Ti-Cats Add Peguese to Lineman Mix

In an effort to fix what ails the defense, the Ti-Cats have acquired defensive lineman Brandon Peguese from the BC Lions for future considerations. This marks the second trade in the last week for a defensive lineman. Just last week, the Cats acquired Torrey Davis from the Calgary Stampeders.

Part of me is happy that the team is going about trying to find players, but another part of me wonders how much impact these players will have this season. Both Davis and Peguese were backups and I don't know how much the Ti-Cats can gain from picking up backup players from other teams. I know that backup players move from one team to another and can thrive, so it is a wait and see approach, but I don't hold out too much hope that these are the two guys that will transform the unit.

Finding the right players along the d-line is something the Cats have been trying to do all season. The d-line has been one of the biggest areas of concern on the team, if not the biggest, and nothing the team has done has been able to change that. I think the biggest problem with the d-line is that the team hasn't come close to adequately replacing players they've lost, either through retirement, free agency or to the NFL. In the last three years, Stevie Baggs, Justin Hickman, Garret McIntyre, Khari Long, Demonte' Bolden, Darrell Adams, Matt Kirk, Jermaine Reid, Luc Mullinder and Maurice Forbes have all left the team for one reason or another. Kirk, Reid, Mullinder and Forbes were Canadians and a lack of Canadian depth on the d-line has forced 2010 draft pick Eddie Steele into a backup role because there is no non-import depth behind him. That has necessitated changes to the ratio that otherwise wouldn't be there if there was a Canadian able to back up Steele. Hickman and McIntyre are plying their trade in the NFL, and Baggs and Bolden are now teammates in Calgary. Losing that many players in such a short amount of time has really hurt the cohesiveness of the unit, and not finding replacements has led to the problems we see today.

Hopefully one day we'll talk about Peguese and Davis the same way we wax poetic about Hickman and McIntyre.

Williams Wins Again, a Trade and All-Time Coaches

A lot of news from the last couple of days that I need to catch up on, so here it goes.

Chris Williams has once again been named the Special Teams Player of the Week. What more can be said about Williams at this point that hasn't already been said countless times? I've already said he's going to be named the Most Outstanding Special Teams Player at the year-end awards ceremony and I also think he is a legitimate shot to win the top award, Most Outstanding Player, as well. If he keeps winning these awards, and this is the third straight week in which he has, I don't know what I am going to say about him. I am seriously running out of ways to say "he is awesome."

The Cats made a deal yesterday with Calgary for defensive linemen Torrey Davis. Davis is a mountain of a man and could be just what the team needs in the middle of their defensive line. Davis and Robert Rose could form a pretty formidable defensive tackle combination for the Tabbies. Davis won't play this week against Toronto, so we will have to wait until the following Saturday against Edmonton to see what he can do.

Finally, the Ti-Cats unveiled the head coach nominees for the all-time team. Five coaches are up for one spot: Al Bruno, Ron Lancaster, Ralph Sazio, Jim Trimble and Carl Voyles. I remember both Bruno and Lancaster, and I remember them fondly, but the pick here has to be Sazio. He won three Grey Cups in four appearances and won 10 playoff games in his five years as Hamilton's head coach. No other Tiger-Cat coach can match that, and while I am sure there are still some people angry over his defection to the Argos, he is pretty much universally considered the greatest coach in Tiger-Cat history.