June 6, 2018

Nye: The biggest thing Riders fans are waiting for

Riderville.com

There is only one thing Rider Nation truly wants to see on Friday when the Riders wrap up their pre-season schedule against the Calgary Stampeders.

Zach Collaros.

It’s time to see it for real after Collaros has had a decent training camp to finally see how he runs this offence and what the Riders should look forward to this season.

Collaros is the final piece of the puzzle for General Manager/Head Coach Chris Jones to turn this team into a Grey Cup Champion and start to see some sustained success.

While many believe Collaros will get back to what he was in 2015, talk is cheap.

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Collaros doesn’t have to be a superstar on night No. 1 in his first game action in a Roughriders jersey after standing on the sideline for the entire first pre-season game. But he does have to show that he’s got control of this offence.

Jones has been clear for every position that until you put it on the field when the lights come on, you can talk all you want about what kind of camp you have — if it isn’t there on game day, Jones is going to have to start thinking about other options.

It’s also the first pre-season action for Brandon Bridge – aka, the other option for Jones at quarterback.

And those are the first and second reasons for fans to show up to the park. Bridge’s pre-season was inconsistent last year, showing very well in one game and looking average in the other.

Bridge was assigned homework over the off-season to work on his accuracy and getting the ball into ‘catchable’ areas for the receivers. Bridge promises he did the work necessary to do all those little things, especially in the short passing game to impress the coaching staff.

When I wrote about the Roughriders’ training camp, quarterback was the number one story as Jones said it was an open competition for the starting job.

Brandon Bridge is looking to take another step forward with the Riders this season (David Chidley/CFL.ca)

While we all assume Collaros will take the first snaps in Week 1, the final pre-season game is the only time Collaros can prove (in game action) Jones was right to invest some big money on the former Tiger-Cats quarterback.

Jones has had hundreds upon hundreds of reps to evaluate throughout the last three weeks of training camp and nothing shows reason to have concern that Collaros won’t be efficient on Friday night and into the regular season.

JOBS TO BE WON … NOT MANY

Friday is the final chance for the bubble players to ensure they’re on the right end of a meeting on Saturday to tell them if they’ll be sticking around to help prepare for the regular season opener, or be on the next plane out of Regina.

However, writing out the players that are locks to make this team, it leaves about a dozen or so question marks and of those, only two starting positions (defensive back and defensive tackle) are really still up in the air.

So what will Chris Jones want to see?

1. Terran Vaughn lock it down at left tackle. Jones says Vaughn has been the most consistent left tackle to protect the quarterback’s blindside but still needs to see better consistency from Vaughn to solidify his spot on the team.

2. A running back to take the job behind Jerome Messam. Zac Stacy, Tre Mason and David Cobb will get to show the coaches which former NFLer should stick around while Marcus Thigpen serves his two-game suspension for PED use.

Stacy should have the upper hand after being the only one that has been through the entire training camp but be mindful, if you see one of these players have a big game, check the tape. If you rush for 100 but allow sacks in protection, that’ll get you cut. The latter is much more important for Jones.

Marcus Thigpen’s suspension will keep him out of the first two games of the season (David Chidley/CFL.ca)

3. Devon Bailey, Josh Stanford, Mitch Picton etc. ease the tension of losing Jake Harty. The Roughriders had Jake Harty go down on day one of training camp with a season-ending injury. Jones didn’t hide the fact they were looking at Harty to play the ratio game on offence to be able to play two Canadian receivers when Messam came out of the game. Well, that now means Bailey, Stanford and the other Canadian receivers have a chance to be that guy.

The other factor is Rob Bagg‘s ankle injury. He’s missed the last couple of days of camp, although it does sound minor. But if Bagg is also banged up, the Riders will need to see their Canadian contingent of young receivers to step up big time.

4. HEALTH! This one is the most important. Chris Jones has much of his roster steady and ready but a major injury, especially to a starter, would start testing the depth of team way too soon for Jones’ liking.