SO, WHICH VERSION OF THE TIGER-CATS WILL SHOW UP?
The Hamilton Tiger-Cats are so flaky that Head and Shoulders should be an official sponsor.
Hamilton should be head and shoulders above the competition in the CFL’s East Division, given the team’s top-flight personnel on and off the field.
The Tiger-Cats do lead the East, albeit with a 6-6 record. Their fortunes were widely expected to ascend following the return of Zach Collaros, but Hamilton has continued to play .500 football with its star quarterback in the lineup.
The erratic nature of the TigerCats makes their next game — Saturday night’s date with the host Saskatchewan Roughriders — especially difficult to call.
Which version of the TigerCats will show up?
If the Tabbies can reprise their performance of Aug. 20, when the visiting Roughriders were eviscerated by a 53-7 count, Mosaic Stadium could be virtually empty mere minutes after the winner of the 50-50 draw is announced.
The Tiger-Cats of 2016 really are a 50-50 proposition. To date, they have won half the time, while showing dramatically different sides from one half of football to the next. They can face double-digit deficits and crawl out of a cavernous hole in sudden, stirring fashion. You just never know. That is what makes Saturday’s game especially intriguing.
Logically, Hamilton should win handily. After all, the Tiger-Cats are poised to oppose a team that has the league’s worst record (2-10).
The Tiger-Cats’ injuries are piling up, but that hardly makes them unique. The Roughriders, for example, are without their premier receiver (Naaman Roosevelt) and both starting guards (veterans Brendon LaBatte and Chris Best).
Despite the absences of all three players, Saskatchewan was able to post a 26-23 overtime victory over the visiting Edmonton Eskimos on Sunday.
That conquest followed three consecutive games in which the Roughriders were competitive, only to lose by margins of eight, three and seven points.
The Roughriders have performed with some consistency in four games since the aforementioned debacle at Tim Hortons Field.
The defence, which had been predictably porous in the earlier meeting with Hamilton, has become less pliable.
Darian Durant, who served up his first four interceptions of the season during the Beatdown In Steeltown, has subsequently managed the offence in a manner that gives the Roughriders a chance to win. And they do have a chance on Saturday night.
Hamilton is the superior team, and there is not a better coach in three-down football than the Tiger-Cats’ Kent Austin. But his team’s enigmatic nature creates the possibility that Saskatchewan could eke out a victory.
So let’s go with that: Saskatchewan 21, Hamilton 20.