Did the CFL go to far to boost Argos?

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joe kapp22
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B.C.FAN wrote:
TheLionKing wrote:Conspiracy theorists unite ! I don't think for a nanosecond that the league strong armed the Eskimos in giving away Ricky Ray. Even with Ray, the Argos are still a long ways from being a contender.
With Ray's salary to pay, the Argos are less likely to be able to sign their own free-agent linemen, Rob Murphy, Dominic Picard and Taylor Robertson. The Argos have 13 free agents, second only to Winnipeg. The full impact of this trade is yet to be felt in Argoland.
Well, not quite so, meaning if the Argos wish, they can exceed the SMS, they just have to pay the tax for so doing and as Wally told Dante and Phillips this past offeason:

"We were 7-11, we don't give raises for not winning"

Argos went what, 4-14? It is not as if they would do worse if they turned the roster over, that has been a poor team for yrs.
Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground ... These things cannot be explained in detail. From one thing, know ten thousand things. When you attain the Way of strategy there will not be one thing you cannot see. You must study hard.
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joe kapp22
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cromartie wrote:Let me see if I understand this correctly. With television ratings near an all time high, six of eight teams likely breaking even or showing a profit and three teams getting new stadiums, the league has to cut the throat of one of it's marquee west teams in order to boost up t Toronto in order to prop up a Grey Cup for....what reason exactly? Because teams can't do well if Toronto doesn't do well?
-Ratings slipped downwards this yr
-Argos were privately telling people they were drawing 8k per game
-recall the Mayor of Toronto was publicly hostile to the Argos and openly preferred trying to lure an NFL team

The Argos Franchise was in a very bad place.


This isn't the 1990s. Stop pretending the league is still a bush league enterprise that has to do things like this to survive. We aren't at the point where it is indestructible, but we are approaching the point where it has earned it's place with a pretty solid break even niche in the sporting marketplace.

Never attribute to conspiracy that which can instead be attributed to stupidity, ego or neglect.
Heh, you'll never find me saying such a thing, I love the CFL, one is a bit sensitive and over compensating methinks/.

Why is it there are several points made in my OP, all ignored save for what I considered the smallest point?

The Argos franchise has tried the"star" approach before, it did not create long term success for the franchise, does repeating it make sense to anyone?
Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground ... These things cannot be explained in detail. From one thing, know ten thousand things. When you attain the Way of strategy there will not be one thing you cannot see. You must study hard.
Buonosjanet69
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joe kapp22 wrote:
Buonosjanet69 wrote:my dream is to see the Lions go unbeaten all season and face the Argos in the Grey Cup in a tight game. Imagine the tv ratngs for that?

Now that I've snapped out of that thinking :wink: the trade is a shot in the arm for the East. And for those who say Cavillo is showing his age, trust me he can still get it done. The CFL needs to be strong in the East (esp Toronto) before it can comptemplate expansion, this is a step in the right direction.
I've found this sentiment among some of us fans of the CFL, so please do not think I'm singling you out BuonosJanet, that is not my intention.
So long as I'm not singled out for spelling contemplate or Calvillo wrong, it'a all good :cool:

Cohon is not the commish, Braley is!

- conspiracy theory #22
geroy_simon_081
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The conspiracy theories are ridiculous and have no base. This is 100% Tillman and nothing more. The notion that ANY team is going to help out the argos is laughable. So Tillman is going to purposely make his team worse to help out a team that doesn't pay his salary and risk losing his job?

The Eskimos are taking a lot of heat with this decision and from a business stand point, this will hurt them financially a lot. There's NO WAY on god's green earth this was done to "boost" the argos. None...next.
ziggy
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Maybe Edmonton also had a players council and they deemed Ricky had to go?
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cromartie
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joe kapp22 wrote:
Heh, you'll never find me saying such a thing, I love the CFL, one is a bit sensitive and over compensating methinks/.

Why is it there are several points made in my OP, all ignored save for what I considered the smallest point?

The Argos franchise has tried the"star" approach before, it did not create long term success for the franchise, does repeating it make sense to anyone?
Whatever "points" you're trying to make are based on an absurd and tiresome premise. Tillman has traded quarterbacks in the primes of their careers on prior occasions. The Eskimos are up against the cap and have needs in multiple areas. When there are multiple legitimate reasons to make a trade, delving into 'conspiracy to benefit Toronto OMGBRALEYRULEZLEAGUELEAGUEISBUSHLOL territory is both absurd and unnecessary.

Toronto is and for the next few years will be a difficult market in which to operate a team. They have no recent consistent legacy of winning for which to build a fanbase, a certain percentage of the populace that considers itself too good for the CFL, though for the most part the NFL dream is a baby boomer oriented pipe dream that resides in Ted Rogers coffin, Paul Godfrey's crypt, and Rob Ford's spitoon, they have a mediocre stadium in the worst possible place and they consistently support the Leafs and only the Leafs.

However, if you can get four seasons of competitive play out of a team centered around Ricky Ray and results in a vein similar to what you got in BC with DD, and you trust Jim Barker to build a front office that knows what it's doing (as opposed to the days when Paul Masotti was in the front office) you can get the Argos to the point where they go from treading water to breaking even. Equally important, you buy yourself enough time to develop the next Travis Lulay behind him.

Toronto has sufford the staggered misfortuntes of having a good business organization and a bad team, or a good team and a bad business organization. What David Braley is trying to do is to get good pieces of both in the same place at the same time. One thinks the pieces are getting in place on the business side, while the Ray acquisition, like the Dickenson acquisition, is the start to the latter on the product side. And he and the league are done a disservice when people like you and Cam Cole blow the dust off the conspiracy theory nonsense.
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joe kapp22
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ziggy wrote:Maybe Edmonton also had a players council and they deemed Ricky had to go?

Zing!!!

:roar:

Cromartie, the thing to me is, was this the right move to help to grow the Argos?

From a purely football business pov.
Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground ... These things cannot be explained in detail. From one thing, know ten thousand things. When you attain the Way of strategy there will not be one thing you cannot see. You must study hard.
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cromartie
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joe kapp22 wrote:
ziggy wrote:Maybe Edmonton also had a players council and they deemed Ricky had to go?

Zing!!!

:roar:

Cromartie, the thing to me is, was this the right move to help to grow the Argos?

From a purely football business pov.
Yes. You can only do so much to improve how your product is marketed, perceived and sold without improving the quality of the product itself. Ricky Ray accomplishes this, as Dave Dickenson did in a way keeping Damon Allen was not going to.
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I see the deal as being nothing more than a football move. As solid as Ray has been the Eskimos have been mired in mediocre to OK football for several years now. Edmonton won 2 Cups in Ray's first 3 CFL seasons. 6 seasons and a lot of change has happened since Edmonton's last trip to the big game. In that time each one of Edmonton's divisional rivals have sipped champagne from Earl Grey's goblet. Everybody respects Ray and knows on any given game day he can be as good as any QB. I find there to be a cerebral aspect to his personality that gives me the impression he doesn't quite elevate his teammates' game to that next level like Calvillo does and I think Lulay is doing. I think Tillman and Reed have simply decided it was time to go in another direction at QB. I think likely they will be looking for somebody who brings more to the table in terms of a multi-dimensional game. Sometimes you have to take a step backwards to make a leap forward. If you've decided you want to go in a different direction at QB then keeping an incumbent like Ray around will serve more as a roadblock to making that inevitable change. He's in his prime and he never plays poorly enough to warrant a benching like the one Burris earned this year. Tillman has shown he is not afraid to make big moves like this. After Kerry Joseph won the MOP in 2007 and the Riders won the Grey Cup he traded Joseph. In getting Jyles I think they are looking at a stop gap measure while they find their real long term solution which could well be Eric Ward or Matt Nicholls or somebody else they sign or acquire in the offseason.
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B.C.FAN
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I see this as a good football move for the Argos, with positive side-effects for the business operation. The CFL is a quarterback-driven league. Ricky Ray is one of the elite quarterbacks in the league and makes the Argos better. They can build a contender around him. This isn't like bringing in a maquee American college running back or quarterback. That almost never helps a CFL team. Ray is a proven CFL commodity. He may be the best quarterback in the East next year if Calvillo's production slips at age 40.
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ziggy wrote:Maybe Edmonton also had a players council and they deemed Ricky had to go?
:wink: :wink:
Buonosjanet69
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cromartie wrote:
joe kapp22 wrote:
Heh, you'll never find me saying such a thing, I love the CFL, one is a bit sensitive and over compensating methinks/.

Why is it there are several points made in my OP, all ignored save for what I considered the smallest point?

The Argos franchise has tried the"star" approach before, it did not create long term success for the franchise, does repeating it make sense to anyone?
Whatever "points" you're trying to make are based on an absurd and tiresome premise. Tillman has traded quarterbacks in the primes of their careers on prior occasions. The Eskimos are up against the cap and have needs in multiple areas. When there are multiple legitimate reasons to make a trade, delving into 'conspiracy to benefit Toronto OMGBRALEYRULEZLEAGUELEAGUEISBUSHLOL territory is both absurd and unnecessary.

Toronto is and for the next few years will be a difficult market in which to operate a team. They have no recent consistent legacy of winning for which to build a fanbase, a certain percentage of the populace that considers itself too good for the CFL, though for the most part the NFL dream is a baby boomer oriented pipe dream that resides in Ted Rogers coffin, Paul Godfrey's crypt, and Rob Ford's spitoon, they have a mediocre stadium in the worst possible place and they consistently support the Leafs and only the Leafs.

However, if you can get four seasons of competitive play out of a team centered around Ricky Ray and results in a vein similar to what you got in BC with DD, and you trust Jim Barker to build a front office that knows what it's doing (as opposed to the days when Paul Masotti was in the front office) you can get the Argos to the point where they go from treading water to breaking even. Equally important, you buy yourself enough time to develop the next Travis Lulay behind him.

Toronto has sufford the staggered misfortuntes of having a good business organization and a bad team, or a good team and a bad business organization. What David Braley is trying to do is to get good pieces of both in the same place at the same time. One thinks the pieces are getting in place on the business side, while the Ray acquisition, like the Dickenson acquisition, is the start to the latter on the product side. And he and the league are done a disservice when people like you and Cam Cole blow the dust off the conspiracy theory nonsense.
also build a new stadium on the smaller side, drive up the demand with more limited supply of tix like you have in Montreal and have the Argos play some playoff games at Rogers Centre, making that experience somewhat intriguing again. But first thing is first: sound management, good QB and build from there. The cap is in place so we won't see any Ismail-like contracts in this big market ever again :cool:
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cromartie
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JohnHenry wrote: You are also wrong in your "recollection" that Toronto's mayor was publicly hostile towards the Argos or "preferred trying to lure an NFL team." (sic) Show me any public quote from mayor Ford (public this time, not private) where he said anything negative about the Argos or that he preferred the NFL? :clown:
http://www.torontolife.com/daily/inform ... -the-city/

Complete with the twin doofus front page photo.

I'm with you on the 8k number though, because that's absurd. The numbers at Argos games I make it to are much closer to 20k. You could tell me that they're limping along with an 8k season ticket base and even if that were plausible, I'd say that is still miles ahead of where they were 10 years ago.
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joe kapp22
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cromartie wrote:
JohnHenry wrote: You are also wrong in your "recollection" that Toronto's mayor was publicly hostile towards the Argos or "preferred trying to lure an NFL team." (sic) Show me any public quote from mayor Ford (public this time, not private) where he said anything negative about the Argos or that he preferred the NFL? :clown:
http://www.torontolife.com/daily/inform ... -the-city/

Complete with the twin doofus front page photo.

I'm with you on the 8k number though, because that's absurd. The numbers at Argos games I make it to are much closer to 20k. You could tell me that they're limping along with an 8k season ticket base and even if that were plausible, I'd say that is still miles ahead of where they were 10 years ago.
I follow Twitter closely throughout the day, and that is exactly what was said, that does not mean tickets sold, it does mean actual people in the stands.

Either the mayor, or his idiot brother, were going on and on about all of the billions the other league would bring into the local economy, meaning the Argos..weren't going to, add in he spoke about it not costing taxpayers a dime (yeah right).

Personally I agree with the sentiment that Braley would have never let the Argos get stuck playing ball in the stadium they are in, it is my hope he can somehow get the Argos a new facility.
Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground ... These things cannot be explained in detail. From one thing, know ten thousand things. When you attain the Way of strategy there will not be one thing you cannot see. You must study hard.
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