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CALGARY — What time is the press conference?
Did that look to anybody out there like a well-coached, well-prepared, properly-motivated football team losing 56-15 to the Calgary Stampeders Sunday?
Can the Edmonton Eskimos possibly proceed through the two-week break to the next game, at home against the Roughriders before the usual horde of Saskatchewan fans, without making significant changes to the coaching staff?
And is it too early to declare a talent airlift between now and when the Eskimos come back here on Labour Day?
Worse and worse
This is getting worse and worse. The Eskimos are now 1-6 and the only positive here is that they aren’t scheduled this weekend.
In their entire history, no Eskimo team has given up more points than 56 in a game. The 1964 Eskimos did the same against the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
“We talk about quick starts and better starts and it’s been talk,” said head coach Richie Hall.
“It’s been talk seven weeks in a row.
“It’s been pitiful.”
Good a word as any.
Abominable. Appalling. Atrocious. Awful. Deplorable. Disgusting. Dreadful. Frightful. Ghastly.
Gruesome. Hideous. Horrendous. Horrific. Lamentable. Pathetic. Repulsive. Woeful. Wretched ...
“We stunk the joint out in two of the last four weeks,” said a red-eyed Hall in the corridor outside the visitors dressing room long after the prescribed wait period for post-game interviews.
“It’s mental. It’s physical. It’s a lack of fight. It’s a lack of confidence,” he continued.
Then he said it.
“It starts with me.”
Bingo.
This is a team which hasn’t been showing up for the starts of games all season.
And what happens at the start of this one?
Ricky Ray fumbled the opening snap.
On the second play, Wes Lysack came through from the back to block a pass.
On Calgary’s first two plays, on the other hand, Henry Burris threw a 30 yard pass to Ken-Yon Rambo and then Joffrey Reynolds took it 27 yards for a touchdown on the next play.
The Eskimos, a team which hasn’t had an offensive line all season, invited even more ridicule when offensive co-ordinator Kevin Strasser decided to send the offence in without one.
Ricky Ray lined up behind centre. The rest of the offensive line located itself way over on the other side of the field near the Calgary bench.
On third down, a bad snap on the punt situation gave Calgary the ball on the Edmonton 30. Field goal.
Ten-nothing.
At the end of the quarter, it was 11-1 — an improvement over the 11-0 first frame from the week before against Toronto.
But it would have been worse if Lysack hadn’t dropped an interception pass from Jared Zubransky which would have gone for a touchdown. And, of course, the Eskimos were 0-5 in second-down conversions.
The Eskimos have now been outscored 51-14 in first quarters this season.
I don’t know who is making the general manager decisions this week, but does he need somebody to draw him a picture?
With Ray having been consistently clobbered in the first half, he was unable to proceed past the midway mark of the second quarter due to damaged ribs and sternum. Which brought in both Jason Maas and Jared Zubransky who combined on plays to produce a touchdown.
But with people in the press box predicting that the next time Zubransky threw the sideline pass it would go for a touchdown, he got the call to throw it again and Dwight Anderson picked it off for an 89-yard touchdown trip and a 32-8 lead at the half.
Thirty-two to eight!
At the half!
The only reason for anybody in Edmonton to continue watching the game was the knowledge of the way it has worked this year for the Eskimos in fourth quarters.
Sure enough
And sure enough. First play. Jon Cornish. Run. Fifty-two yards. Touchdown on the next play. Next series. Seventy-four yards to Nik Lewis. Touchdown to follow. Next series.
Twenty-five yard penalty for a player ejection and a bad snap and kick of the ball through his own end zone for a safety.
Next series. Seventy-five yards in 10 plays. Touchdown Stampeders.
It was 23-0 in this fourth quarter. That makes it 98-25 in fourth quarters so far this season.
The Eskimos were a league-worst minus eight in the give-away/take-away stats and were a minus-four in this one for a league way worst minus-12.
This was worse than the game in Winnipeg.
That one cost Danny Maciocia his job.
More heads have to roll after this one. And you can start with the head coach. He’s a nice guy. So was Nice Neill Armstrong who coached the Eskimos in the ‘60s.
The players may love him. But they aren’t playing for him. Not in the beginning. Not in the end.
When the coach isn’t getting the message through to the players, you have no choice. You have to fire the head coach.
terry.jones@sunmedia.ca