MIKE STACKHOUSE’S 10 THOUGHTS

1 – FAJARDO: I give the Calgary Stampeders credit.  They made sure Cody Fajardo didn’t have the ball at the end of the game on Friday night and they secured the victory.  I’m a little out of the loop this week on the goings on in Rider Nation, but it sounds like someone broke into Fajardo’s car this week as well.  These are the types of things that we really can’t do anything about but when they occur, they put a stain on the reputation of Regina and Saskatchewan, in general.  It’s disappointing.

2 – NOT A BIG LOSS: The Riders were due to suffer a defeat and the Stamps were the home team on top of being a very formidable foe.  I felt that the two clubs looked pretty close to even for most of the night and the result didn’t do anything for me as far as thinking the Roughriders can win the Grey Cup.  Shaq Evans may have to keep the heat turned off in his home this week to get himself used to playing in the cold down the stretch, but there is no reason to deviate from the notion that this is a three horse race between Calgary, Saskatchewan, and Hamilton.  Everyone else falls in line after that but there is a big gap after the top three teams.

3 – EHLERS: I find that Saskatchewan Roughrider fans are hard on their players (example, Fajardo) while Winnipeg Jet fans are the opposite.  They think the marginal player is an all-star. I was at the Jets game on Tuesday and I’ve been to, approximately, 6-8 Jets games a year over the last handful of seasons and I watch over 50 Jets games a year.  I feel as though I have a decent grip on how their players are doing. It’s time to just admit Nikolaj Ehlers isn’t worth $6-million a year. I’m not even sure he’s worth half of that amount. He has 0 career playoff goals in 21 games.  He has never scored 30 goals in a season and he gets prime ice time game in and game out. He’s also a liability defensively and isn’t the least bit physical. Yet, try and convince a Jets fan that Ehlers and his contract may already be an albatross and you won’t get far.  He’s loved and some even think he’s underpaid. Here are some other players making $6-million a year: Jonathan Huberdeau, Taylor Hall, Gabriel Landeskog, Filip Forsberg, Jonathan Marchessault, and Shea Weber. Ehlers should be, but isn’t, in the class as those aforementioned players.  He looks great skating real fast and carrying the puck. But, he’s not helping when he’s eating up second unit powerplay minutes and second line ice time that could be given to someone else who may do more with it.

4 – JETS REVIEW: It’s early in the season, but I really like what I’m seeing in Patrik Laine.  He’s skating hard and back checking. It’s resulted in nine assists through eight games and a much more complete player.  Jack Roslovic looks much improved as well. He appears more confident and fit right in with Blake Wheeler and Mark Scheifele for about ten minutes on Tuesday night when Laine had to go for repairs from a high stick.  Andrew Copp has only three points through eight games centring the second line, but he’s got Ehlers out there with him and that hurts. I don’t know where this team would be without Josh Morrissey. He’s the only bonafide top four defenseman on the team, with all due respect Neal Pionk, who appears to be a solid NHLer, but nothing super special.  The other four who played on Tuesday looked out of their league and need more seasoning or are just not good enough. In goal, I talked about Connor Hellebuyck last week and with Laurent Brossoit struggling, you can expect Hellebuyck to mirror whatever his back-up is doing.

5 – MLB VETERANS: The analytical data will tell you that it’s unwise to use older players in Major League Baseball, but here are the six oldest teams in the big leagues this year:  Washington, Yankees, Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, and St. Louis. All six made the playoffs. It’s just more fuel on the fire to suggest most MLB clubs have no desire to win.

6 – MAYBE THEY SHOULDN’T: I suppose when the Philadelphia Phillies pay Bryce Harper over $300-million and they go from 80 to 81 wins, why should teams fork over heavy dough for superstars?  The team Harper left, the Nationals, are headed to the World Series. It’s not that I’ve advocated for handing over big contracts, I just don’t believe in giving away good talent for lotto tickets.  For example, trading away Marcus Stroman for pennies on the dollar makes no sense to me. If he wants too much money come free agency, then let him go. But, find someone else who can help the team for the amount of money you have available for Stroman that you didn’t use.  That’s all I’d like to see teams do. Anibal Sanchez was paid $6-million this year. There isn’t a team in baseball that shouldn’t be able to afford that.

7 – COLE SILLINGER: It’s quite an accomplishment when you really sit down and think about it.  Sillinger is a 2003 born WHL forward with the Medicine Hat Tigers and he is third on their team in scoring despite being a player who should be on the Regina Pat Canadians for this season and next.  But, he’s too good for the Midget AAA level and he’s finding life to be, relatively, easy in the WHL playing against many who are three years older than him, some even four years older than him. When you are 16, you are still a kid.  When you are 20, you are pretty much a young man. No problem for Sillinger so far.

8 – PFC SEMI FINALS: I suspect the Saskatoon Hilltops will win, easily, over the Edmonton Wildcats and then they’ll host the winner of the Regina Thunder-Edmonton Huskies game for the PFC championship.  The Thunder-Huskies game has the makings of a classic. I like the talent on the Thunder more than what is on the Huskies, but the Huskies don’t give you many opportunities to beat them. They are fundamentally sound.  Blake Scherle and Declan O’Flaherty, in my opinion, are the two best quarterbacks in the conference but the game may come down to star running backs Brandt Burzuk from Edmonton (6.4 yards per carry and 6 touchdowns) and the duo of Brayden Long (5.6 ypc, 2 td) and Gregory Lamb (6.1 ypc, 2td) from the Thunder.  Ultimately, if the Thunder win the turnover battle, I think they will win this game.

9 – TRUDEAU: Overwhelming support in the comments section last week for my remarks on climate change and the phoniness of Justin Trudeau (some of you have even taken the time to see how much I don’t support him on my Twitter feed), so I will close this week by saying I’m very skeptical about the validity of the issue last weekend where he came out with Ghostbuster like looking security people and he was wearing a bulletproof vest as a result of a supposed threat on his life that was so dangerous that he needed to send Sophie and the kids home, but it was perfectly okay for him to mingle in close quarters with 400 vulnerable supporters.  He was looking for the sympathy vote and the whole thing was a ruse. If I’m wrong, so be it. But, that’s what you get for lying every time you speak for four years.

10 – UNIFOR STRIKE: I have no use for Jerry Dias, but the reality is that this is a bad look for our provincial government.  You can’t give your politicians a raise and try to lead by example and then turn around and say there is no money for the public servants.  I realize there is a lot more to it than that and I’m over simplifying it; but that’s really the nuts and bolts. I also saw pictures on Twitter of the Sasktel CEO and SaskPower CEO posing with striking workers.  That’s like a worker crossing a picket line and then posing for a photo with the managers inside. Right or wrong, the government is beat on this one. Pay them and let’s get back to normal. Having said that, it is a bit puzzling as to how all these people can go on strike and I haven’t noticed one bit as far as my service is concerned.

(Mike Stackhouse is a freelance reporter/broadcaster. Follow him on Twitter at @Stack1975)