Cauz: Tackling early season Elks-Lions hot takes

Matthew Cauz

CFL.ca

@mcauz56

I’m usually quite lousy when it comes to restraint. Recently I was on my first ever cruise ship and tiramisu for “lunch dessert” occurred more than once.

After the first week of the CFL season there is this temptation to take small sample sizes and blow them up into grand sweeping opinions.

Examples?

The Bombers will go 18-0; it’s over for Bo Levi Mitchell and Douglas Coleman is going to win Most Outstanding Defensive Player, meaning the award will not be leaving Ottawa anytime soon.

These sorts of pronouncements are fun to do but at the end of the year you’ll find your batting average for correct takes is well below the Mendoza Line. With that in mind, I am going to soft launch some opinions that have been floating around the CFL ecosystem that relate to the BC Lions’ home opener against the Edmonton Elks.

“Vernon Adams Jr. is the best player in the game not named Zach Collaros”

In terms of pure football talent, I would say no, as there are several defenders and elite receivers I would have over Adams. But if we’re talking about importance to their respective team, considering the oversized influence a quarterback has on wins and losses, then you can absolutely make this argument.

What I loved about Adams’ game against the Calgary Stampeders was the high frequency in which he attacked deep. Adams had no fear challenging the Stampeders’ defensive backs. On the Lions’ first two touchdown drives, Adams completed all five passes that travelled over 10 yards in the air with a couple legitimate bombs, including a 30-yarder to Dominque Rhymes.

Something to keep an eye on this week: Adams walked that fine line between being aggressive and reckless, with one of his passes being picked off by Cameron Judge and several other throws that could have been knocked down or even snagged by Calgary defenders. That may be me nitpicking or I’m just overcompensating for people saying Adams will make the province of British Columbia forget about Nathan Rourke.

Adams was tremendous. You blinked and suddenly he was halfway to 300 yards. You have to be impressed with a Lions team that went into Calgary to kickoff the season and led 22-6 with under seven minutes to go. Just remember that against the Riders last week, Kai Gray and Nyles Morgan both had interceptions off of Trevor Harris and Jake Ceresna is a beast on the line (two sacks).

“Taylor Cornelius is not the answer for Edmonton”

It’s too early to say this but I understand where this sentiment comes from. His overall record as a starter is poor, he has been an inconsistent passer to start his career and on Sunday more than half of his passing yards was the result of Eugene Lewis outmuscling and outjumping Jeremy Clark for a Cornelius moonshot and beating the entire Saskatchewan Roughriders defence for a 102-yard touchdown.

The best way I can describe how I’m feeling about the Edmonton quarterback is a quote that everyone in a relationship dreads hearing: “I’m not mad at you, I’m just disappointed.” After the game Elks head coach Chris Jones admitted that it was one of the worst games of Taylor’s career, which makes this week’s contest all the more compelling. Jones wasn’t saying anything that his quarterback doesn’t already know. What better way to wipe clean the memory of Week 1 than with a strong showing against the second-best team in the league? We have all seen stretches of brilliance from the third-year passer and there are more than enough weapons around him to help with his progress. Let’s circle back on this take come Labour Day.

“Dominique Rhymes will be just fine without Nathan Rourke”

I promise the Rourke references are coming to an end. This opinion I 100 per cent endorse and it goes beyond the 118 yards and two touchdowns the All-Star receiver put up.

“If you are playing weekly fantasy, I cannot stress highly enough that you must take Rhymes this week no matter what the cost is.”
— CFL.ca’s Matt Cauz

What stuck out for me was just how open he was on just about every pass that came his way. Rhymes made life very easy for Adams and I would not at all be shocked to see Rhymes put up even greater numbers than his 1,401 yards from 2022. If you are playing weekly fantasy, I cannot stress highly enough that you must take Rhymes this week no matter what the cost is.

To be fair, the young Elks secondary, which had three rookies playing last week (Gray, Dwayne Thompson and Darrius Bratton) held up quite well, limiting Trevor Harris to 179 yards and two interceptions. However, Rhymes presents a whole different set of problems. It should be a big day for him.

“Edmonton will again miss the playoffs”

The thing about cliches is they almost always start from a place of truth. We all get tired of ones like “it’s a game of inches” but in the case of Edmonton it really is. They were 36 inches away from ending their record home losing streak in front of a packed house.

I know the storylines this week will be about another home loss, but Edmonton easily could have come out victorious against the Riders. They led against Saskatchewan for much of the game and if not for a brilliant diving interception by Rolan Milligan and a wasted Edmonton goal line opportunity they could have won their home opener and the conversation this week would feel and sound very different.

Most of the time when a CFL team has a first-and-goal from the one-yard line they punch it in. However, thanks to the Herculean effort by the Riders’ defensive line and Milligan’s third-down tackle that would make a RBC Canadian Open security guard proud, the Roughriders outmuscled Edmonton down the stretch for the win.

The Lions were clearly the better team against Calgary, but it was a one score game late. Meanwhile, Edmonton had its chances to win. This is a long way of me saying this game will be much closer than people think. On top of all that LL Cool J is the musical guest for the Lions so the 15-year-old version of me is psyched for the pre-game, while the much older version is intrigued to see what the results will be and how it will shape our far-too-early conclusions to the just begun 2023 CFL season.

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