The games of this week of the CFL season and the context surrounding them should serve as a reminder that the end of a season can be a treacherous time to bet on teams. You think you know what each team is going to do ... and then you remember what's all going on in the league.
Let's look at the East first. Everything is locked up there. The Tiger-Cats will finish in first, the Alouettes second, and the Argonauts and REDBLACKS will miss the playoffs.
Nobody really has any incentive to win. All of them could end up sitting starters at this point: the top two, to preserve them for the postseason, the bottom two, to lock up those top two draft spots and keep them from getting hurt at the end of a lost season.
But someone's going to have to win. With no byes left for East teams, each team plays each of the others one time before the season ends.
The one game that really actually interests me is the Week 20 REDBLACKS @ Argonauts matchup. It could very well decide who picks first in the 2020 draft. (On the other hand, my relative lack of knowledge on the league could mean I'm placing undue emphasis on the draft.)
I'm much more unsure/nervous/excited about the West, where everyone has an incentive to win.
Yes, even the recently eliminated Lions have a reason to win: they can still play spoiler to a couple teams by beating them.
They're already guaranteed a top three draft pick. If they're satisfied with that, they could try beating the Roughriders this weekend. The only problem they might run into is that the Riders are still trying to lock up that top seed.
I can't predict what the Lions will try to do in the last week of play when they host Calgary. Too much has yet to happen before that. Let's see how the Stampeders do in their two games against the Blue Bombers first.
For now, here we stand.
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