Fat cats or hungry dogs?
Esks have talent to two-peat. Motivation's the question.
By TERRY JONES -- Edmonton Sun
Is this the beginning of another Edmonton era? Is another Eskimo dynasty about to develop?
Some would suggest it's too soon to start asking those questions. But, in my case ...
"Is this the beginning of another Edmonton era? Is another Eskimo dynasty about to develop?"
That's quote-unquote. Those were the words I chose to use on these pages last year. I wrote it before they won one.
I still could be ridiculously wrong and open to ridicule, of course. But I thought I saw it then. And I still think I see it.
Last year I thought I saw a team which had found the door, knocked on the door and was ready to knock it down. And I wrote it because I wasn't the only one who saw it coming with this team, which hadn't won a Grey Cup since Ron Lancaster was coach in 1993.
Lancaster himself had come to the conclusion his old mate Gluey Hughie Campbell may be about to go out as CEO with the kind of team he came in with as coach in Edmonton when the Eskimos won five Grey Cups in a row.
"They're putting it together that way," is how Lancaster put it at this time last year. "They're the best team in the league on paper, no question. Look at all the talent. I mean, they're loaded.
BUILT TO KEEP IT
"They've built it and they've built it to keep it. They've been building it to stay in place for a while. It's quite an assembly. They didn't lose anybody they didn't want to lose. They've added some very good players. That's an awfully good lineup."
The Eskimos hadn't won a Grey Cup for so long they'd taken the reference to their 11 championships off their letterhead. Everybody but Saskatchewan, Winnipeg and Ottawa had won a Grey Cup since the Eskimos had last won one. And Ottawa was just back in the league.
Baltimore had won it since the Eskimos last carried the Cup and they're not in the league anymore. Calgary, Toronto and B.C. had both won it twice since the Eskimos won it in 1993. Finally, they won one again.
But now it's a year later and the Eskimos have lost Ricky Ray to the NFL and some would say that alone means no way.
"I think it's there. We've definitely got the building blocks," said Sean Fleming.
The Eskimo kicker who was there in 1993 when they'd last won definitely knows something about not counting your Cups until you win them.
"The thing is, you don't see teams repeat very often. It doesn't happen a lot."
Indeed. Since the Eskimos strung the five-in-a-row together from '78 through '82, only Doug Flutie's Toronto Argos have been able to win back-to-back championships.
After Jackie Parker's '54-'55-'56 three-in-a-row Eskimo team, there were only three occasions when teams won back-to-backs before Edmonton put together the five-in-a-row run.
"Everybody guns for you," said Fleming.
"The thing about being the Eskimos, though, is that everybody is gunning for you anyway," he said of the sqaud, which has a 32-season streak of making the playoffs.
"We have an opportunity. We have a chance. We have the tools. The big question is the hunger. Our motivation was a lot different last year," he said of a team which had lost the Grey Cup the year before.
Singor Mobley believes they have what it takes to do the double.
"It's not going to be easy this year. But we have the talent in this room."
But no Ricky Ray?
"I think we're going to be where we were in the second half of last year a lot earlier this year," said offensive coach Danny Maciocia.
"Jason Maas is a better quarterback now than he was a couple years ago. And he has a pretty good supporting cast. If he lets his supporting cast help him out, he'll be fine. We're not asking him to win games, we're asking him to not lose 'em."
Maciocia says he has more weapons.
"We're better with the addition of Mookie Mitchell," he said.
"We're going to be able to play a Canadian running back this year and that's huge. It gives us four top import receivers and that's what we wanted to be able to do."
KEY IS THE DEFENCE
The offensive coach says the key is the defence. The Eskimos defence, Maciocia believes, is going to be dominant.
That means field position.
"We feel good about the people we have," says defensive co-ordinator Greg Marshall. "Last year we kept improving every week. This year it shouldn't take us as long."
In many ways Maciocia and Marshall are the coaches who know this team best.
Both believe this could be a third exceptional Eskimos team.
"You can't just show up and say, hey, we're the defending Grey Cup champions. I think we still have the hunger. I can sense it. I can feel it," says Maciocia.
"I don't sense they're going to become fat cats or have a letdown," says Marshall.
"I don't think our guys spend a lot of time talking about how good of a team they could become over a span of time. They look at the challenges from week to week. If you don't do that, it can bite you pretty quick. You can't just talk about it. You have to go out and do it."
I believe the Edmonton Eskimos will do it again. And maybe again. And ...
