O’Day wants to see more ‘bounce back’ from team in 2024

After a second straight season in which the Saskatchewan Roughriders saw their year end with a seven-game losing streak, general manager Jeremy O’Day has zeroed in on what needs the most improvement for 2024.

“When we have a tough game and have a tough two games, we have to figure out how to bounce back because that is something we haven’t been able to do. We’ve been close but not close enough in some of those games where we just didn’t get it done down the stretch,” O’Day told The Green Zone on Thursday.

“Those were some long months and long weeks when you are going through those stretches of not winning football games and everyone is starting to press and you are looking for every reason possible as to why you can’t get over the hump.

“You’re not going to win every game, but you have to be able to bounce back and get back on track. For whatever reason or a number of reasons, we weren’t able to do that the last few seasons. That is what led to the change and with change is a fresh attitude — a change in the culture, a change to the person in front of the room and changes to the staff as well.”

One of the biggest changes coming to the Riders in 2024 will be a new head coach. The Riders hired Corey Mace to fill the role after moving on from Craig Dickenson.

It will be Mace’s first head-coaching job and while O’Day hasn’t interacted with Mace much, his assistant general manager, Kyle Carson, has. Carson was with the Calgary Stampeders from 2012 to ’18 before joining the Riders. Mace was a player and then a coach in Calgary during that time.

“The good thing about it is that I had someone in the interview process who had worked with (Mace) in the past,” O’Day said. “I don’t want to say people come into interviews and they fake (who they are), but even though you’ll spend eight to 10 hours with them before you hire someone, that’s not a huge amount of time to spend with them. You gather information from people who worked with them in the past and you spend as much time talking to people who have had experiences with them and football minds and former players and coaches.

“Kyle being in the room having already worked with Corey, it really wasn’t a ton I asked him. It was more so just to confirm that what we are seeing is what we are going to get.”

Carson and the team’s other assistant GM, Paul Jones, both signed two-year contract extensions this off-season.

Now work continues on trying to put a winning roster together in hopes of making a return to the post-season. Part of that is determining who to bring back and who to target in free agency.

“You learn a lot in exit interviews. I wish there was information that was coming from the players I could pinpoint, but there’s little things here and there that they will give you that you can see need to be addressed. I think that happens at the end of every year,” O’Day said.

“When you bring the players in, you have to realize one player might have had a great year, one player might have had a bad year (and) one player might not have played that much. You’re getting different perspectives. But overall, the character of the players was really strong.

“We didn’t really have a ton of bad stuff that came out of those exit interviews but they are very good for gathering information and for trying to figure out from (the players’) perspective — you should have a good feel for how they feel — but you do get some perspective on the players and the little things that they see during the year.”

One of the questions surrounding the Riders will be the status of Trevor Harris for 2024. The 37-year-old quarterback suffered a season-ending knee injury in Week 6.

“I think the reality is we feel comfortable with Trevor as our starter going into next season and we are excited for him. He is rehabbing hard and doing everything he can and he’s a guy that takes exceptional care of his body and attacks every day with working out and rehabbing,” O’Day said.

“He brings so much value to our team as far as all the experiences he has had in our league. (We’re) just looking forward to him working with (offensive co-ordinator) Marc (Mueller) and getting back to playing ball.”

There are also questions about who the backup quarterback will be next season with Jake Dolegala and Mason Fine both on expiring contracts. Short-yardage pivot Antonio Pipkin was signed to an extension.

“(We’re evaluating) to try and decide who’s our best option behind Trevor. We will continue to do that,” O’Day said. “After hiring our offensive co-ordinator, he will have an involvement with that on who he believes is the best guy to run his offence and so those are the things we are going through right now.

“We haven’t had conversations with those guys to date but we do look forward to doing that in the near future.”

Another area of interest for O’Day this off-season will be the offensive line. The Riders only averaged 84.4 rushing yards a game (second-fewest in the CFL) and the Riders’ pivots were sacked 54 times (third-most).

“We took steps in the right direction but nowhere where we wanted to be as a whole. It’s a critical part and I think some of our shortcomings in the last few years have been impacted by our offensive line,” O’Day said.

“There are various different reasons – whether it’s personnel, whether it’s injuries, whether it’s the ball coming out fast enough. It really is a group effort to try and make the unit better but it is a focus for us going forward and making sure we are good up front and we want to protect the quarterback.

“It is something we are focused on and we talk about it all the time. We’re working hard at signing guys off of our negotiation list and then preparing for the draft. It will be a focus for us going into the season.”

O’Day added some deals are close to being done, but couldn’t say if they would be done before Christmas or shortly after.