Who Knew the Blue Would Squash the Ticats?

Leah knew the Bombers would SQUASH the TiCats! This dress was a nice 1.00$ find at a friends garage sale.

Bomber Playoff Final (here’s a quick video of what it was like being in the raucous East Granstand towards the end of the game when the Blue defence was riling up the crowd. The vid was shot with a still camera, so the footage is grainy…)

Playoff football in Winnipeg. Brisk, cold air, biting wind and the season on the line against a former castoff quarterback. What could be better? Yesterday’s East Division Final marked my last chance to bid adieu to venerable (re; old and tired) Winnipeg Stadium. What a great way to cap off 32 years worth of football memories at the old barn. I can vaguely recall my first game as a 6 year old. It was a match against the Calgary Stampeders and I got a gut ache from the cigarette smoke in the stands and spent the majority of the game with my head on my dad’s lap. Ah yes, going to Bomber games was an eye opening education for me. Drunkeness, cigarette smoke and blue collar ‘Loogins swearing about everything from coach Jauch, to lame calls and the immobility of Dieter Brock. Y’know, that aspect of a Bomber game has changed a lot, what with the smoking ban and seemingly more restraint when it comes to swearing. I guess there’s always S section…

Fortunately, the good memories far outweigh the negative (somehow the Reinebold era has largely been expunged from my memory bank…) Who could forget the day defensive back James Jefferson scored 4 touchdowns on a rainy day against Hamilton? Or the time my dad and I (for some reason, my twin brothers weren’t along) went to a regular season game against the Ottawa Roughriders. The game was memorable because with 6 minutes left, lightning struck the corner of the West grandstand and refs and everyone else at field level scurried for the dressing room! Being witness to Milt Stegall’s record breaking 138th touchdown was awesome.  Characters of teams gone by loom large in my memory. I still recall being impressed as a small boy by the towering presence of  6’6″ Bobby Thompson on the O-line, the rifle arm of Dieter Brock, and the miniature RB Willy Miller and PK Trevor Kennard. The Canadian slotback duo of sure handed Joe Pop and the “lay out and dive, even if it’s not necessary” Rick House were names my cousin Tim and I often adopted during the many times we played football at the lake. A walk down Blue Bomber memory lane could go on and on , but I couldn’t leave out the brash linebacking duo of Tyrone Jones and James “Wild” West from the list. Man, those guys could play!

Going to Bomber games has had a way of creating shared experiences with my dad, brothers, and cousin Tim. I’ll never forget going to a BC Lions playoff game with my brothers when I was about 8 years old. I can still almost hear the echoing chants of “BC Sucks” ringing through the circular ramp as we descended from the upper deck on our way to catch a city bus for the 35 minute ride across town because my brothers didn’t have their licences yet. Sunday’s pre-game show on CJOB noted how Bomber Nation (along with Rider Nation) is unique in the way that it hands down passion for the home team from generation to generation. Hopefully the new stadium will be a place where I’ll have the chance to build new memories over the next 34 years with my kids…somehow, I don’t think there’s much doubt that it will.