9-day road trip a chance for Argos to bond
Get better, that’s about all there is to do in the eyes of Toronto Argonauts tackle Bryan Hall.
The Argos beat Saskatchewan last Thursday and then stayed put. They hung out in the locker room waiting for the Riders to finish their practice, and at night stayed in the hotel room bonding over film.
It was literally eat, practice, eat, film, eat, more film, sleep for the team.
“The coolest thing I did was walk over to the mall that closed at 6 o’clock,” chuckled Hall, who came over to Toronto in free agency after spending his first couple of years in the league in Hamilton.
However, the time spent in Regina may have been a blessing in disguise for a team still trying to get to know one another.
“Especially in the CFL when training camps are three weeks. That’s not enough time to really gel and bond so any opportunity you can be on the road with your brothers and mesh and really understand what we’re thinking — what Keon’s thinking, what Ricky Foley’s thinking, Justin Hickman’s thinking and how are coaches are thinking. And being locked in to Regina, Saskatchewan what better opportunity are you going to get.”
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So you get the picture, Bryan Hall won’t be vacationing in Regina any time soon but we’ll have to wait and see if their business trip actually turns out to be as productive as he believes it was.
The Argonauts are a team that needs better from their defence if they want to improve on last season.
It won’t be easy. They lost some top players from Chad Owens and Trevor Harris on offence to Euclid Cummings, Greg Jones, Tristan Okpalaugo on defence.
Changes also came in the coaching staff defensively as Rich Stubler returned to Toronto for his third stint as the team’s defensive coordinator.
Hall’s biggest adjustment with Stubler is the fact the coach doesn’t use a playbook but the veteran CFLer is adapting well.
“We’re structured but we definitely have freedoms to make plays and that’s what it’s about, to put players in position to make plays. He allows players to make plays and that’s what the game comes down to and he’s going to put is in position to make those plays every time.”
And making plays was lacking last year for the Argonauts defence. They were a group who had the second fewest takeaways in the league and the lowest amount of points off turnovers in the league. If the Argonauts can help out the other side of the ball with more takeaways that will be a good thing.
They appear ready to do so with a fumble return for a touchdown that actually provided the game’s winning points in last week’s win over Saskatchewan.
The other thing Hall has taken away from the long-time coach is how to watch film and how to prepare for each and every opponent.
“It’s just an open concept so you understand football because a lot of coaches become really [particular] when it comes to Xs and Os and that’s just not good for players sometimes when you sort of force the Xs and Os rather than understand the game of football and understand what the offence is doing out there.”
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“Edge pass rushers are hard to come by. Period.” |
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Hall isn’t the only new face. Keon Raymond has come over from Calgary with Stubler; Justin Hickman came up the QEW with Hall from Hamilton.
Other players are getting either bigger roles on the team because of the departures or there are rookies trying to make an impact.
The one thing Hall believes they all need to understand is a lot can happen in 18 games and they just have to build towards the playoffs.
“Our goal is to be playing our best ball by the end of the year. We understand we’re going to have a lot of growing pains but we just have to stay together and believe in the process that (Rich Stubler) has in front of us.”
Come the end of the season, Hall hopes they are making an impression like the BC Lions are at the beginning of the season on the defensive side.
His specific description of the future reputation for the Argos defence, “the most ferocious defense, nobody wants to play us and you can’t really get a beat on us because we’re doing so much stuff, it looks very similar, but it’s totally different.”
They’re a long way from being that, but with time and possibly thanks to the hospitality of Saskatchewan, the Argonauts will want to spend a week in Regina every year.