Lionbackers.com

Matt Baker wrote: Tue Apr 24, 2018 9:20 am If you think Jeff Reinebold is going to let his social media persona get in the way of coaching football, you simply don't know Jeff Reinebold.

hunsperger wrote: Sun Apr 22, 2018 7:14 pm Call me old school...and I love Jeff, remember him from the early 90's, man wears his heart on his sleeve, but I'll tell you what, not sure if the man wants to be a football coach or a celebrity at this point in his life...if he spends 10 percent of the time on Special teams, as he does on his Twitter account, we will not only have the best special team in the CFL, but the best in the universe...not sure if this is a good sign, at his point in his life...your thoughts...

In a grander football sense, mini-camp is usually like kindergarten. Nothing too strenuous for players who don’t see pads for weeks. Most never even make it to main camp. But Reinebold is grinding and growling, pushing for more. It’s April, but Reinebold is screaming as if the Lions had lost six of their last seven, which is actually how they ended last November.

Yet moments later after the last session, Reinebold insists on taking a team picture, like a counselor might suggest of kids at summer camp for the last time. This is how the new/old special teams coordinator develops ohana on a CFL team. Football is family.

The changes in the front office involving Ed Hervey and Rick Lelacheur represent the biggest facelift with the Lions but a very close second in importance might be the alterations in Wally Buono’s coaching staff, to some the basis for the team’s first non-playoff appearance in two decades.

There’s an appeal to Lotusland that is inescapable for Reinebold, who had interest in the head coaching vacancies the last few years at UBC and SFU and decided he had to pull himself away from the Hamilton Tiger-Cats to come west before it was too late.

When Buono made it clear he won’t coach past this season, Reinebold made his move. He settled, for the time being at least, not far from where the head man was renting at the start of last season in Crescent Beach to create the purrfect fit. A year with the winningest coach in CFL history and free time steps from the Pacific Ocean. Come by and visit anytime, Reinebold tells an inquisitor. He is, quite frankly, another reason fans find the CFL engaging.

It’s an odd pairing on the surface. Buono had lived in mortal fear when facing teams coached by the likes of Reinebold and Mike O’Shea, knowing both are willing to resort to gadget plays and knowing the Lions counterpart will not respond. Not this year, Buono says. The Lions are back in the trick play business.

B.C.FAN wrote: Sat Apr 28, 2018 11:52 pm

It’s an odd pairing on the surface. Buono had lived in mortal fear when facing teams coached by the likes of Reinebold and Mike O’Shea, knowing both are willing to resort to gadget plays and knowing the Lions counterpart will not respond. Not this year, Buono says. The Lions are back in the trick play business. -- Lowell Ullrich