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cromartie
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He belongs in the Ring of Honour. His Orange Lions' jersey #81 will be retired.
I'm not unmindful of this and I absolutely agree with this. I honestly can't remember another instance where what Geroy did happened. Even if it isn't deliberate, it's astoundingly tone deaf.

Again, I don't begrudge the guy for not retiring. I'm glad he's found happiness and won another Grey Cup elsewhere. But man, you don't do that. You just don't.
Also did the Rock N Roll HOF in Cleveland on the same trip I hit Canton. The HHOF is my favourite and I think the best of the bunch. I don't get tired of visiting it. Cooperstown and Canton are just as you say, like peaking into Valhalla. Understandably given the shoestring budget it operates on and its very low-key profile the CFHOF lags far behind the rest. Given how many more teams and organizations etc that have historically been intertwined with the big 4 leagues they simply have exponentially more stuff and history to put on display. Where I can spend all day in the HHOF and most of the day in Cooperstown and Canton I think I've been in and out of the CFHOF in little more than an hour.
This more or less echoes my experience. I was a little underwhelmed in Cooperstown, and I think the RRHOF is overrated. I take friends there when they come to visit, and that ends up being the general consensus. Personally (and I know others will disagree), I like the Rock and Roll Experience in Seattle a little bit more.

The CFHOF does the best it can with the budget it has. They're nice people to boot. The bust room is really something, but I've never been enamored with the rest of it, personally. What really needs to happen, in my opinion, is that they need to establish a Hall of Fame weekend for the CFHOF in the same manner they do the NFLHOF. Regardless of the turnout in Canton (and the game and ceremony usually doesn't sell out), the NFLHOF induction ceremony stands as the official kickoff of the preseason. It's also permanently held in Canton, with the game as the climax of the weekend.

To me, this works well. It raises the visibility of the hall, honors the past and lets people know the season is just around the corner. As a marketing tool, it's difficult to top. To me, the CFHOF needs to do the same thing. The weekend needs to be in Hamilton, the induction ceremony needs to be in Hamilton on a Saturday afternoon, and Sunday should be a CIS/CFL preseason doubleheader in Hamilton (I don't know how you swing that with the CIS, I'm sure someone will weigh in on why that won't work). The current format, where it happens in a different city during the season, essentially makes the HOF invisible or an afterthought.
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cromartie
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TheLionKing wrote:
Lions4ever wrote:
Shi Zi Mi wrote:News1130 Sports ‏@News1130Sports 41m

Keep hearing the #BCLions are shopping receiver Marco Ianuzzi. No confirmation yet.
Gee, what could they get for him? A kicking tee and a couple of uninflated footballs?
Didn't Iannuzzi made the comment that if was picked by Ottawa in the expansion draft, he won't report because he now calls Vancouver home ? I know Dean Valli threaten to retire if he was drafted but didn't Iannuzzi also ?
And I believe the Rouge et Noir's GM's comment was "Uh, we weren't interested in you anyway, but thanks."
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David
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This is the way I saw the Geroy thing. There was a very low key announcement/presser or whatever you want to call it, before the game at BC Place with Skulsky, Wally, and Geroy. I think I saw Geroy in a grey shirt (neutral). It was after, when interviewed by Farhan on the sideline (while "scouting" on behalf of his employer) that he appeared in a Rider golf shirt. He then walked down the field to the lockers in the airlock in that same Rider shirt, but disappeared for the night. The ovation was warm, with reverence (especially in "Geroy's Corner"), but not overwhelming.

Could he have stayed in grey all night? Sure. Did it bother me that he changed into his "work clothes." I guess not, 'cause I didn't think of it 'til it was brought up here but ya, probably not necessary. I really don't think he'll be wearing any green for the Ring Of Honour ceremony though. That would be height of poor taste!


DH :cool:
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DanoT
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pennw wrote:
cromartie wrote:
sj-roc wrote: For me, it comes down to this. Whatever disagreeable things GS has said or done seem to be directed at the Lions organisation themselves. We're not the Lions. We're the fans. I don't see that he's directed anything negative at the fans. The Lions, toward whom all his gestures have been directed, seem to have taken the high road the whole way through this. As for the less-aggrieved fans? In some cases, maybe more closely following the Lions' lead would be the right path.
Steve Yzerman is the General Manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning. He played his entire career in Detroit, went into the front office into Detroit. It was made clear that he was not going to advance beyond a certain point in the front office. He was not happy about this. So he took his puck and his acumen and went to Tampa.

When he came back for the Winter Classic, he kept his Tampa affiliation to himself. He was a Red Wing. Whatever bitterness he had toward the organization about his non advancement, he didn't take it out on the fans. He didn't do interviews in Lightning gear. He was a Red Wing that week. Period.

There are dozens of examples. Joe Montana didn't walk into Candlestick to get honored wearing Chiefs gear. Bernie Kosar didn't come back to Cleveland in Cowboys gear waving his Super Bowl ring and there was a guy who had every right to.
Consider this: suppose he had walked completely away from football after last year's GC and got a "real" job in the corporate world with... let's say Microsoft (feel free to sub in Apple or whoever else might strike your computing fancy). If he showed up wearing a shirt with Microsoft's insignia on it, would that be a "d*ck move"?
No. While I fully understand that sports is a business, being honored in front of fans is an inherently emotional event. It is one of the few areas where I understand the relationship of players to fans. Fans root for teams and players on teams. There are rivalries that are inherently emotional (which, in turn, is not rational). Sports, in the fans mind, in situations like these, are not business. They're emotion.

So if you want to plug a non rivalried business, I understand that. But to walk into that announcement on that day, wearing Rider gear is a d*ck move.

You can genericize this example however you want and the conclusion is the same. I'll give you an example.

Sidney Crosby is in his last year in Pittsburgh. After the season, he and the GM sit down to talk.

"Sidney, I'm demoting you to the fourth line and would like you to take a pay cut."

"I think I can still play. I'd like you to trade me."

Five days later, he's traded to Philadelphia.

He plays half the season in Philadelphia, scores four goals in the Stanley Cup Finals, wins a cup and likes it so much that, when the Flyers offer him a front office job, he decides to stay.

The next year, rightfully, the Penguins decide to retire his number. They make the announcement. He does all of his interviews in Flyers gear.

Every single Penguins fan would see that as a d*ck move. I'm sorry. You can replace the cities, the players, the sport with whatever scenario you'd like, the result is the same. You're thumbing your nose at the fans who supported you, who invested time and money in seeing you play and wishing you success by doing that. It's classless.

I don't know. It's probably my passport talking. I run this scenario by every sports fan I know and they're mortified that this would happen. But whatever, it's his legacy, I guess.
Geroy disrespected BC and their fans , plain and simple . And I find it hard to believe it wasn't deliberate .
I'm a Lions fan and I don't feel disrespected, so speak for yourself and some other fanatics but not this fanatic.
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WestCoastJoe
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David wrote:This is the way I saw the Geroy thing. There was a very low key announcement/presser or whatever you want to call it, before the game at BC Place with Skulsky, Wally, and Geroy. I think I saw Geroy in a grey shirt (neutral). It was after, when interviewed by Farhan on the sideline (while "scouting" on behalf of his employer) that he appeared in a Rider golf shirt. He then walked down the field to the lockers in the airlock in that same Rider shirt, but disappeared for the night. The ovation was warm, with reverence (especially in "Geroy's Corner"), but not overwhelming.

Could he have stayed in grey all night? Sure. Did it bother me that he changed into his "work clothes." I guess not, 'cause I didn't think of it 'til it was brought up here but ya, probably not necessary. I really don't think he'll be wearing any green for the Ring Of Honour ceremony though. That would be height of poor taste!


DH :cool:
Maybe some hidden green socks? LOL

Hey, what is tattoed on Geroy's heart? Orange logo or green logo?

Sorry, the emotions are running high all around ...

A high school coach between years changed schools and they then met in the playoffs. The coach pregame, wearing his new colours and logo, moved over in front of the "opposing fans," stood there for a moment, and then pulled up his sweat shirt to reveal a T shirt with the logo of his previous school. Got a good reception. People are well aware of intentions and the meaning of gestures in regard to team logos and colours.

Wear the opposing colours or logo at a "soccer" game in different parts of the world and you take your life in your hands. Team symbols are strong medicine.
John Madden's Team Policies: Be on time. Pay attention. Play like hell on game day.

Jimmy Johnson's Game Keys: Protect the ball. Make plays.

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Sir Purrcival
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Frankly I am not one that is given to fan craziness. I don't idolize players because I think they are humans just like the rest of us. I respect them and I admire their talents. I might even envy them a little wishing that maybe I could play like this or that athlete. I do have however a pretty good handle on people and actions are more indicative than words most of the time.

To suggest that Geroy isn't smarting because of what happened last year before going to the Riders is just plain silly. Here is a player that for a decade basically was the franchise name and face who was able to write his own script. He wasn't ready to accept that his role was changing. The Lions accommodated him as best as they could but they weren't prepared to do what he wanted and for the first time in many years, he found himself being treated more or less like everyone else. Having been around the Lions as long as he had, he had the opportunity to see how this game was played. Carl Kidd, Jason Clermont and many others all ended up getting demoted before they were ready to go. That is Wally's MO. So he asked to go and go he went. I don't know for sure what he really expected but I suspect that he felt that somehow he was immune; that somehow he would call his shots all the way to the end. Not the way Wally works as most of us know.

Whatever your opinion of Geroy and his post Lions time, the simple truth is that many of his actions since that time have divided fans. People want to believe (I know I do) that Geroy did what he did because he wanted to play some more. Most of us can understand and even get behind that. What we can't understand is how someone who over the years professed to be Orange, through and through, could somehow suddenly be able to act so indifferently towards his fans and and passively hostile against his former team. The word tantrum comes to mind. Now I missed this latest event and I don't know what really happened but common sense says to me that after so many years a Lion, it might be sensible to try and be a little bit more neutral when it comes to matters concerning them. Geroy by contrast has not only not done that, he has pretty much done the opposite. He has to be aware that he has caused some issues among the Lions faithful but appears to not care in the slightest. That is hard to accept from someone who spent so many years here. Most of us would at least show some concern if we had done something that might have offended; try to make some show of reconciliation. Not Geroy and and as a consequence I don't feel the need to let myself get sucked in further to this idea of Geroy being a Lion at heart. His credibility in that regard is shot. He played here, was a CFL great and deserves his recognition for this. That is all he deserves. If he wants to be obtuse to how some of his actions have affected the fans, then so be it. The way the Lions have handled things has been appropriate. They have nothing to be regretful for and if anything, it inspires some renewed faith that the management has handled a difficult circumstance very patiently and without apparent umbrage. I can't say the same for Geroy himself.
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Shi Zi Mi
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IMHO, once he became a Rider, he was obligated to appease an entirely new fan base.....a very rabid fan base at that. This appeasement didn't just include his play on the field or work in the community.... but his words and actions as well........he was well aware his words/actions were closely scrutinized by this rabid fan base and governed himself accordingly.

If you think about it......it's no different for anyone going to a new employer......you toe the company line and say the right things.....singing the praises of a former employer doesn't sit well, especially when that former employer is a direct competitor.
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Sir Purrcival
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I don't think that anybody expects him to sing the praises of the Lions. Just be a little more respectful. It is easy to sing the praises of your current team without saying anything negative about your former squad and a consummate professional should get that.
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Shi Zi Mi
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Sir Purrcival wrote:I don't think that anybody expects him to sing the praises of the Lions. Just be a little more respectful. It is easy to sing the praises of your current team without saying anything negative about your former squad and a consummate professional should get that.
In the heat of the moment, things get said that many would love to take back.....even seconds later. IMHO, Geroy's comments weren't even much of a rant.....simply a moment of ill-advised gloating.

I'm actually quite amazed at the "holier than thou" attitude of fans that think the man should be anything more than a human being.......he's not........so, let the person who's never gloated in their life speak up.
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Hambone
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Many seem to want to vilify him simply for wearing the colours of his employer on the night when the announcement came out. My gut feel is that Simon really was at the game first and foremost to act on behalf of the Riders with the announcement being more of a hastily planned thing that happened because Geroy just happened to be planning on being in the house. Usually when such announcements are to come down the team's media relations people send out a release at least a day in advance that there will be an announcement. In this case the advisement didn't come out until a few hours before the formal announcement. I think the Lions opted to make the announcement when they did only because they became aware Geroy was going to be there thus the opportunity for some photo ops. From what I recall when the pics were taken with Skulsky and Buono he was wearing a hoodie over top of his Rider polo shirt. It would've looked tacky for sure for him to be flying the Rider flag then but after that he's free to wear whatever turns his crank.
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WestCoastJoe
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Wearing the green in the hallowed house of the Lions, at the time and place of the announcement of ultimate respect for an individual, was a deliberate act of disrespect, and a show of some arrogance.

Fans are strongly polarized. Geroy's loyal supporters, seeing nothing inappropriate in his words or actions. Other fans seeing disrespect and disregard. And that is one of Geroy's legacies. And that is part of the damage done to the fan base and to the organization.

Strong polarization and strong division. Wounds on both sides.

And this is not a case of being bigger than one's feelings. (Can't we just ignore perceived insults? It doesn't work like that.) Wounds take time to heal in breakups.

Geroy's fans are upset to see anger and other negative emotions directed at him.

Other fans see actions and hear words that clearly communicate something to them, something negative, something disrespectul.

If one is upset at his actions, one can see the Rider business including some smoke and cover. Well I had to wear Rider gear because I was doing some "essential" scouting for my new team (although I would have come back here if Wally would have gone for the same deal he offered last year). Not everyone buys the "essential" scouting rationale for choosing to wear green (Here is my clipboard. See, I am scouting. And out of loyalty to my new team, I am wearing their colours.)

Let's try not to shoot at each other. Strong emotions by all parties.
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Sir Purrcival
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Shi Zi Mi wrote:
Sir Purrcival wrote:I don't think that anybody expects him to sing the praises of the Lions. Just be a little more respectful. It is easy to sing the praises of your current team without saying anything negative about your former squad and a consummate professional should get that.
In the heat of the moment, things get said that many would love to take back.....even seconds later. IMHO, Geroy's comments weren't even much of a rant.....simply a moment of ill-advised gloating.

I'm actually quite amazed at the "holier than thou" attitude of fans that think the man should be anything more than a human being.......he's not........so, let the person who's never gloated in their life speak up.

I quote from my earlier post.

"Most of us would at least show some concern if we had done something that might have offended; try to make some show of reconciliation."

That is all it would take. No one expects him to be purrfect but you don't get the slightest sense that he really cares about it. And that is hard to reconcile in the face of a decade's worth of "Lion for life" kind of rhetoric. My interpretation is that actions speak louder than words. Vilify him, I don't, what I do say is that I now longer accept on face value that Geroy is a Lion at Heart. His actions, last year, his choice to retire as a Rider after failing to get what he wanted here this year tell me his time as Lion has a different meaning for him. He is free to make his choices. We are free to take meaning from them.

Some prefer to turn the other cheek, I myself have troubles with mixed messages. Geroy plays the good team guy but often (and this goes way back before he became a Rider) there seemed to be an undercurrent of "me". His actions speak to me differently than maybe they do to you. I can accept that. I think you can accept that others here will feel differently. It shouldn't be a source of amazement. People read things differently all the time. I don't really expect to convince anyone to see it my way as we are all individuals but I don't expect to change my stance on things either.
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Hambone wrote:
cromartie wrote:
Do Hall of Fame CFL players go in as a certain team member?
No. That applies only in Baseball, where guys go in wearing a cap of a particular team. The remainder of the sports do head shots or busts and lists teams as part of the biography. This includes the CFLHOF.
And even in Cooperstown the HOF, not the player, determines which cap the player will be sporting on his plaque. I think both Gary Carter and Andre Dawson prefered that they be wearing a Mets and Cubs cap respectively as opposd to an Expo cap.
Yeah.
ImageImage
What's good about the busts in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame is that the there's neutrality in that they are not wearing helmets showing a team's logo.
David wrote:I think I saw Geroy in a grey shirt (neutral). It was after, when interviewed by Farhan on the sideline (while "scouting" on behalf of his employer) that he appeared in a Rider golf shirt. He then walked down the field to the lockers in the airlock in that same Rider shirt, but disappeared for the night. The ovation was warm, with reverence (especially in "Geroy's Corner"), but not overwhelming.
Could he have stayed in grey all night? Sure. Did it bother me that he changed into his "work clothes." I guess not, 'cause I didn't think of it 'til it was brought up here but ya, probably not necessary. I really don't think he'll be wearing any green for the Ring Of Honour ceremony though. That would be height of poor taste!
I'm sure at the official ceremony, he will dress conservatively in a nice business suit just like Damon Allen in his own BC Lions Wall of Fame ceremony. Despite the possibility Allen may have more personal attachment to the Eskimos or the Argonauts given the fact that he won his first two championships in Edmonton or his last GC and only MOP award in Toronto, he was smart enough to not cause any controversy and allow fans to play the role of a devil's advocate. He was smart enough to wear an orange necktie as well. So Geroy, don't wear a green tie at your ceremony!
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Hambone wrote:Many seem to want to vilify him simply for wearing the colours of his employer on the night when the announcement came out. My gut feel is that Simon really was at the game first and foremost to act on behalf of the Riders with the announcement being more of a hastily planned thing that happened because Geroy just happened to be planning on being in the house. Usually when such announcements are to come down the team's media relations people send out a release at least a day in advance that there will be an announcement. In this case the advisement didn't come out until a few hours before the formal announcement. I think the Lions opted to make the announcement when they did only because they became aware Geroy was going to be there thus the opportunity for some photo ops. From what I recall when the pics were taken with Skulsky and Buono he was wearing a hoodie over top of his Rider polo shirt. It would've looked tacky for sure for him to be flying the Rider flag then but after that he's free to wear whatever turns his crank.
That is exactly my take too.

It was so hastily scrambled together it had to have happened precisely as you state. The Riders weren't paying for a ticket to the game and they see Geroy coming so they did they did quickly. OR they would not have done late in the day on game day.

It's a business and why should it be any different than any other business when it comes down to putting food on your table.
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Well. It seems a lot of views have been expressed on "Shirtgate" since my previous post in this thread. I'm only going to quote Hambone's post (since his views seem to align most closely to my own and most of my response builds on his comments) but I'm really adddressing anyone who feels they "have a dog in this fight." I was reluctant to get too critical of Geroy here since there seemed to be rather little in the media about it, and let's face it, the media LOVES controversy. Surely they would have jumped all over this if it had any legs? So I did some poking around online.
Hambone wrote:Many seem to want to vilify him simply for wearing the colours of his employer on the night when the announcement came out. My gut feel is that Simon really was at the game first and foremost to act on behalf of the Riders with the announcement being more of a hastily planned thing that happened because Geroy just happened to be planning on being in the house. Usually when such announcements are to come down the team's media relations people send out a release at least a day in advance that there will be an announcement. In this case the advisement didn't come out until a few hours before the formal announcement. I think the Lions opted to make the announcement when they did only because they became aware Geroy was going to be there thus the opportunity for some photo ops. From what I recall when the pics were taken with Skulsky and Buono he was wearing a hoodie over top of his Rider polo shirt. It would've looked tacky for sure for him to be flying the Rider flag then but after that he's free to wear whatever turns his crank.
This is all quite plausible in terms of things coming together on this episode rather quickly. The earliest media report I noticed was around 12:30pm on gameday Friday when Ian McLetchie reported during a 1040 news update that an announcement (of a still-unspecified nature at that time, of course) would be made at 6:15pm that evening.

I checked bclions.com for any video content of the goings-on. Here's Skulsky's announcement:

http://www.bclions.com/video/index/id/97549

Simon never appears in this video, but Skulsky points to him somewhere off-camera to the viewer's right. Skulsky even got a bit tripped up in his words, mixing up for a moment whether it was the Ring of Honour or the Wall of Fame to which Geroy had been named. Perhaps this rather unrehearsed-sounding delivery — he doesn't even get around to mentioning the RoH until after a full minute and then some of rather unpolished rambling where he gave the date/opponent and plugged a sponsor — is an indication of just how quickly this came together.

Here's a shorter video from the event where we do see Geroy:

http://www.bclions.com/video/index/id/97527

This is mostly a direct Q&A with the media in front of a multi-Lion-logo'ed backdrop, after his appearance with DS&WB at the podium (there's also a quick shot of that around 0:12). In both shots he's wearing a neutral grey zip-up hoodie (presumably over his Rider logo'ed shirt) as has already been mentioned. He reveals here that he only found out about the RoH nod yesterday (Thursday). He was in Toronto at that time for their game that night. The Argos even tweeted a picture of him talking to Chad Owens shortly before the game started, and he's wearing a fully green (almost certainly Rider) golf shirt, so he's presumably there in his Rider capacity:



Image

If Geroy wanted to pull off a "d*ck move" he could have just worn this shirt to BCP. But from what I saw in other online sources (and I believe David also pointed this out) it seems he wore a white golf shirt with a Riders logo on it, which is certainly more discreet. Moreover, the fact that he was at the Argos game Thursday in his Rider capacity certainly makes it plausible that he came here the next day in like capacity.

In my digging around online, I found another interesting tweet that was posted Friday evening. It's not from anyone particularly notable, by all appearances just another rank-and-file Lions fan:


Nice to see @geroysimon at the #lions game today! Just a regular guy paying for parking... With bling #cfl #Riders pic.twitter.com/sf6mjpDe1u
Image

Looks like the same grey hoodie he wore at the presser. But my main point here is: If Geroy had come here strictly as a Lions guest, doesn't it seem odd that they wouldn't arrange some transportation for him instead of making him drive to BCP himself? Or at least not put him in a spot where he has to go find parking and pay for it to boot? Surely, it would make more sense that he was here principally as a Rider employee (and thus likely paid for the parking on expense account).

Let's break down this photo a little more. Here we have Geroy taking a few moments from his busy day to let some fan of his old team — who just happened upon him in the parking lot — get a picture with him and try on his Grey Cup ring that he won somewhere else. Where does this rate on the spectrum of "d*ck moves"?

I think it's fair to say there was a rather unique set of circumstances surrounding this "Shirtgate" episode — which was by all appearances rather a hastily arranged event — to a sufficient extent that it would render any comparison to Yzerman or Montana or Crosby or whoever a rather moot exercise. Apples and oranges. Chalk and cheese.

One other comment: from some posts I've seen here, there seems to be some sort of "us vs them" angle getting played up between supposed supporters and haters of Geroy, which I find a little oversimplistic. Frankly I don't identify with either "camp". Why do we have to be one or the other? Can we not just examine a person's actions objectively on a case-by-case basis and let these observations guide our views? I don't find much fault on Geroy's part here. But you'd be fooling yourself if you thought I was rooting for him to win another GC last year. And I'd have to take a dim view to any Rider crests on his attire come July 25.

This discussion kind of reminds me the one I got into on here last year over John Tortorella's comments about the Grey Cup. I never cared too much for JT but I nonetheless tried to examine the context of what he had to say. Like this Shirtgate, the lack of a media feeding frenzy was an obvious red flag that there was more than meets the eye to what happened. In the final analysis I found his comments to be fairly anodyne when weighed against their context, even if not everyone else chose to take these considerations into account.
Sports can be a peculiar thing. When partaking in fiction, like a book or movie, we adopt a "Willing Suspension of Disbelief" for enjoyment's sake. There's a similar force at work in sports: "Willing Suspension of Rationality". If you doubt this, listen to any conversation between rival team fans. You even see it among fans of the same team. Fans argue over who's the better QB or goalie, and selectively cite stats that support their views while ignoring those that don't.
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