What the hell was that?

I deliberately waited until this morning to post this - had to let the emotional reaction pass, in favour of a more objective view. But it's really hard to be entirely objective about the Riders' 45-28 evisceration at the hands of Dave Dickenson and the B.C. Lions.

The Rider offence (save for some meaningless scores in "garbage" time) was putrid. And the defense was even worse. I can see the offence needing some time to adjust to the injection of a new quarterback, offensive coordinator and.............playing indoors? But the defense is virtually unchanged from last year - so what excuse is there for that pedestrian effort? The defensive backs may as well paint their helmets orange if they insist on playing like pylons in the future!

And, quite frankly, the Green Machine was clearly outcoached on both sides of the ball. That's a trend that has to stop immediately. With the "win or else" nature of this season, G.M. Roy Shivers can't afford to stand idly by and watch a talented team underperform as it did last night. Not when jobs are clearly (and publicly) at stake.

Let's put it this way: a similar effort next Sunday at Taylor Field against the same Dickenson-led Lions will not be tolerated by the paying observers. Nor should it be. Let's hope this was an unfortunate aberration, rather than a sign of things to come. Yuck.