Younger's defense

[Blue In BC]

The number of pts given up is a key metric for any defence in any league

Yes there are others but some are not giving that metric enough credit to try to show that our defense wasn't decent last year, which is was

I will evaluate this club between 1/4 and 1/2 way through

D has more issues than positives thus far but I have some hope

Agree the Os>Ds across the board at the moment

Some good debate here all

Tough match up this week

Agree gotta generate turnovers and protect the 🐖

The key metric is winning when you have the lead and the ball. The rest is window dressing.

[dd]

The key metric is winning when you have the lead and the ball. The rest is window dressing.

I would expand that to if your team has the lead can you stop the other team from scoring and winning the game. When push comes to shove with the game on the line, do you rise up and make plays that stop the other team from scoring or do you lay off and play soft zone and let them match the field and win the game. We all know what the answer is. I have zero faith in our defense in holding a lead and winning the game for us. Never. They fold everytime. They wait for the other team to make a mistake and self destruct.good teams don't make mistakes and you're going to have to make some plays to stop them. Our defense isn't that defense 

[Blue In BC]

I would expand that to if your team has the lead can you stop the other team from scoring and winning the game. When push comes to shove with the game on the line, do you rise up and make plays that stop the other team from scoring or do you lay off and play soft zone and let them match the field and win the game. We all know what the answer is. I have zero faith in our defense in holding a lead and winning the game for us. Never. They fold everytime. They wait for the other team to make a mistake and self destruct.good teams don't make mistakes and you're going to have to make some plays to stop them. Our defense isn't that defense 

Unfortunate but true. We saw games lost in the dying minutes because the defence couldn't get that stop. You know what they say about prevent defences.

[RebusRankin]

37+41+28=106 or 35.3 per game in three games versus Calgary.

34+21=55 or 27.5 ppg in the Banjo Bowl or LDG.

42 points allowed in the ESF to Montreal.

We played well on D against Montreal's 4th string QB and their back-up in the season finale. 23 points or 11.5 in those two games. We allowed 16 against the Rider's B team at season's end. So that's 39 points in 3 games or 13 ppg. They held Masoli to 14 early in the season.

My point, this defensive system struggled against good teams last year too.

[Throw Long Bannatyne]

Unfortunate but true. We saw games lost in the dying minutes because the defence couldn't get that stop. You know what they say about prevent defences.

Disagree, they lost the game when they gave the ball back to the Elks with 3:20 left on the clock clinging to a 1 pt. lead. After the punt the Elks began that drive on their own 53 yd. line, every team other than maybe Ottawa would have turned around and put enough points on the board to win the game in that situation.

[Blueforlife]

The key metric is winning when you have the lead and the ball. The rest is window dressing.

please let us know how many times that occurred last year

I don't agree that is more important than having one of the best total pts allowed

You could have a season when you only win couple times with the lead and the ball and have the worst record in the league and the worst defense

There are few situations when you would have one of the best total pts allowed and not have a good to great D, the average of pts allowed over an entire season tells you things

wee bit of cherry picking of the stats there imo

ah well, we won't agree on this one

the rest isn't window dressing, like I mentioned the other stats of yards given up also indicate a pretty good D last year, can't just ignore all those stat to try to support you narrative that our D wasn't good last year

as others have suggested we had an O problem last year, not a D problem, the O made a good D look bad on some nights as they were never off the field

yes our team as whole wasn't good enough to beat the good teams that is true, I believe with a better OC and O we would have won a few of those and our D's stats would have been even better

All this doesn't really matter as right now our D isn't great and we need to fix this quickly, if you thought our D was bad last year, I am not sure what you are calling it this year LOL

[Blue In BC]

please let us know how many times that occurred last year

I don't agree that is more important than having one of the best total pts allowed

You could have a season when you only win couple times with the lead and the ball and have the worst record in the league and the worst defense

There are few situations when you would have one of the best total pts allowed and not have a good to great D, the average of pts allowed over an entire season tells you things

wee bit of cherry picking of the stats there imo

ah well, we won't agree on this one

the rest isn't window dressing, like I mentioned the other stats of yards given up also indicate a pretty good D last year, can't just ignore all those stat to try to support you narrative that our D wasn't good last year

as others have suggested we had an O problem last year, not a D problem, the O made a good D look bad on some nights as they were never off the field

yes our team as whole wasn't good enough to beat the good teams that is true, I believe with a better OC and O we would have won a few of those and our D's stats would have been even better

All this doesn't really matter as right now our D isn't great and we need to fix this quickly, if you thought our D was bad last year, I am not sure what you are calling it this year LOL

There have been many examples of this problem. Interesting you think points given up is more important than winning as a key metric.

Most recent example is the game against the Elks.

It's true that a short pass play wouldn't have been automatically successful. It's more of a statistical probability. We needed a TD to win. What do you think the Elks would be most like to cover with little time left.

If you can't answer that without bias then I don't know what to say. Did the receiver in the deep shot look open?

[Tecno]

Disagree, they lost the game when they gave the ball back to the Elks with 3:20 left on the clock clinging to a 1 pt. lead. After the punt the Elks began that drive on their own 53 yd. line, every team other than maybe Ottawa would have turned around and put enough points on the board to win the game in that situation.

You bet.  TSN nailed it in the OTT game (I think) where they pointed out the O's are owning the D's across the league right now.  Scores are mega-high.  D's give up explosions and TDs.

Given that environment, if we wanted to win in the last couple of drives, we needed to MAKE SURE we drove the field and hopefully got a TD, but at minimum a FG.  Because most decent teams are capable of having at least 50/50 chance they can drive the field and score -- especially when it's the last 2 mins and they are in 3-down mode.  And many/most of our close losses in the last 3 seasons (some in GC's/ESF!) were because the O stunk up the joint and gave the ball back to let the other team win.

As such, I would seriously consider having the braintrust think about going in 3 down mode (before the drive starts!) in that situation.  I know it sounds nuts, but develop a gameplan that can get 8 yards on 2 downs and get a 90% plan for getting the final 2 on 3rd down -- whether perfecting some Brady runs or finally figuring out a sure 2Y short pass.  Maybe Perkins passing or handing off to Brady could do it -- like a Strev type option package.

Gut reaction will be "that's crazy talk", but we had a much better chance of winning if we were doing a 3-down dink & dunk for 3.5 mins to go vs giving the ball up when our D has NOTHING AT ALL to stop a dink & dunk strategy.  Or just give them the TD for free with 2 mins left so THEN we have time to dink & dunk the field ourselves.

[Tecno]

Unfortunate but true. We saw games lost in the dying minutes because the defence couldn't get that stop. You know what they say about prevent defences.

Ironically, we didn't change anything for EDM's final drive.  We didn't go any more "prevent" than normal.  It's just our whole D scheme is a form of pseudo-prevent D!

Now, you could argue we often go "prevent O"... and that's more of a problem.

We could only dream of being up so big that our D can go full "prevent", lol.  That hasn't happened in a loooong time.

[Blueforlife]

There have been many examples of this problem. Interesting you think points given up is more important than winning as a key metric.

Most recent example is the game against the Elks.

It's true that a short pass play wouldn't have been automatically successful. It's more of a statistical probability. We needed a TD to win. What do you think the Elks would be most like to cover with little time left.

If you can't answer that without bias then I don't know what to say. Did the receiver in the deep shot look open?

Never said that the overall record or winning was more important than low pts per game given up by the D, nice try there.

The missed deep shot was disappointing, we took what they gave us.  Yes short game might have worked, never will know.  Not really following you on this one.

[Blue In BC]

Ironically, we didn't change anything for EDM's final drive.  We didn't go any more "prevent" than normal.  It's just our whole D scheme is a form of pseudo-prevent D!

Now, you could argue we often go "prevent O"... and that's more of a problem.

We could only dream of being up so big that our D can go full "prevent", lol.  That hasn't happened in a loooong time.

Except we threw a bomb instead of grinding it out.

[Blue In BC]

Never said that the overall record or winning was more important than low pts per game given up by the D, nice try there.

The missed deep shot was disappointing, we took what they gave us.  Yes short game might have worked, never will know.  Not really following you on this one.

The point is that we've often had leads and the ball with little time left and still lost. It's a combination of often too conservative offence and being forced to punt.

That said, with the game on the line we seem prone to soft defence and allowing the opponent to score when we need to force them to punt.

The Elks game was a variant of that. Bad play selection on the deep route followed by soft defence. Elks completed a 2nd and 15 IIRC. 2nd and long is our weakness and we've seen it in other games.

You'll have to think back and refresh your memory even about the Grey Cup losses against back up QB's that ran around the edge to continue late scoring drives.

This was 2023 Grey Cup info as one example. Note in particular the 3rd and 5 conversation for 31 yards.

With the game on the line, Cody Fajardo and Tyson Philpot delivered the Montreal Alouettes a most unlikely Grey Cup title.

Fajardo's 19-yard touchdown pass to Philpot with 15 seconds remaining rallied Montreal to a thrilling 28-24 victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Sunday in Hamilton. It earned the Alouettes their first CFL title since 2010 and followed an uncertain off-season that saw the franchise taken over by the league in February, then sold a month later to businessman Pierre Karl Peladeau.

Fajardo's toss capped a stellar seven-play, 83-yard march. It included a clutch 31-yard completion to Cole Spieker on third-and-five before a Tim Hortons Field sellout of 28,808 as Montreal ended its season with eight straight wins.

This was the 2022 Grey Cup loss. Note the 2nd and 15 conversion.


Smith wasn't Toronto's only unsung hero. Backup quarterback Chad Kelly engineered the five-play, 36-yard drive Ouellette capped. Kelly, the nephew of former NFL star Jim Kelly, replaced veteran McLeod Bethel-Thompson, who suffered a dislocated right thumb.

Kelly delivered a crucial 20-yard run on second-and-15 to the Winnipeg 15-yard line that kept the drive going. The march was set up by Javon Leake's 44-yard punt return to the Bombers' 31 with 6:07 remaining.

It's just indications of finding ways to lose instead of win late in games. Ottawa and Crum winning comes to mind.

Check the 2025 Bomber games in the schedule that shows results. Look at the play by play in the August 9th against the Stamps where we lose on a late drive. final score 28-27. There were a few games like that last year.

[kkc60]

2/3 games this year we've needed our defense to get a stop to put us in a very good position to win. Both times they got walked down the field. Sorry, no excuses

[3rdand1.5]

If the football database stats are to be believed....our run defence is far and away the worst league wide...in fact the disparity is so high that after three weeks the next closet to us is Ott. and they have surrendered 105 less yards along the ground 463-358....

We give up an average of 154.3yrds a game along the ground, for context to show just how bad this is T.O which after three weeks has the best defence against the run based on stats has surrendered 177 yards in total in all three games...yes less than 23 yards given up in all three of there games more then we average per game.....

[Throw Long Bannatyne]

The point is that we've often had leads and the ball with little time left and still lost. It's a combination of often too conservative offence and being forced to punt.

That said, with the game on the line we seem prone to soft defence and allowing the opponent to score when we need to force them to punt.

The Elks game was a variant of that. Bad play selection on the deep route followed by soft defence. Elks completed a 2nd and 15 IIRC. 2nd and long is our weakness and we've seen it in other games.

You'll have to think back and refresh your memory even about the Grey Cup losses against back up QB's that ran around the edge to continue late scoring drives.

This was 2023 Grey Cup info as one example. Note in particular the 3rd and 5 conversation for 31 yards.

With the game on the line, Cody Fajardo and Tyson Philpot delivered the Montreal Alouettes a most unlikely Grey Cup title.

Fajardo's 19-yard touchdown pass to Philpot with 15 seconds remaining rallied Montreal to a thrilling 28-24 victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Sunday in Hamilton. It earned the Alouettes their first CFL title since 2010 and followed an uncertain off-season that saw the franchise taken over by the league in February, then sold a month later to businessman Pierre Karl Peladeau.

Fajardo's toss capped a stellar seven-play, 83-yard march. It included a clutch 31-yard completion to Cole Spieker on third-and-five before a Tim Hortons Field sellout of 28,808 as Montreal ended its season with eight straight wins.

This was the 2022 Grey Cup loss. Note the 2nd and 15 conversion.


Smith wasn't Toronto's only unsung hero. Backup quarterback Chad Kelly engineered the five-play, 36-yard drive Ouellette capped. Kelly, the nephew of former NFL star Jim Kelly, replaced veteran McLeod Bethel-Thompson, who suffered a dislocated right thumb.

Kelly delivered a crucial 20-yard run on second-and-15 to the Winnipeg 15-yard line that kept the drive going. The march was set up by Javon Leake's 44-yard punt return to the Bombers' 31 with 6:07 remaining.

It's just indications of finding ways to lose instead of win late in games. Ottawa and Crum winning comes to mind.

Check the 2025 Bomber games in the schedule that shows results. Look at the play by play in the August 9th against the Stamps where we lose on a late drive. final score 28-27. There were a few games like that last year.

Back before 2019 they often lost or won on late game FG's with Medlock, especially in Calgary it was always a battle to see who kicked the last FG.