Steel terrible

Well the Hamilton Spectator took some shots at the Blue Bombers and the city of Winnipeg last week — all in the spirit of competition and rivalries no doubt — and, as I mentioned in here before, vibe around the Steel City weeks ago was that Hamilton fans felt the team's best chance for a win was going to come against the beloved Big Blue.

Really?

Well, lo and behod, the Bombers go and pull a blank job on the lowly Cats, move their record to 5-2 and make those who get paid to be experts on the CFL look ridiculous for their pre-season picks.

If you just joined us, the Bombers were picked by many (read: all) experts to:

A) Miss the playoffs
B) Win no more than five games
C) Both.

If you listened to enough of them, you'd probably have heard some suggest the Bombers put corks on the end of their dinner forks for fear that a group so incompetent couldn't possibly eat without poking an eye out with the pronged utensils.

After all, that's what was being said right?

The Bombers still have a ways to go, but second place is almost all but sewn up for them what with Hamilton being egregiously awful and Toronto right there with them. Sure, 5-2 (with Hamilton at home on Friday) is a nice spot to be in but hopefully it doesn't overshadow the fact that there are still glitches.

A few other randoms:

• A Canadian Press article suggested earlier this week that it appeared B.C. was getting back on its horse with back-to-back convincing wins over the Argonauts and Stampeders. I'm not convinced.

Contrary to the scoreboard, the Lions did not look overly sharp against a Toronto team that was downright awful (more on them in a minute). They left a lot of points on the field, started most of their possessions near centrefield and yet left the Argos hanging around until midway through the second half before finally putting the foot down (thanks largely to Toronto's incompetence.)

• The Stampeders have fallen from grace, meaning they are not the media darlings of the league anymore. Seems the consensus was, after a 3-0 start, that the Stamps were giant killers but now, since losing their last four, it would appear that's a joke too. Very simply, how can you trust a team led by Henry Burris? Undoubtedly he has the athletic ability oft coveted in a CFL quaterback, but it's hard for me to imagine a team winning a Cup with him in charge, especially considering he really doesn't have that many weapons around him. Yes, I know Joffrey Reynolds — who I think is the best all-around player in the CFL — and I know Jeremaine Copeland and Nik Lewis, too. I'd just think you need more, especiallyl when Mr. Two Face is at the helm.

• Toronto is in bad shape. That offensive line might be the worst in the history of the league. If you didn't see that when Ricky Williams was having troubles just getting out of the backfield, then it was evident, too, last week when Damon Allen returned to the lineup and was chased out of the pocket nearly every time he dropped back.

Wasn't it just last year when Kent Austin was being praised as an offensive genius? Yet with Allen returning from his broken finger, Austin and the Argos decided to pick up where they left off and start throwing the ball all over the field. Allen, as veteran as he is, doesn't need a bit of time to get to game speed and into the motions? They talk about how great a back-up RB Jeff Johnson is but in the first half he might as well have had ebola, because Allen certainly didn't go anywhere near him.

So back to Guru Austin. Is it not the most basic of football principles that the run sets up the pass, and the pass feeds off the run? Yet here are the Argos, with a rusty quarterback, avoiding the run like the plague and deciding to live and die in the air. It made no sense and it doesn't seem like the decisions that an offensive genius would make. Good thing he didn't come to Winnipeg after all.

• I hate Montreal more than any team I've ever despised. The Cleveland Browns, Sacramento Kings and New York Yankees could assemble a team in the CFL, have Elvira Kurt coaching them, and come out to music by 50 Cent and I still wouldn't hate them as much as I hate Montreal.

Further to that, tell me one person — other than people in the city he works in — that actually LIKES Don Matthews. He's the biggest puke in the history of Canadian football. In fact, I'm getting on the horn tomorrow to track down Lawrence Phillips to see if he wouldn't mind taking a drive into Matthews yard. If he coached the Bombers, I'd honestly have to re-think a lot of things in my life. Perhaps that would be the straw that would make me leave Canada.

• Saskatchewan still stinks, despite winning on Saturday. What a gawd-awful game that was. I will keep to my assertion that so long as Shivers and Barrett are at the helm there, nothing good will come to the Roughriders. Why no one can see that is beyond me.

• I made Bold Prediction No. 3 today. In case you hadn't seen before, I predicted that Ricky Williams would not run for 100 yards against the Bombers (check) and the Bombers would finish 11-7 (pending). So that leads to:

Bold Prediction No. 3:
• The Winnipeg Blue Bombers will not give up a 100-yard rusher this season.

So that's random, completely uninteresting musings from the week that was.

Here, I'll give you my picks too: Montreal (10.5); Winnipeg (6.5); Edmonton (1.5) and Calgary (3.5)