’t care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done! Now, if you know what you’re worth, then go out and get what you’re worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain’t where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain’t you. You’re better than that!
PS – Remember the 1989 Dallas Cowboys? The freshly cleaned-house 1-15 1989 Dallas Cowboys? Do you remember the 1992 Dallas Cowboys? 1993 Cowboys? 1995 Cowboys? Even the 1994 Cowboys were nothing to sneeze at. That’s what happens when you start fresh and build a team from the ground up. I realize there are certain differences between the 2016 Roughriders and the 1989 Cowboys, but I’m just sayin’. (Play theme from Jaws here.)