Tuesday Morning QB (CFL Week 10)
Things were not looking great for the Montreal Alouettes at the beginning of the season with a quick coach search and no definitive answer at quarterback seemed to make them the laughing stock of the league again.
They had plenty of experience in that position and nobody could see much of an end after they fired their head coach weeks before the new season.
That coach had only recently decided that Antonio Pipkin would take the starting role over Vernon Adams after the team was forced to release Johnny Manziel.
It was another year of an organization seemingly doing everything they could to lose games and the addition of a new ownership search only made things worse.
By all accounts, it was another season lost and once again it seemed to only get worse when Pipkin was hurt early in the season.
The coaching search and the injury to Pipkin turned out to be the best things to happen to this team in years.
The hiring of Khari Jones was unexpected but it has turned out a team with a new attitude that has helped them to be competitive.
Jones has long been an offensive mind in the league but never really got much of a look as a head coach.
In a season where DeVone Claybrooks and Orlando Steinauer were the go-to guys, a veteran offensive coordinator wasn’t necessarily the top choice least of all for a team with a head coach entering his second year.
Mike Sherman was fired though and the Alouettes looked internally to find their guy and so Jones was brought in as the new head coach.
It may not have worked out immediately but as the season has moved on his style has begun to take over the team.
He is far more laid back than the former head coach of the team, constantly smiling and even dancing on the sidelines.
That has led to a team that seems to trust in him and want to do well to make sure he remains in this position.
His biggest asset was the fact that in every position he held before this he was a QB whisperer but that didn’t seem to be the case at the start of the year.
The Als struggled on offence with Pipkin only throwing for 57 yards before an injury took him out of the game in Week 1.
That is when the next twist of fate came in as Vernon Adams took over and seemed to have a better command of the offence.
It was still a loss in Week 1 but there were some signs of life and it only increased in Week 4 when William Stanback went off for 203 yards.
That provided the spark and Adams began carrying the torch for a team that began to compete every week.
They won three straight games and were competitive when Adams was under centre although an injury kept him out for a few weeks.
He returned in Week 10 and led the Als to what could be the signature win of this campaign.
Just like their season, the Als looked out of it early against the Stampeders as they continued to fight but couldn’t prevent the big plays allowing the Stamps to build a lead.
That lead began to slip away in the fourth though as Adams was able to lead the Als back into the game and eventually tied the game up.
After two overtime mini-games, the Als took the win in one of the wildest games in recent memory and the best comeback of the season.
For the Als, this seems like a launching pad for what could be an unexpected season as they haven’t even hit Labour Day yet and are making progress towards the top of the division.
With the Tiger-Cats losing their star quarterback they are vulnerable, albeit not entirely out of it, and the Als have already split the season series so far with them.
They are looking like a team that has gone through just about everything that a team can go through and are beginning to turn things around.
With a game against the worst team in the league set for Week 11 the Alouettes should be able to get beyond .500 and start their march to the top.
If they can do it, this season could be a turning point for a team that seemed to constantly be in the hunt for the Grey Cup.
They could find their way back to being a team to fear and the rest of the season will be that transformation in real-time.
Fourth Down
Another QB Down
It has been a bad year to be a quarterback in the CFL as almost every team has lost their Week 1 starter to injury. There were only three teams who still had their top starter under centre in Week 10 but that number fell to two teams by the time the week was finished. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers had been the best team in the league throughout the year and a big part of that has been the play of Matt Nichols who compliments Andrew Harris so well. Nichols went down with an upper-body injury and landed on the 6-game injury list. It leaves the Bombers with a familiar situation as they have dealt with injuries that have derailed their seasons. They hope to keep it going with Chris Streveler taking over into the heart of the season.
More Questions in Toronto
As Toronto’s season continues to get worse they are suffering issues both on and off of the field the latest coming with their star running back. Coming back from their bye week, James Wilder returned to the team late leading to some questions about his future with the team. Just before their game on Friday, it was revealed that Wilder was a healthy scratch. Rumours have begun to swirl about whether it was Wilder who took himself out of the game or the team took him out of the game. That scratch has led to only more rumours about Wilder as his time in Toronto might be done after years of in-fighting between him and the team.
The Sport Addiction 