Als need to find a new general manager next season
CFL club needs to hit reset button after latest stinker Sunday against Ottawa
The truest thing about sports fans is they will forgive anything if you win.
Doping? Did you see that home run?
Completely obnoxious, dysfunctional personality? Meet Nick Saban, coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide.
A systematic culture of cheating? How about Bill Belichick and the Patriots, eh?
Bizarre temper tantrums? Treating reporters like doggie doo? Not nice, but look what John Tortorella has done for the Columbus Blue Jackets.
We could go on. The outrage, when it’s expressed at all, is mostly from the media. The fans want spectacle. They want outrageous feats. They want Ws. They want parades. Give them that and they’ll forgive the shabby treatment of a coach or three.
On a scale of Saban to Barry Bonds, what the Alouettes did to their coaching staff last week is small potatoes. The team was losing, after all. Badly. When teams lose, coaches walk the plank, even if (as is often the case) it’s someone else’s fault.
In general, there is no loyalty in professional sports — and little honour. When there is loyalty, as in Marc Bergevin’s loyalty to Michel Therrien, it is sneered at as though loyalty was a character flaw.
So we can’t be too surprised at the dismissal of Alouettes head coach Jacques Chapdelaine and defensive coordinator Noel Thorpe. Chapdelaine, the veteran assistant finally promoted to head coach, couldn’t coax much out of the offence and with the team in a state of collapse, the skids were greased.
But there is no earthly way Thorpe should have been part of this. Since the end of Anthony Calvillo’s Hall of Fame career at quarterback, Thorpe’s defence has been the only thing standing between the Als and a winless season. Game after game, coaching change after coaching change, the defence made this team look better than it was.
Yes, the defence of late had some bad games. It happens, especially when the offence is producing nothing but two-andouts or interceptions thrown into triple coverage. Firing Thorpe under these circumstances was Jim Popp shabby.
But a win against the division rival Ottawa Redblacks Sunday with GM Kavis Reed acting as interim head coach and the fans, always eager to forgive and forget, might have turned the page.
Instead, despite home-field advantage and facing Ottawa’s third-string defence for a good part of the game, the Alouettes turned in another stinker in a 29-11 loss to the Redblacks that opened the new era with a thud.
This one was lost by the midpoint of the second quarter in large part because of the strange case of the yips on the part of starting quarterback Darian Durant. This wasn’t a case of Durant throwing into triple coverage — it was simply that Durant couldn’t throw a football.
With a series of reasonably short throws to open receivers any good midget football quarterback could make, Durant short-hopped the passes. It was reminiscent of former Dodgers second baseman Steve Sax, who developed a legendary case of the yips after a play against the Expos in which he made an errant throw home with Andre Dawson standing at third.
After that, Sax suddenly couldn’t hit the first baseman with routine throws he’d been making all his life. It was that way with Durant: you know he’s been making those throws since he was 10 years old, but that ability deserted him Sunday.
Twice in a row, the Alouettes had something good happen, the first time on a brilliant interception by Jonathan Mincy, the second time on an outstanding runback by Stefan Logan. Each time, Durant short-hopped the offence to a two-and-out.
Reed finally bowed to the obvious and got backup Drew Willy onto the field, but by the time Willy got his rhythm and began playing a pretty good game, it was too late. The Alouettes would fall to 3-9 and if there’s any life left in the carcass, it’s only because the CFL East is so thoroughly rancid.
For the third time in three seasons (a CFL record) the Alouettes have fired a coach midseason. And to add to the bizarre record, each time the GM was involved in the coaching change. In 2015, Popp fired Tom Higgins and took the reins himself. Last season, Popp was eased out of the job and it was handed to Chapdelaine. This year, Reed bounced Chapdelaine and took over.
There’s a pattern here and it’s all bad. You can’t build anything when you’re firing a coach every year. You can’t build anything in football when the quarterback position is such a revolving door that fans expect to see Vince Ferragamo take the field any day now.
There is no point making further changes in a lost season. During the off-season, the Als are going to have to hit the reset button with a new GM and a new head coach.
In their search for a competent GM, the Als should interview anyone not named Eric Tillman.
As for a new head coach,
I heard a chap named Noel Thorpe is available.
You can’t build anything when you’re firing a coach every year. You can’t build anything ... when the quarterback position is such a revolving door.