Jun
Can the Ticats line shine in 09?
Courtesy Hamilton Spectator:
You have a priceless Ming vase in one arm, a crystal bowl in the other and three dozen raw eggs in your backpack. If you get knocked down, stuff’s getting broken. Where do you want to be?
a. In a bubble-wrap suit.
b. In space with zero gravity.
c. In a pool filled with Jell-O.
The correct answer? None of the above. It’s a trick question.
Everybody knows the safest spot in the world is the other team’s pocket at a Ticat game. At least, it has been for the past couple of years.
In that time, opposing quarterbacks could drop back, count to 15 steamboats, check out the cheerleaders, toss some fake grass in the air to evaluate wind direction, wave to their family in the stands, tighten their shoelaces and then throw a pass and still have nobody in black and gold close enough to knock them down.
When the final stats were tallied for last season, Hamilton’s defence had a league-worst 26 sacks — only three more than B.C.’s Cameron Wake had all by himself — and was near the bottom in nearly every other significant category.
Many of those issues could be traced in some part to an ineffective defensive front.
An absence of heavy pressure on the QB created all kinds of trickle-down problems. Opposing receivers had all day to get open. That made life horrible for defensive backs who wore themselves out trying to cover speedy ball catchers on the big Canadian field. Even if they were successful for a time, the effort it took in the heat of a midsummer game eventually lead to breakdowns. Which lead to points. Which lead to losses.
So it’s little surprise that when Greg Marshall was hired as defensive co-ordinator this past off-season, one of the first orders of business was cleaning house and starting over.
“I said that was an area of concern and needed to be better,” he says.
Out went a handful of ineffective Cats. In came Brandon Guillory from Edmonton and Matt Kirk from B.C. to combine with returnees Darrell Adams and Jermaine Reid. And J.P. Bekasiak was moved back to his natural position after an ill-fated experiment on the offensive line. So is it all fixed now?
Good question. So good, in fact, even the Cats’ brass doesn’t really know.
With more than a week of training camp down and the first exhibition game on tap for tonight, the defensive line remains perhaps the greatest mystery on the team. It could be much better, or it could still be a weak link. There are reasons to believe either outcome is possible.
The pessimist would point out that even with the additions, the unit has a grand total of just 18 CFL sacks on its resume — Guillory has nine, Adams has eight and Reid has the other — and six of the 12 guys still fighting for roster spots are new to the league.
The optimist would argue that the new guys are far better than what’s been here in a while.
“They brought in a whole bunch of studs,” Guillory says of the newbies.
Either way, the lack of a track record keeps the mystery alive and makes predictions rather tough. With head coach Marcel Bellefeuille running a camp heavy on teaching and light on full contact, the D-line guys have had to keep their powder dry and not show everything they can do.
“We’re kind of just itching to hit somebody,” Adams says.
Even the lack of enough evidence to support a verdict hasn’t deterred Guillory from predicting big things for this group. As in — brace yourself — double-digit sack totals for as many as four guys.
“I honestly think we can lead the league in sacks,” he says.
If he’s right, this unit suddenly goes from a perpetual soft spot to a league power. And makes a bunch of linebackers, defensive backs and safeties a whole lot better by default.
That alone would be worth a few tick marks in the win column.
