CFL Week One

I'm going to put up my picks here throughout the season, for no reason other than to add to the blog.  Do not expect anything deep.

Friday:

Saskatchewan at Hamilton.  Henry Burris seems to have played the pre-season with a chip on his shoulder; I expect that will carry through into the season.  He has a plethora of targets to chose from (newcomers Giguère and Fantuz, yougsters Grant and Williams, as well as the veteran Stala).  The Green Riders did a complete over-haul of their roster over the off-season, which was needed; this team was uncompetitive throughout most of 2011.  They still have a strong receiving corps and a couple of newcomers at halfback.  Darien Durant will need to prove that 2011 was an aberration.

I expect Hamilton to come out firing, and to win this one by at least 13 points.

Winnipeg at BC.  BC begins its Grey Cup defence and there does not seem to be too many holes on the team.  They have the best QB in the league and explosive receivers.  The defence has lost a couple of key elements (esp, Eliminian) but added to its secondary, probably making it the strongest in the league.  Winnipeg is a work-in-progress, with new faces in the backfield (Dorzon and Woodson) because of the season-ending injury to Chris Garrett, and a very young receiving corps, behind the veterans Edwards and Denmark.

This one also should be over by half-time.  BC should win this one by at least two majors.

Saturday:

Toronto at Edmonton.  The Argos' Ricky Ray returns to Edmonton to face-off against Steven Jyles.  Or Kerry Joseph.  Or Matt Nicholls.  What a mess at QB for the Eskimos. I am expecting that Steven Jyles' game stats will feature a lot of '11-26, 155 passing yards, 3 interceptions, and 1 TD'. It will be interesting to track yardage statisitics for the receivers on these two teams throughout the season.  For example, Fred Stamps averaged over 1200 receiving yards catching passes mostly from Ray over the past three seasons.  Does he even break 1000 yards this year with the Jyles/Joseph combo?  Conversely, how well will Durie and Owens do running patterns for an accomplished QB, rather than the likes of Lemon, Jyles and Bell last year?  Of note, I fully expect Nicholls to be the starter at year's end in Edmonton.

Toronto over Edmonton, by a TD.

Sunday:

Montreal at Calgary. This one's hard to call.  Montreal still has the top RB (Whittaker) and top receiving combos in the league (Richardson and Green).  Their defence was a weakness last year.  And here is a bold prediction:  this is the year where Anthony Calvillo starts showing his age. It is mostly just a gut feeling, but either through injury (probably a string of nagging minor ones) or loss of a step due to age, AC will look human this year.  It is difficult to tell whether MacPherson can take over, given the very limited reps he has had over the past few years.

Montreal over Calgary by 3.

Cheers.