complaints about the ticket prices<\/a>, which seems to be a common theme. That\u2019s not great overall for the Stampeders, but they did see growth year\/year last season. In fact, five of the nine teams in the CFL had growth last year, and Toronto was essentially flat.<\/p>\nIt\u2019s too small of a sample size to be concerned just yet, but it\u2019s worth monitoring.<\/p>\n
After five consecutive Grey Cup appearances, the Blue Bombers took a more conservative approach in free agency ahead of the 2025 season. It didn\u2019t pay off, as they had to enter the East bracket as the crossover playoff team and lost to Montreal in the East semifinal. In the CFL, if the fourth place team from the other conference has a better record than the third place team, they crossover and make the playoffs in the opposite division.<\/p>\n
This offseason, they got really aggressive in adding key pieces to the team. The two biggest ones were wide receiver Tim White and defensive lineman Jake Ceresna. Both players, along with cornerback Jonathan Moxey and offensive tackle Jarell Broxton, were massive in Friday night\u2019s 30-28 win on the road over the Stampeders.<\/p>\n
White stepped up in a big way, and the Blue Bombers needed it with Nic Demski only catching two passes for 28 yards. He caught five passes for 60 yards, including a touchdown in the third quarter.<\/p>\n
The biggest return on investment has been Ceresna. They moved on from Jackson Jeffcoat after the 2024 season, and having Willie Jefferson not having a dominant option on the other side proved to be a huge impact on the Blue Bombers\u2019 pass rush. Ceresna didn\u2019t just play well, he was dominant, getting three sacks on the day.<\/p>\n
There are still questions about the Blue Bombers this season, especially with the age of quarterback Zach Collaros, but this is a great start. If they can beat Hamilton on Thursday, the Blue Bombers will be viewed much differently.<\/p>\n
Davis Alexander still has the magic<\/p>\n
Going into last year\u2019s Grey Cup, Montreal Alouettes quarterback Davis Alexander hadn\u2019t lost a game. His first loss was against Saskatchewan in the Grey Cup. He was 11-0 in regular season games with a 13-0 record, including the playoffs.<\/p>\n
The Alouettes got down 24-10 in the third quarter, and Robert Kennedy sparked it with a pick-six on Bo Levi Mitchell. Alexander then led the game-tying drive, leading to a Jose Maltos-Diaz field goal to tie it, and then another to win the game in overtime. He\u2019s got the magic to lead the Alouettes to a Grey Cup.<\/p>\n
The key is going to be staying healthy. Alexander suffered multiple hamstring injuries, including reaggravating it in the Grey Cup, hindering him enough to where he couldn\u2019t perform as well as he should have. If he can stay healthy, the Alouettes will be serious contenders.<\/p>\n
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NFL<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t2026 CFL Season Preview: Roughriders look to defend their Grey Cup title with MOP Nathan Rourke emerging into superstardom\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\nThe 2026 CFL season is set to kick off on Thursday night, and it\u2019s shaping up to be one of the most intriguing in years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Week 1 of the Canadian Football League showed us a lot about the top teams in the league…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":726590,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,50475,182041,941,82,7504],"class_list":["post-726589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-football-league","tag-canadianfootballleague","tag-cfl","tag-davis-alexander","tag-jake-ceresna","tag-montreal-alouettes","tag-sports","tag-winnipeg-blue-bombers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=726589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/726590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=726589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=726589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=726589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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