FRIDAY COMMENTARY – DRATS
(Listen daily for the Rod Pedersen Commentary on Cat Country 98 FM & Rock 98.5 FM)
IT WAS DEFINITELY THE SHOT HEARD ACROSS THE CFL.
TRAGEDY – IN FOOTBALL TERMS – STRUCK THE SASKATCHEWAN ROUGHRIDERS ON THURSDAY WHEN NO LESS THAN FOUR PLAYERS WENT DOWN WITH ACHILLES TENDONS INJURIES ON DAY 3 OF TEAM WORKOUTS AT MOSAIC STADIUM.
THE NEWS WENT ACROSS THE CFL LIKE A B-C WILDFIRE, AND LEAGUE PERSONNEL AND FANS ARE STILL TALKING ABOUT IT TODAY.
THE PLAYERS, BY NAME, ARE FIRST ROUND PICK NELSON LOKOMBO, STARTING DEFENSIVE PLAYERS LARRY DEAN AND FREDDIE BISHOP, AND ROOKIE CANADIAN RUNNING BACK JONATHAN FEMI-COLE.
MY FIRST THOUGHT WAS, HOW ARE THEY GOING TO REPLACE THESE GUYS? ROSTERS ARE SOMEWHAT LIMITED DUE TO COVID RESTRICTIONS AND TO GET NEW FACES IN, ESPECIALLY AMERICANS, SEEMS LIKE A NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE TASK WITH THE QUARANTINE RULES. IT CERTAINLY IS IF THEY WANT TO BE HERE BEFORE THE START OF TRAINING CAMP ON SATURDAY.
MY NEXT THOUGHT WAS SYMPATHY FOR THE PLAYERS. THESE GUYS HAVE SACRIFICED SO MUCH JUST TO PLAY AND NOW THEIR SEASON’S OVER AND TRAINING CAMP HASN’T EVEN STARTED YET!
THE BUZZ IN THE LEAGUE IS HOW OR WHY THE RIDERS WERE HOLDING SUCH WORKOUTS IN THE FIRST PLACE? GM JEREMY O’DAY WAS QUICK TO POINT OUT THURSDAY THAT THESE WERE NON-CONTACT DRILLS AND SAID THEY BASICALLY ADDED UP TO MULTIPLE FREAK ACCIDENTS, THE LIKES OF WHICH HE’S NEVER BEFORE SEEN.
WERE ANY RULES BROKEN AROUND THESE WORKOUTS? THAT’S WHAT EVERYBODY’S ASKING BUT I TRULY DOUBT IT. GROUP ACTIVITIES WERE CLEARED AFTER THREE NEGATIVE COVID TESTS AND THAT WAS THE CASE HERE.
IF THERE’S ONE THING ABOUT O’DAY, HE GOES BY THE BOOK. WHETHER THESE WORKOUTS ARE WITHIN THE RULES OR NOT WAS THE LEAST OF MY CONCERNS.
BUT WITH TRAINING CAMP LOOMING ON SATURDAY AND NOW SOME GIGANTIC HOLES ON THE RIDER DEFENSE, THINGS JUST GOT A LOT MORE INTERESTING.
WHY DID SUCH A FREAK THING HAPPEN ALL IN ONE DAY?
YOU’D HAVE TO ASK THE FOOTBALL GODS ABOUT THAT.
THAT’S TODAY’S ROD PEDERSEN COMMENTARY
Word was out out a few weeks back asking who would be the first team to screw up CFL Covid19 protocol and the Saskatchewan Roughriders were at the top of the list, lo and behold it came true, no surprise there.
How is this even REMOTELY related to Covid???
Think Boltboy think. CFL’S return to play predicated by bargained agreements by various govt agencies, Justin Toudoo and his clueless crew, the CFLeague, clueless Randy, players union, etc etc and on and on it goes.
The story has yet to be written on this. Whether in the rules or not, something’s not right when you have 4 guys go down within minutes with similar injuries. This could be the end of careers for a couple of them. This may be the beginning, as it was with retirements where a small trickle led to a flood of them. How many players had access to gyms, how many kept true to the training when the season shut down? We have all our gym equipment downstairs & if we lay off working out for a month or two,… Read more »
The turf not right after that heavy Ice melted on the football playing field.
WASN’T THERE A LOT OF TALK AFTER LEGENDARY RIDER QB DARIAN DURANT WENT DOWN WITH AN ACHILLES… THAT TOO MUCH FOCUS ON MUSCLE AND BULKING UP WITH LOW REP HIGH WEIGHT EXERCISES? AS OPPOSED TO MORE DYNAMIC WORKOUTS.
Look, There are known knowns, that is to say there are things a team would know about starting a camp. There are also known unknowns and as this is the first training camp back after close to 2 years. There are things a team knows they do not know when starting one of these – first would be how are they going to react getting tagged? We don’t know…..well now we do. Then there are the unknown unknowns. There are things they can’t fathom, but if they look at Murphy’s law concept it should be a good indicator to plan… Read more »