A week after stumbling badly in Hamilton, the Argonauts righted the ship on Saturday night in Toronto thanks to a defensive performance for the ages, edging out the Winnipeg Blue Bombers 16-14 in overtime to improve their record to 4-3.
Here are my thoughts on the game.
D-Fence! D-Fence!
The only reason the Argos won this football game was because of the turnovers created by their defence. A 41-yard Tarvarus McFadden pick-six was the team’s only touchdown, three of their four forced fumbles were recovered well within Winnipeg field goal range, and they forced a turnover on downs with under a minute remaining on the Toronto 22-yard-line. They were hitting hard all night and it was big licks which led to two of their forced fumbles. Without any one of these gigantic plays, the Argos would likely have lost the game.
To give the defence further credit, on Sergio Castillo’s missed field goal at the end of the first half, starting weakside linebacker Fraser Sopik forced his way through the line and appeared to alter the ball’s flight path as it missed just to the left.
Toronto Sack Exchange
The Toronto Sack Exchange returned with a vengeance Saturday night, taking down Zach Collaros five times and knocking him to the ground on at least half a dozen other occasions. Cornerback Benji Franklin joined the party with a sack on a corner blitz that seemed to be triggered by Winnipeg’s formation rather than a called play. Jake Ceresna had two sacks and his fellow defensive linemen Woody Baron and Ralph Holley had the other two.
Collaros was pulled from the game by the concussion spotter following a hit from rookie defensive end Derek Parish. Though he returned shortly thereafter, he was under fire all night and slow to get to his feet on several occasions.
Silence Dogood
One play aside, boundary cornerback Benji Franklin had a solid outing. Now that one play was a big play, but it’s hard to say with absolute certainty that it was his fault.
After completing back-to-back short passes in front of Franklin and boundary halfback Mason Pierce, Collaros appeared to be looking that way again, with backup quarterback Chris Streveler running a short drag route toward them. Both defensive backs stopped their feet and came down towards Streveler, allowing Ontaria Wilson to streak on by for the easy touchdown.
Either Pierce or Franklin blew their assignment, but it’s impossible to know which. Franklin forced a fumble, registered a sack, had seven tackles, and dropped his shoulder a few times on the much larger Brady Oliveira.
QB & A
Cam Dukes has been the Argonauts’ starting quarterback all season and though he started this game as well, the leadup certainly felt different. For the first time all year, he and Nick Arbuckle appeared to split first-team reps at practice and head coach Ryan Dinwiddie was coy about the situation, not naming the starter until Friday.
Dukes played the entire first quarter and while he didn’t make any mistakes per se, completing three of four passes for 37 yards, he took two sacks and generally took too long to process what he was seeing downfield.
Arbuckle played from the second quarter onwards and struggled even more from a statistical standpoint, completing only 54.5 percent of his passes for 87 yards, but he didn’t surrender a sack and was more deliberate in his decision-making. Each quarterback threw one pass that probably should have been intercepted. Dukes finished with a quarterback efficiency rating of 103.1 with Arbuckle’s much lower at 64.0.
The Argonauts’ offence had two drives end in field goals and hit another in overtime after gaining seven yards. Not scoring a single offensive touchdown in the CFL is unacceptable, and Dinwiddie will have to take a close look at his options before heading off to Calgary. Between Dukes and Arbuckle, the team averaged a pathetic 4.8 yards-per-passing-attempt, which was lower than their 5.1 yards-per-rushing attempt.
I wonder if the coaching staff will consider looking at third-string quarterback Bryan Scott this week. He’s looked good in limited preseason and regular season action this year, and at the very least, Scott probably has the best deep ball on the team. For a squad struggling to push the ball downfield, getting Scott some playing time should at least be a consideration.
On the ground
No football game can ever really be about just two players, but there was a lot of focus on running backs Ka’Deem Carey and Brady Oliveira in this one. Carey was the league’s leading rusher coming into the game, 14 yards and three touchdowns ahead of his counterpart.
With Toronto second in the league in rushing yards allowed per game and Winnipeg last, this matchup appeared to favour Carey on paper. That didn’t take into account the loss of Toronto’s elite run-stopper Jared Brinkman, who was put on the six-game injured list this week. Additionally, Winnipeg’s defence spent the evening loading the box in an attempt to force the Argos to employ a pass-heavy offence.
Carey continued to run very well with 10 carries for 62 yards, but Oliveira’s 13 carries for 96 yards put him back into the league lead.
Receiving corps 2.0
The Argonauts stunned most of the CFL, as well as their own fanbase, on Friday when they released Rasheed Bailey, who had been playing good football and was leading the team in receptions.
The plan coming into this season appears to have been to start two nationals at receiver to go along with DaVaris Daniels, Damonte Coxie, and Bailey. Due to a slew of injuries, this plan never got off the ground, leading to a shift in tactics that saw the Argos play four Americans including rookie Makai Polk to start the year. Polk’s play has been extremely impressive, and with Canadian receivers Dave Ungerer III and first-round draft pick Kevin Mital making their season debut Saturday night, Toronto clearly decided to return to their original plan at receiver and made the difficult decision to substitute Bailey for Polk.
Polk is on a far more cost-effective rookie contract and under team control. Plus, despite being the tallest Toronto receiver, he has a gashing style that compliments this unit well.
None of the Argos receivers were given much of a chance to show anything against Winnipeg with DaVaris Daniels and Damonte Coxie logging only one combined catch, but Polk once again looked like the most dangerous receiver on the field. He led his positional group in targets, catches, and yards, while also posting the biggest play of the evening -– a 22-yard catch and run.
Scoreboard
The Argonauts came into Saturday night leading the league in points per game, but their miserable 16-point output knocked them down to third spot behind the B.C. Lions and Montreal Alouettes.
As was the case last season when they were putting up similar scoring numbers, all three phases of the game have been contributing. On this night, the offence was the only unit that didn’t put up any points.
Grant grounded
The eyes that weren’t on Ka’Deem Carey and Brady Oliveira in this game were on return specialist Janarion Grant. The former Blue Bomber has been on a torrid pace so far this season, leading the league in kick return and punt return average, while his former club was at or near the bottom of the league in just about every relevant return-related statistic.
Winnipeg did a masterful job of not only keeping Grant out of the endzone — which would have set a CFL record for return touchdowns in four consecutive weeks — but keeping him entirely at bay with one punt return for six yards and two kickoff returns for 36 yards.
Home sweet home
With over four weeks having passed since their last home game, the Argos saw by far the best turnout of the season from their fans. It helped, I’m sure, that it was a beautiful summer night in the city, that the team gave away 10,000 hats, and that it was Afro-Caribbean Culture night. BMO Field is an extremely loud venue at the worst of times and on Saturday night with just short of 15,000 fans in attendance, the volume was noticeable, to say the least.
Honouring a legend
Argonauts players wore a “PM” decal on their helmets for this game to honour the passing of legendary linebacker, builder, and broadcaster Peter Martin. A moment of silence was also observed prior to the national anthem.
At halftime of Toronto’s last home game a month ago, Martin was enshrined as an All-Time Argo in the builders category. It occurred to me as I was standing in silence Saturday night how tragic it would have been had Pete not been alive to receive the news he was being honoured, knowing how important the team was to him.
Too often, legends are honoured posthumously, so I want to recognize my broadcast partner Mike Hogan and the rest of the Argonauts organization for pressing to make sure that special ceremony came together last month for him to see.
Martin had a saying about ugly football games like this one: “Even if it’s an ugly baby, somebody’s got to take it home.” The Argos will gladly take this one home, ugly as it may have been.
Up Next
The Toronto Argonauts (4-3) head back out on the road to take on the Calgary Stampeders (3-4) on Sunday, August 4 at 7:00 p.m. ET. The Stampeders were embarrassed 33-6 this week in Ottawa, so Ryan Dinwiddie and whomever his starting quarterback might be will not receive the warmest welcome from his former club.
