JONES: The only quick fix is to win for image-battered Edmonton Elks
There were lifelong fans ready to divorce the football team following a report that general manager Brock Sunderland had “banned” Joey Moss from the dressing room in the final months before the death of the beloved locker-room attendant
Terry Jones Edmonton Sun Oct 07, 2021
When a team of tradition that’s supposed to be up near the top of the standings drops to the bottom halfway through the season, there’s going to be noise — a lot of noise. There’s going to be grief.
With the Edmonton Elks, much of it has been earned. Some of it has been unearned. They don’t deserve it all.
There were lifelong fans ready to divorce the football team Wednesday with a report that general manager Brock Sunderland had “banned” Joey Moss from the team dressing room in the final months before the death of the beloved locker-room attendant.
I checked that one out with Adam Walker, Moss’s nephew who has been the Moss family spokesperson since Moss’s death.
“I can assure you the Edmonton Elks always included Joey within the organization until the time he was no longer able to work,” said Walker. “The Elks continue to support Joey and his legacy 50-50 in 2020 raised nearly half a million dollars for the Joey Moss Memorial Fund. The Elks have also hired two individuals from the Winnifred Stewart Employment Program. They have been an outstanding organization and have always treated Joey with the highest respect.”
Walker then sent an almost identical statement out on behalf of the family that the Elks posted on their website.
But that didn’t end it. A significant number of people on social media rushed to point out that Walker hadn’t actually denied that Sunderland had banned Joey.
I got back to him on that.
“Let me be more clear,” he responded via email. “Joey was never banned from the dressing room, Terry. Joey had dementia. Over the last couple of years, it became harder for Joey to go to work. But I really don’t think his health is anyone’s business. Joey was welcomed everywhere. The Moss family has nothing but respect for the Elks and they were nothing but class to Joey.”
The rest of the noise has been much more normal, if you can call firing a second-string halftime and post-game analyst with debatable credentials by the rights-holding radio station normal.
Fire the coach. Gas the general manager. Can the CEO.
In exceptionally short form, I already fired coach Jaime Elizondo in print after the team lost the last game in Ottawa. I believe GM Brock Sunderland gave Elizondo what should be a 5-2 team to this point and he coached it to 2-5.
But I also believe both Sunderland and CEO Chris Presson deserve to be sanctioned in many areas for continually forgetting they work for a community-owned franchise with a proud history and tradition of the way they treat people in the organization from an equipment man of 49 years to many season-ticket holders of long standing that are upset they can’t get a friendly voice on the phone to discuss a situation and a long list of other complaints.
Some of that is likely going to survive the season regardless and require a deep dive analysis by EE chair Ian Murray and the back-to-being-the-Nervous-Nine board of directors at the end of the season.
In the meantime, there’s only one way to make some of the noise go away and that, in the words of Oakland Raiders’ legend Al Davis, is this: “Just win, baby.”
The trouble with that is it might be too late.
It’s like this. The Elks, after losing for the second time this season to the worst team in the league, now have put themselves in position where they pretty much have to go to Winnipeg on Friday and beat the best team in the league.
If Edmonton doesn’t win in Winnipeg, it would probably punt them so far back not only in terms of possible playoff positioning but also in the damage done as an organization in minds of so many, that you wonder what the damage might be, short-term and long-term.
If Winnipeg wins to go 7-1, they would take one more step toward securing their first home West Division final in 49 years and leave Edmonton at 2-6 with six games to play this coronavirus pandemic-shortened season.
Yes, the Elks could lose and return to Commonwealth Stadium against the same Blue Bombers team next Friday and run the table and still finish over .500.
But a loss in Winnipeg would make it three straight losses, and remember, the Elks have a four-game losing streak at home and end the season with three games on the road in three different time zones over seven days.
Having Calgary, Winnipeg, Winnipeg, Hamilton and Saskatchewan in consecutive fall home regular-season games looked like a sensational stretch to sell tickets when the schedule came out, but …
There’s been a great deal of damage done to the image of the EE football organization, again earned or unearned, in a great many areas that’s going to possibly take a great deal of time, effort and money to repair.
On the field, the Elks have dug themselves a deep hole but at least they haven’t totally run out of hope of digging themselves out. It’s just that the Winnipeg Blue Bombers have put themselves in position to shovel dirt on top of them in that hole this weekend and/or next weekend.
For the Elks, in so many different directions, this is a game with an unbelievable amount of hair on it. And they’re not playing against air.
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