LUKE WILLSON INADVERTENTLY CRAPS ON THE NFL, NHL & ALL SPORTS IN GENERAL

Luke Willson posted a note on social media critical of the June 20th game between the Saskatchewan Roughriders and the Toronto Argonauts. Here’s the link:

Luke Willson on X: “I told you I would be honest and tell the truth about the CFL. If the goal is to grow the game and attract a younger demographic, the on field product of the Sask/Toronto game is just not going to cut it. That game was hot garbage…Let me be clear in saying that I don’t think” / X

We’ll have to see if Mr. Willson still has a job with TSN after shitting all over one of the network’s crown jewels, although I suspect Argos head coach Ryan Dinwiddie would probably agree with everything Mr. Willson said and immediately hire Mr. Willson as a consultant (if not special teams coach).

Speaking for myself and possible my mom (who lets me live in her basement), I don’t like the tone of Mr.  Willson’s post because it reeks of the kind of implied pro-NFL bias that is just plain boring at this point.  The CFL does not have the same quality of play as the NFL because there is more money down south (and the NFL finally decided to let African Americans play quarterback). 

This money thing is same reason no Canadian NHL hockey teams will ever win the Stanley up again; the money and lifestyle in the USA will always pull the best players south.

Sure, Connor McDavid is up in Canada, but for every Connor McDavid, Guy Lafleur and Maurice Richard, there is a Sidney Crosby, Bobby Orr, Bobby Hull, Brett Hull, Phil Esposito, Mario Lemieux, Connor Bedard and for chrissakes Gordie Howe. 

You can say some of those players were drafted by the US-based teams, so they had no choice but to play in the United States, but what about the all-time greats that headed south after they served their time in Canada?  Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier, Jari Kurri, Paul Coffey, Glenn Anderson and Kevin Lowe all got the hell out of the “City of Champions”.  If you can get out of Canada, you do, and you stay out. 

Eric Lindros flatly refused to play in Canada.

When is the last time a top Canadian player, starting his career in an American city, subsequently decided to move up to Canada?  Are you crazy? 

Four of the last six Stanley Cup Champions are from Florida, and one of the others is from Las Vegas.  Las Vegas?  Fuuuuuuck….

And with the latest rule changes at the US college level, particularly now that US college sports are dropping the façade of amateurism, no young hockey player with an interest in going pro is going to play in the CHL much longer, and certainly not at a Canadian university—if you are smart enough to go to a Canadian university, you are smart enough to know it’s a hockey dead end.

The Canadian NHL teams are the CFL of the NHL. We still love our Canadian NHL teams, but they are the unofficial minor league of the US-based NHL teams. They can’t compete with the allure of the US-NHL teams. Canadian-based NHL players are still world-class professional athletes, just as all CFL players are world-class professional athletes, but those football players that have a chance to play for the big money in the US of A are gonna do it. A lot of the time, it’s just bad luck or bad timing that a CFL player doesn’t stick in the NFL, but you cannot fault him for trying.

So yeah, Mr. Willson pointing out the sometimes sloppy play during the Riders/Argos tilt is completely valid criticism, but that’s just an unfortunate side effect of the impact money has on professional sports in North America, not just professional football.

Anyway, I think having a Don Cherry-esque “tell-it-like-it-is” shit-disturbing loose cannon commentator with terrible hair around like Mr. Willson, shooting his mouth off and risking getting fired, is absolutely great for the league. It keeps everyone talking about the league; it even gets ignorant lumps like me posting on my irrelevant website. 

Where I diverge from the otherwise completely engaging, insightful and interesting Mr. Willson is his veiled criticism of the rouge.  In this regard, Mr. Willson goes too far, I say, too far!

Yes, Brett Lauther missed a chip shot and was nevertheless awarded a single point. The criticism is that the single point rewards failure. It does not.  The single point is the reward for driving the ball far enough down the field that you come away with something. It’s just a rule that all CFL teams have to take into account.

If the single point is a reward for failure, then the field goal is also a reward for failure.  If you cannot get the ball into the endzone via a pass or rush, why should you be allowed to come away with three points on a field goal?  Those three points are a reward for your failure to get into the endzone and get six points. How is it fair that the team that cannot get the ball across the goal line gets to trot out some ancient fat fuck, whose only skill is kicking a ball that is politely place in front of him and carefully held by another player, to try a field goal that is sometimes only a few yards away? Who came up with that bullshit?

And this doesn’t end with Canadian football.  Sports is littered with rules that reward incompetence and failure. Take the NFL.

In the NFL, every offensive series contains a repeated and massive reward for failure.  Fourth down?  Are you kidding me? If your shitty offence, stacked with the best athletes money can buy (see above), can’t get a lousy ten yards in three plays, why should your failure be rewarded with another down? The NFL is a total clown show!

Did you know–and this is true of both the CFL and NFL–that near the end of close games, teams will not even try to score a touchdown? They will be content to run the clock out and kick a field goal to win the game. That’s not a reward for failure, that’s counting on failure!

What about overtime across nearly every sport in the world?  If you cannot win the game in the time allotted, then why should you be allowed some extra time to try to win the game?  That rewards BOTH teams for their failure!

How about baseball, America’s national pastime?

If you cannot hit a home run, why are you rewarded for your failure by being allowed to get on base if you hit a single, double or triple? Do you know how many baseball games have been won by teams failing over and over to hit home runs?  It’s gotten so bad, teams will actually try to avoid home runs entirely (i.e., failing on purpose) by bunting to move players from one base to the next, who themselves were rewarded for their failures by being allowed to stay on base, all designed to get to home plate without hitting a home run. It’s a veritable parade of failure.  And these guys get paid for that.

Three strikes? THREE strikes?!  Every swing after your first swing is a reward for failure.  And if you cannot hit the ball after two swings, it’s time to retire, bucko. And don’t get me started about walks!  You can literally stand at the plate and eat a ham sandwich, and four balls later, you get to walk to first base. No wonder half the MLB players possess the bodies of unemployed garbage men.

How about the Olympics?  You get a medal for third place?  Third place?  That is the original all-time reward for failure. You lost a race? Here’s your medal. You even get a medal if there are only three participants!  You can be in last place and still get a medal. Trust the Greeks to come up with that nonsense.

Ricky Bobby said it best:  If you’re not first, you’re last!

So yeah, call out all the incompetence you want in the CFL, Mr. Willson, but you leave the rouge out of it, dammit!

One more point. When Mr. Willson goes on these rants, he is treating CFL fans like adults. His criticism of the penalties and the incompetent 11-men boobery is spot on.  If the CFL wants to be treated like a professional sports league, it has to accept being scorched for obvious examples of below-professional-level play. Grow up, CFL babies. Mr. Willson is treating us like adults.

But that Mario Alford touchdown… there is no way around it–totally awesome in any league and in any sport.

PS – Mr. Willson needs to do something about his hair. I hope he is not paying someone to cut it. Go back to the manbun if that’s the best you can do.

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