Predicting the CFL playoffs is a lot like bringing a gun onto the set of an Alec Baldwin movie.  No one knows if it’s loaded and something bad is going to happen.

It starts out with a bunch of experts assuring everyone that everything is under control and everyone is doing everything right.  Then something terrible happens that looks like, in hindsight, was entirely predictable and completely unavoidable.  This is followed by those same experts explaining that, actually, nothing was under control and nobody did anything right. Then everybody starts pointing fingers at each other and a bunch of people get fired.

Montreal Alouettes at Hamilton Tiger-Cats

The season started out with everyone saying the Montreal Alouettes will only go as far as Vernon Adams Jr will carry them.  Everything is dependant upon Vernon Adams Jr.  All is lost without Vernon Adams Jr.  Vernon. Adams. Junior.

Now the Alouettes have a quarterback whose own teammate called, just this season, a brittle little baby. Talk about a confidence booster. And the worst part is, virtually everyone who has any connection to, or interest in, the CFL, just kinda shrugged and agreed.

And the Tiger-Cats?  Ehh.  Sure.  They’re okay.

I asked my Magic 8-Ball if Hamilton would win.  It said “Likely”.  So I’m going with the Alouettes, just because I think my Magic 8-Ball is an asshole.

Calgary Stampeders at Saskatchewan Roughriders

The Roughriders’ season will end on the strangely warm-ish tundra of Mosaic Stadium.  It will come with a whimper not a bang.  The team will go gentle into that good night.

A stout Roughriders defense will keep the game close in the first half, but the wheels will come off in the second half as despondency sets in. Repeated swing passes for three-yard losses, as the game grows further out of reach, will begin to produce a smattering of boos.

A nervous home crowd will offer tepid support at times, but their heart won’t be in it. They know what’s coming. The Roughriders offered the appearance of competency throughout the 2021 season, but there is no spark this year.  The hollow thud off the crossbar continues to echo throughout Riderville.

A workman-like effort from Bo Levi Mitchell, who will not appear to break a sweat, and a 100 yard-plus performance from Ka-Drew Carey, or whatever his name is, will carry the Stampeders to a similarly workmanlike beating from the Winnipeg Blue Bombers next week.

This West Semi-Final is an irrelevancy:  two mediocre teams fighting with each other for the right to be crushed by the waiting Blue Bombers.

Prove me wrong, Mr. Fajardo, prove me wrong.

And my Magic 8-Ball? When I asked if the Roughriders will win, it said it would prefer not to tell me now. See? What an asshole.