The Rider Happy Hour is back! Peter Klein looks at the Saskatchewan Roughriders' tough loss against Winnipeg in the Banjo Bowl and what needs to be corrected. He reviews their matchup with Calgary this weekend and breaks down how Saskatchewan can end this winless skid.
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SportsTranscript
00:00Welcome, everyone, to the Ryder Happy Hour.
00:13It's been a couple weeks.
00:14My name is Peter Klein.
00:15Thank you very much for tuning in today.
00:18Coming up on the show, we're going to look back a couple of weeks at the Banjo Bowl,
00:22and then get ready for this weekend's game against the Calgary Stampeders.
00:27For those of you seeing me or tuning in for the first time, my name is Peter Klein.
00:30I was a radio host in Calgary for a very long time.
00:34Still am.
00:35Weird story.
00:36But they laid me off, and now I'm back doing freelance stuff with them, because the media
00:39industry in Canada is severely broken.
00:42But I host the Couch Potato Diary, which you can get wherever you are consuming this bit
00:46of content.
00:48But the Ryders are a team I focus on, and so I do a Ryder-specific show.
00:52Try to do it as regularly as possible.
00:53That has not necessarily been possible the last little bit.
00:56But we're doing one today.
00:58So, let's get right into it.
01:00Let's recap the game that we saw a couple of weeks ago.
01:03Again, it is a Ryder team that is not making the plays when they need to.
01:09Down by two.
01:10Late in the game.
01:11Need a stop.
01:12They do eventually get a stop, but they allowed Winnipeg to take a substantial amount of time
01:18off of the clock before this game wrapped up.
01:22And then that allowed Winnipeg to get that field goal, and it forced the Ryders to have
01:26to try to push the ball down the field, and that ended the way it did.
01:29Which meant that they needed a big pass, and it gets intercepted.
01:33Bad penalties all afternoon.
01:34I actually don't think this team is playing that bad right now.
01:39I don't think they're playing as bad as a seven-game winless streak would lead one
01:43to believe.
01:44I do think that there are some things, though, that need to be tightened up.
01:48And it is, it's a little bit difficult, because on the one hand, like they are, again, a couple
01:56interceptions in this game, I don't think they're really Harris' fault, but they're
02:00playing, I don't want to say mistake-free football, but they're not getting the big
02:04plays that you need to make up for the mistakes.
02:08When you are just doing kind of the little dink and dunk and dink and dunk and dink and
02:12dunk all the way up the field on offense, you can't really afford to have the penalties
02:18that they are taking.
02:19And you kind of have to play perfect in every other aspect.
02:21You can't afford to give up big plays on the other side, and then just slowly work
02:25your way upfield.
02:26You can't afford to have those interceptions and fall behind 10-0.
02:29Yes, they came back, but they had to do a lot to come back, and then it was only a little
02:32bit, and then Winnipeg was able to get past them again.
02:35The Riders are not getting enough big plays to help kind of offset some of the bad plays
02:42that they are having.
02:43Overall, I do think that A, this is a good football team, and B, this is a football team
02:48that is playing good football for the majority of games, but they aren't playing great football
02:53enough to make up for the bad football that's happening.
02:56Am I explaining myself well here?
02:58I hope I am.
03:00But either way, this is not a team that is getting enough kind of big plays here.
03:05Looking at the stats, I guess they are, oh no, that's opponent, oh jeez, that's not
03:10great.
03:11I don't think Saskatchewan has allowed the third most, actually, yeah, third most opponents
03:1730-yard completions in the Canadian Football League right now.
03:22Only Edmonton and Toronto have allowed more, but 30-yard completions for the Riders, they
03:26are fourth best, or fourth worst, sorry, in the league, with 15.
03:33So again, when you are not getting those big plays down the field, and then you are A,
03:38getting yourself in 10-0 holes 8 minutes into football games, and B, when you are kind
03:44of struggling to get big plays yourself on offense, um, or sorry, when you're turning
03:50the ball over, or just making some mistakes, it is really hard to catch up.
03:53And that has been some of the issues that this team has had.
03:56But overall, I thought Trevor Harris, again, his accuracy is SO good.
04:01That pass that he had to Bain, where two guys basically ran the same route, and there's
04:05like six defensive backs around, and he was just able to pinpoint it in.
04:09Some of the stuff that he is able to do is just so impressive to watch from a Rider standpoint.
04:14And really, I don't think the two picks in that game were his fault.
04:17One of them, Johnson falls, and it's an easy pick for Ford.
04:20The other one, Ford makes a really good break, and a really good read, and comes off of his
04:25guy and makes a pick.
04:26Now, the throw is a little late, and when you are late and outside, those tend to get
04:31intercepted.
04:32But, I don't think that it was a, I don't think it was a bad game for Harris.
04:37The one thing I do have an issue with, and this is with the Riders in general, I get
04:42frustrated with the amount of passes that this team makes short of the sticks on second
04:48down.
04:49And, there are a couple of times where, like, Schaefer-Baker is able to take one from in-tight,
04:55and then he is able to kind of loop it around, and get a first down.
04:58And they do get a few of those, but this team continuously comes up a couple yards
05:05short on second down.
05:06And part of that is other teams pressuring.
05:09Another part of this, and I know I talked about this last time, I believe we did a show
05:12here, but the Riders are third, sorry, the Riders are last in the league in yards gained
05:17on first down.
05:18They are also third last in the league in second down conversions.
05:23It was better in the Banjo Bowl, but we still saw a lot of times, and late too, when they're
05:28trying to make that push, where it's just, okay, first down, run the ball up the middle,
05:34second down, Harris pass for everything we need to fix it.
05:38And it becomes very predictable.
05:39And again, it became a little less predictable in this game, which is nice, but it did become
05:44a bit of an issue, and it just gets a little bit frustrating, because again, this is not
05:49a big play offense, but when you constantly are needing second and five, second and six,
05:53second and seven, and you're in these obvious passing down situations, it allows teams to
05:59gear up for you.
06:00And then, when you combine that with the fact that this offensive line has been banged up
06:03since week five, and it really does kind of throw things off for Saskatchewan.
06:09And again, it just all comes down to the way this team plays, everything kind of needs
06:15to be perfect, and when you are in second and eight, it's very difficult to be perfect.
06:22And teams, I think, have kind of recognized, like, okay, let's pressure, let's bring everyone
06:25up a little bit, they're not really going to beat us over the top with this.
06:29Harris isn't going to escape and beat us on a deep ball down the field, so we can kind
06:33of swarm guys and be able to get those stops, and it gets a little bit frustrating.
06:37Now, that being said, I don't want to go completely away from the run, and we'll talk about this
06:41in the game preview a little bit, because Hickson has looked good.
06:45Once he got rolling in that fourth quarter, there were a few good plays.
06:47I was really impressed with his vision.
06:51There were a couple of times where it was very clear that the hole that was supposed
06:55to be there wasn't, but there was one on this side.
06:57And so, maybe that was the design play.
07:00I guess I shouldn't see very clear.
07:02But just a nice little cut back lane and go, he was able to do that.
07:07And his vision to see those openings is good.
07:08He has a pretty good cut, relatively explosive, and has been good so far.
07:15Again, don't run him into the ground on first down, but there is a balance that needs to
07:19be had.
07:20That being said, again, the difference between this team and some others, those key plays
07:26in ball games, and when you have to be perfect, when you don't make those, it gets frustrating.
07:32He has a drop down the left sideline in the second quarter, I believe second quarter.
07:36It's a wheel route, it's designed perfectly, I don't think it ends up being a touchdown
07:40if he gets it, but it is a big play for a team that we just explained to you doesn't
07:44have a lot of them.
07:46And he just straight dropped it.
07:47And I get he's a running back, but you need to make that play.
07:50And the Riders, again, cannot afford to have miscues like that one.
07:54But the receiving group is good.
07:56Emilis with a really big play deep down the field, that was nice to see him get going.
08:00Keenan Schaefer-Baker was, I thought, excellent in this game.
08:03Takes a short-ish pass and makes a really good gain down the field.
08:09He had a couple other good ones on second down to help keep drives going.
08:13Johnson slipped a couple of times, which was annoying, but he also comes out with a
08:16big touchdown.
08:18He has been good.
08:19Even a Joe was at least noticeable in some spots as he continues to grow into this offense.
08:25The one that is a little bit frustrating is Bain continues to be quite quiet.
08:30I do think he is really good.
08:32He is only averaging 24 yards a game in the last four games.
08:36I think he is dynamic, so it'd be nice to get him going a little bit.
08:40But again, this is the thing, they're moving the ball okay.
08:44A, sometimes they're not finishing these drives, and that's annoying.
08:48And B, it's again those big plays that just aren't there.
08:51But I do think that they are moving the ball okay.
08:54And that is the frustration with trying to figure out what is going wrong out in Saskatchewan
09:00right now.
09:01Looking at Trevor Harris' game log at the moment, just going to pull this up real quick.
09:06Boy, he's played for a very long time.
09:09So yeah, you look at it, since he came back in week 11, 355 yards and a couple of touchdowns
09:15against Montreal.
09:16190 against Toronto, that was a really ugly game.
09:19But he bounces back in Labor Day with 368 yards and three touchdowns against the Bombers.
09:24And then in the Banjo Bowl, 287 yards, a couple of touchdowns.
09:27There are some interceptions mixed in there as well.
09:30But again, moving the ball well, it is just at these big moments in games, things just
09:36keep happening.
09:37And the turnovers have been really brutal at different times as well.
09:41Defensively, they kept getting beat underneath a lot.
09:44I understand, like, you're in a tricky situation there, right?
09:48Because you can't just back all the way up and leave the underneath stuff there.
09:55But you can't all just like overcommit to dump passes to the running back and then leave
10:00Dembski and all those guys over the top open and leave that layer there.
10:04So it is a tricky balance, but it does seem like every other team, when you throw it underneath,
10:08they can still at least swarm and get you stopped for a seven-yard game.
10:13But when it happens against the Riders, it's like a 12 or 15-yard play.
10:16And so it just seems like they are a yard or two too far back.
10:21And that is allowing things like what happened on the third and 13 to take place, where it
10:27almost feels like they're not quite aware of where the sticks are.
10:30And that is allowing guys to kind of get a little bit beyond that, make some plays,
10:36and get the first down marker, and continue drives.
10:39It hurt against Toronto, there was a couple here against Winnipeg that really came back
10:42to bite them.
10:43Eventually they did kind of, I don't want to say correct it, but they just weren't getting
10:46beat by it as much.
10:49They only allowed 26 points, and they were in some really bad spots, especially early
10:54in the game, off of the turnovers and whatnot.
10:57And it helped them, the defense helped them survive.
10:59And the run defense, again, was fantastic.
11:05I do the best bets piece for Three Down Nation, which, boy, this has been a great year to
11:10do that.
11:11But doing the best bets piece for Three Down Nation, one of the things that has kind of
11:16been a lock has been running back under props.
11:19And those just didn't come out by the time that I needed to get the thing published,
11:22but they have been phenomenal in that.
11:26They have done such a good job on Olivera, and basically everyone not named Javon Leak
11:31this season out in Saskatchewan.
11:34That front four is so good.
11:36They're able to get pressured with just four a fair amount, and the run defense has been
11:40really solid.
11:41I do think that a few more blitzes maybe need to be mixed in here, because when they do
11:48blitz, it does seem to be very successful.
11:51And it does seem to throw teams off a little bit.
11:53And it just felt like there were too many occasions where Caleros just had a beat or
11:56two longer than the Riders would have wanted him to have, and maybe a little bit more pressure
12:01could have helped up.
12:03Now, the Riders may have to change up things defensively quite a bit this week, as injuries
12:08are literally and figuratively hurting this defense.
12:11Carney and Lanier are both out for Saturday's game against Calgary.
12:16Also, Milligan is going to miss the game for the birth of his child.
12:21So that is three very big pieces on defense that the Riders are going to be missing, and
12:29that is going to sting a little bit.
12:30I don't really have a lot of faith on the Calgary offense to take full advantage of
12:35this, but this defense is going to be missing a few key pieces.
12:38So, what about the matchup against the Calgary Stampeders this week?
12:41Well, quite frankly it's a must win for Saskatchewan.
12:44At 5-7-1, they are very lucky that neither Winnipeg or BC have pulled away.
12:49You cannot let Calgary leapfrog you in the standings, and I get technically they would
12:53be tied, but at this point Calgary would then have the tiebreaker, I do believe.
13:00And you just, you cannot allow that to happen.
13:02You cannot fall out of a playoff spot right now.
13:05There is potential that by the end of the week, everyone in the West is going to be
13:09within three points of each other.
13:11A, that's insane.
13:12B, a win here, all of a sudden, because BC is idle right now, all of a sudden you are
13:18a point out of a home playoff game, and if Edmonton beats Winnipeg, you're a point out
13:22of first place in the West Division.
13:25After playing dreadfully for two months, there is an opportunity for Saskatchewan to still
13:31have a home playoff game, and maybe even a first round bye.
13:34Now, it can go the other way, obviously.
13:37Saskatchewan loses here, then Calgary is tied with them, and then an Edmonton win and they
13:42leapfrog, and all of a sudden Saskatchewan's in last place.
13:45Also, you do have to worry about Hamilton now starting to sneak up, as they've played
13:49better in the last couple of games, and Chris Jones has that defense going.
13:52So, just win.
13:55It just makes life a whole lot easier.
13:56If you can just go out and just win.
14:00All the issues that they've been having just need to get sorted out.
14:04The schedule isn't that bad to end the season.
14:06They do have a couple of tough games on there.
14:09But after this game, they have one more road game left.
14:14That's it.
14:15It's against Edmonton, who has traditionally not been great at home the last few years,
14:19but this team is a whole lot better than they were when they were racking up all those home
14:24losses at the early point in the season.
14:26But still, your toughest games left, I would say right now, are BC and Ottawa.
14:32Although Edmonton, you know, certainly making a case for that.
14:34But, BC and Ottawa right now, points-wise, whatever, are your two toughest matchups.
14:38You get both of them at home to close out the season.
14:40You get one more against Calgary in Regina at the end of the year.
14:45If you can be within striking distance of anything at that point, that would be huge.
14:49So the schedule does kind of shape up in a way where if Saskatchewan is this team, they
14:54should be able to take advantage.
14:56If not, then maybe they are a little bit further away than we thought they were coming into
15:01this year.
15:02I still think, I do still think things are progressing in the right way.
15:06I mean, not in-season, but just on a bigger scope.
15:10I do think that things are progressing the way that they should be.
15:13It is just not showing results the last seven games.
15:16Which is a weird thing to say in a league where you play 18 games.
15:19You know what?
15:20Just half the season hasn't really gone our way.
15:21But aside from that, it's been pretty good.
15:25That just seems like whistling past the graveyard.
15:27But I do think, kind of long-term, things are progressing the way you want them to.
15:30But if this does go south, or continue to go south, and these last few games, what are
15:38they, 5-7-1, so there's five games left, if they go 1-4 in this stretch, then it does
15:42kind of feel like we're just back to where we started at the beginning of the year.
15:46And you're doing that with a 38-year-old quarterback, and with the backup who was supposed
15:50to be the young one who comes in, kind of got worse as the season went along.
15:55So, you know, no pressure.
15:58It's just kind of the faith and direction of the franchise going forward that's on the
16:02line in the next five weeks.
16:03A little overstatement, but still.
16:05Offensively, I think this is going to be a Hickson game.
16:07Calgary is the worst run defense in the league.
16:10If you can get Hickson rolling, that is going to be huge.
16:13We talked a bit about it before.
16:14The Riders do like to run on first down.
16:16Also, teams like to stop them on first down.
16:19But if Hickson is able to kind of get that run game going, and really start to put the
16:24Riders in again, second and three, second and four, type of situations, that just makes
16:29life so much easier for Saskatchewan.
16:31And then you start to see those linebackers creep up, just a little boop over the head.
16:36Harris is so good at those touch passes and with his accuracy, and I think that's where
16:40you can really start to see this offense start to really shine.
16:43And so I do think this is going to be a very important Hickson game.
16:46Defensively, they have to clean things up on the short passes.
16:49And Calgary is a team that you have to do that against.
16:52The Stampeders are, they have more passing attempts with a depth of target of 0-9 yards
17:01than any team in the Canadian Football League.
17:03Now, they have the fourth fewest in the 10-19 yard range, and they have the third fewest
17:09passes that travel more than 20 yards.
17:12And the teams that are around them in that area, one of them is Montreal, who has used
17:16three different quarterbacks this season.
17:18One of them was Toronto, who also used three different quarterbacks this season, and one
17:22of them is Dukes, who was very conservative.
17:24And the other was Winnipeg, who have only used a couple, but one of them, for a not
17:28insignificant amount of time, was Streffler, who isn't going to be throwing those deep
17:32passes all that much, right?
17:34So I, like, you look at the other teams that are in that area, and you can kind of explain
17:40it away.
17:41Calgary, with the exception of one game, has had their starter in all season long.
17:44And so for them to be in the bottom half, bottom third of the league in those categories
17:48does kind of signal that there is a game plan here, and a comfort level with those
17:52sorts of throws.
17:54And so those are the exact type of throws that Winnipeg kind of killed Saskatchewan
17:58with, back in the Banjo Bowl.
18:00That is something that I think the riders need to adjust to, especially with Noe Carney
18:06helping to cause problems in the pass rush.
18:08I do think that Saskatchewan, if you're going to cheat either way, I think you have
18:13to cheat up a little bit.
18:15If Calgary is going to beat you deep, then give it to them and that's fine.
18:20But I do think you kind of have to, not fully sell out, but you cannot let Calgary get those
18:24real momentum-building drives going with all of those short passes.
18:29Calgary has struggled to run the ball this year, and the rider defense is fantastic in
18:33stopping the run, as we discussed before.
18:36And so I do think that there is an opportunity to turn Calgary into a bit of a one-dimensional
18:40football team and force them into some of those longer throws that they aren't necessarily
18:45as comfortable with.
18:46Penalties do need to be reined in, especially on special teams, man.
18:50Like Saskatchewan, in that game against Winnipeg, had so many drives where they had to start
18:55deep in their own territory because there's a holding this, or a this, that, or the other
18:58thing.
18:59There's some discipline issues on this team, and I mean, the one thing we haven't really
19:04addressed so far is the big blowup that happened at practice.
19:09I do think that this can be one of those, like, rallying point things that wakes everybody
19:14up.
19:16It does kind of feel like, not that I think Mace is a pushover, but I do believe that
19:19he would be maybe a bit more a player's type of a coach if we were going to categorize
19:23him.
19:24And again, I'm not there, so maybe I'm speaking well out of turn, but just the sense you kind
19:28of get.
19:29And so it kind of feels like, okay, now he's mad, this is serious, we really got to lock
19:34this in.
19:36Again, it can totally go the other way, where everyone's just like, oh, well fuck that guy
19:40then, and it just completely falls apart.
19:42But I do think that sometimes just getting that shit out in the open can really, really
19:47help a team.
19:48And so it'll be interesting to see how the riders respond.
19:50I do think they get the job done.
19:52I didn't put this game in my best bets, because why would you?
19:56Neither of these teams have been overly predictable so far this season.
20:00But I do, if we're making a pick, I am going to go Saskatchewan minus two and a half.
20:04A couple other plays, for those of you who are more gambling-inclined, I am going Hickson
20:09over 55 and a half yards rushing, and I am going Diedrich Mills under 60 and a half yards
20:15rushing.
20:16So, that is it.
20:19Thank you guys so much for tuning in.
20:20If you have only been joining Couch Potato Diary through the Rider Happy Hour, I do want
20:26to let you know that we are doing things a little bit differently from now on.
20:30Not with these!
20:31These are going to probably stay the same for a while.
20:34But we do have a new fall schedule.
20:36And so, as you can see here, we're now going live.
20:39Some of these need to be adjusted a little bit.
20:41Kick, there's going to be some changes coming to that, but that's coming up very, very soon.
20:46But we are going live, twitch.tv slash primetimePK, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday,
20:53and also doing some video game streams on there as well.
20:56The Kick integration didn't go as smoothly as we wanted, but we are, I figured out a
21:00couple of different ways to try things with that.
21:03So, this is the new schedule going forward, and the Rider Happy Hour will continue to
21:08be on Thursdays throughout the postseason.
21:11Thank you guys so much for tuning in.
21:12Remember to subscribe wherever you are tuning in.
21:16If you are watching, make sure you like it.
21:18If you're listening, make sure you leave a review.
21:20Thank you guys so much.
21:21Follow me on social media at PrimetimeKlein, and I will talk to all of you later.
21:25Have a great rest of your day, everyone, and enjoy the football coming up this weekend.
21:30I'll talk to you later.
21:31Bye.
21:32Bye.
21:33Bye.
21:34Bye.
21:35Bye.
21:36Bye.
21:37Bye.
21:38Bye.
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21:47Bye.
21:48Bye.
21:49Bye.
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21:54Bye.
21:55Bye.
21:56Bye.
21:57Bye.
21:58Bye.