It’s about time for the Saskatchewan Roughriders to make a kicking change, according to Glen Suitor.
“I’d start doing it right now,” the TSN analyst and former Rider said Tuesday on the SportsCage. “Maybe after the Banjo Bowl.”
Suitor’s rationale for the Riders to replace the struggling Alex Hale either before or immediately after Saturday’s road rematch with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers is simple.
There isn’t much runway left for the team to settle on its kicker for the stretch drive and the playoffs. The Riders are going to have a difficult time moving on from Hale if they don’t do it soon, Suitor said.
“It just looks like the deeper you go here, the further the coaching staff is going to have to stick with him,” he said. “If you make the change with two games to go before a Western semi or a Western final, you’re really rolling the dice now.”
Hale has been a major talking point for the wrong reasons for much of the season, and that was never more apparent than during Sunday’s 32-26 win over the Blue Bombers.
Boos rained down on Hale after he missed his second field goal of the game early in the third quarter, a 47-yard attempt. He also was wide on a 46-yard try earlier in the contest.
Those two failures dropped him to 50 percent this season on kicks 40 yards or longer. He was 1-for-3 against the Bombers and his overall success rate dipped to 75 percent.
It’s not like Australia hasn’t had his high points in his CFL rookie campaign.
Hale struggled early on, forcing the Riders to sign Dawson Hodge in early August. Riders coach Corey Mace had Hodge take every rep in an Aug. 12 practice leading up to their game in Hamilton three days later. Even though Hodge made every kick – including a 57-yarder – Mace elected to stick with Hale.
Hale rewarded his coach’s faith in him by making all four field goals – including a 52-yarder – in a losing effort against the Tiger-Cats, his second of three straight perfect kicking performances.
But Hale has put just three of six balls through the uprights over the last two games. Sunday’s outing was perhaps rock bottom.
“It looked to me like he has a confidence issue,” Suitor said. “When you miss one left and then one right, (it’s) like when you’re playing golf and you’re standing over the tee box and you’re going, ‘I don’t know where this is going to go.’
“When you’re thinking that way as a kicker, you’re in trouble.”
The uncertainty that Hale has proved this season might be the biggest flaw with the Riders roster. It seems like a change at his position is all but a foregone conclusion.
Provided that is the case, it had better happen soon. Suitor said he’s imperative that any new kicker gets in the lineup for at least two games that matter in the standings before the postseason.
“Let’s say they know that they can’t do better than second (in the West Division) or let’s say they get the first and they lock it up with a game to go. You don’t want to throw him in that game because you won’t get a true measure of what he plays like under pressure,” Suitor said. “I think any time in the next couple of weeks you take a look at some other guys.”
Watch the full conversation below.
