The Calgary Stampeders will just have to grit their teeth and take it Friday night, as the Ottawa Redblacks will no doubt roll out a glitzy video, a banner and maybe even the Grey Cup itself to start their new season.
Sorry Stampeders, but here’s a little salt for that just-healing wound. Rub, rub, away.
It’s easy to make this game all about revenge. No doubt that’s part of the mental game for at least some of the players who watched Henry Burris and friends raise the Cup last November. But, the principals involved say it can’t be all about payback.
“It’s not like it didn’t happen. The game happened. We all know that, we all understand it, we all played in it,” Bo Levi Mitchell said. “Our motivation can’t be drawn from that.”
The kid has a point. Go in guns blazing, vowing payback for the travesty of last November, lose…..and then what happens?
Losing the game – especially the way the Stampeders did – provided plenty of motivation to work hard in the gym and hit the field ready to go. But the game can’t be allowed to take on any significance bigger than the fact it’s week one and it’s time to punch the clock for another season.
There are 18 games between now and the first weekend of November. Win enough and you can make up for last season’s shortcomings.
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