Riders to Test Depth Against Alouettes
Published: Friday, Aug 9th 2019, 2:08pm
by Alex Dormuth (@RealAlexD)
Tonight’s Riders/Als game is a battle of the walking wounded. Many stars are out for both teams, for Montreal, QB Vernon Adams Jr. and RB William Stanback are out. Antonio Pipkin and Jeremiah Johnson will start in their place. But for the Riders, it goes much deeper than that.
75% of the Riders D-Line is out as AC Leonard (6 game injured list), Zack Evans (6 game injured list) and Micah Johnson (1 game injured list) will miss this game. CFL Sacks leader Charleston Hughes is the only regular in place against Montreal.
Starting this week with Hughes will be Jeremy Faulk (who was with the Riders in Training Camp), Makana Henry and Earl Okine. If you’re asking “who?”…. exactly. Okine has been rotating in recently, but is still an unknown. Mak Henry can be a bull in a china shop, but he NEEDS to smarten up. He’s taken way too many penalties for someone who barely plays. I don’t mind a penalty here or there if you are playing hard and things happen, but his penalties are of the STUPID variety.
Next man up is the mantra that pro sports teams use when injuries happen, so I guess we will see if these new faces are pro caliber. I fully expect Montreal to run the ball some, then run it more and then run it again. The Riders D-Line lost all it’s edge against Hamilton last week when Evans and Johnson went out and it doesn’t leave me too confident going into tonight’s game.
As for other injuries, we will see if Loucheiz Purifoy and Shaq Evans will play and how affective they’ll be. Tonight’s game might not be the prettiest game you’ll see, but it will show us that what the Riders have in the stable is ready, or if GM Jeremy O’Day needs to make some calls during the bye week
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