Turnovers, poor special teams' performance lead to Riders' failing grade from Wes Cates

Saskatchewan Roughriders quarterback Mason Fine, left, throws under pressure from Toronto Argonauts' Jonathan Jones, centre, and Adarius Pickett during the first half of CFL action in Halifax on Saturday, July 29, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese

Rider Nation is licking its wounds as the green and white recover from a 31-13 loss against the Toronto Argonauts during Touchdown Atlantic.

Brit Dort:

Wes Cates for another edition of X's and O's – kind of a special one with the Touchdown Atlantic game. Wes you're actually fresh off the plane. You got to go experience it. Tell me about it.

Wes Cates:

“I don't think Halifax is big enough for Riderville. I mean as soon as I hit the streets there was green everywhere. So the fans definitely showed up – despite the outcome of the game, Riderville won. They definitely out-fandomed Toronto. Actually shout out to the Rider organization and the Argonauts for kind of teaming up – they had a great VIP section for the charter plane folks and some other people that bought the tickets and then it was just a great time. A lot of snacks, a bunch of eating, drinking, a party and went to the tailgate pregame, all that stuff. Halifax hosted, SMU did a great job, St. Mary's was awesome. So it was a good time.”

Well, I'm happy to hear. Maybe not a good time for Rider fans – dealing with the loss here. But you know statistically if you look at this game, you would see that Mason Fine threw for over 300 yards, compared to Chad Kelly who was only 122 yards and the Riders didn't really do much with it. So what was the downfall the green and white this time?

“Yeah Brit, honestly I was hot – like literally and figuratively – it was hot out there. I was mad, the Riders. Toronto jumped out on the Riders and it wasn't looking good. So as a fan, I was hot and then I had a chance to sleep on it and my head coach when I was a rookie in Calgary came to mind – Tom Higgins – used to say it's never as good never as bad. What he means by that is when you play a game, you know your emotions are running high about the good and bad things that happen. You may be down on yourself or high on a whim. But when you go back and look at the film, you realize you didn't play as great as you thought you did. Or you definitely didn't play as bad as you felt like you did coming off the field. And that's what happened with the Riders against Toronto this time. If you look at they lost the ball on the one. So that's six, seven point’s right there. Get a pick six, I was a little mad at Mason Fine he had a couple of bad throws that were costly interceptions. Kind of the same type of interception as last week with that pick six. I didn't like that. You take that off the board. It's a close game, and then you got bad tackling on special teams that cost you another score. So really, if you had kind of just tackle a little better, obviously protect the ball better – then it's a tough matchup. Defense definitely stepped up again this week – can't be mad. The Riders out scored Toronto in the second half 13-10. So definitely we can't get defense enough credit for coming in and putting on a good showing, a good effort every week.”

Well, I know Rider Nation is all up in arms about the quarterback situation right now – because we saw backup Jake Dolegala come in and lead a successful touchdown drive. But after the game, head coach Craig Dickinson said “No Mason fine is still going to be our starting quarterback.” So what do you say to Rider Nation right now?

“I just say be patient. They're looking good, like you said Brit, 300 yards passing there's just some things they need to clean up maybe a little more communication that needs to happen. I think I am going to get on these receivers about the waggle. I think the timing of the passing plays would be better if they hit the line a little faster. And obviously the O-Line is still struggling a bit – they can't really get a run game going and struggling just to give Mason the time he needs right? Or any quarterback for that matter.”

Well, I'm going make you grade them. We did see eight penalties from the Riders, five turnovers you mentioned. So what are you giving them this week after that performance?

“Like I told you last week Brit, if they didn't come out and make it a close game, or win it, I was gonna fail them. So I'm giving them an F and these are reasons why: Didn't take care of the ball – Mason, you’ve made the same interception pass again. Just throwing that late out – you can't do that against these good DBs. Special teams: Tackles – atrocious gotta get guys on the ground. Defense. They're bringing the grade up, but we got to fail them this week.”

Alright, I’m going let you go and I’m going to let you say that – next week we can get a passing grade. Thanks for this one Wes.

No problem.