By Jack Bedell,
MontrealAlouettes.com
A couple of seasons ago, Detroit Lions receiver Roy Williams offered up one of the craziest quotes I’d ever heard…
Just after his team had posted single digits in a blowout loss, Williams told reporters that the Lions were so close to racking up 40 points in the game it wasn’t even funny.
At the time, I thought it was one of the most delusional proclamations I’d ever heard an athlete make. But after watching the Alouettes over the past month and a half, I think I know exactly what Williams meant now.
As the old coaching cliché goes, games really do turn on a handful of plays. Each dropped pass, each penalty that extends an opponent’s drive, each ball put on the turf, each interception that slips through a DB’s hands, they all bleed points off one team’s board and deposit them on the other team’s tally.
A handful of plays, five mistakes or missed opportunities, really can be the difference between six points and 40. It can be exactly that close.
Take the game in Toronto last week. Finishing a hard seven-yard run in the red zone, Jarrett Payton got caught by a hit in exactly the worst possible spot, and the ball popped out.
Points came off the Als’ board, momentum was exchanged, and an opportunity was left on the field.
Who’s to say how the game turns if Montreal scores on that drive.
Or what could’ve happened if Randee Drew had knocked down the ball down on Michael Bishop’s second-down pass that went 70-plus yards to Andre Talbot setting up the Argos’ first score.
Drew had the jump on the pass and was in the perfect spot to make the play. The ball just squirted through, and the game turned again.
The other night while I was doing my weekly spot on the Team 990’s “Midnight Snack” with Moe Khan and Trex Griffin, I was asked what I thought the Als needed to do to turn things around down the stretch.
What I said probably sounded as delusional as Williams’ statement, but, just like the Williams’ quote, that doesn’t mean it isn’t true.
I said the Als were already doing what they needed to do to win.
The offence is efficient. Anthony Calvillo is sharp, and Kerry Watkins is playing inspired ball. The defence is talented and well-coached.
It’s really just a matter of those five plays going the Als’ way instead of being left on the field.
No matter what the scoreboard’s said in the past, the team is exactly that close to doing what it needs to do to win in November.
