CFL fans are undoubtedly aware of the fact that Paul Weiler, the man who played Pigskin Pete III retired at the end of last season, and that the Cats were going to be undertaking an exhaustive search for the next Pete in the off season.  Except that they didn't.

As reported by Perry Lefko at Sportsnet.ca, the team failed to hire a full-time Pete and is instead going with three different stand ins for each game. The Cats' Scott McNaughton told Lefko that "At every game this season, the spirit of Pigskin Pete will live on via three Oskee-wee-wees at Ivor Wynne Stadium -- one by a kid, one by a fan and one by a celebrity." Proving definitely that even the Ticats recognize that no kids or celebrities are also fans of the Ticats.

Now having watched the new plan in action last night, we feel comfortable in saying that it doesn't work. First of all, there were no kids cast in the Pete role and unless they are somehow counting Angelo Mosca, there was no celebrity either. Regardless of that though, a big reason that the Pete role works is that he would walk around the field interacting with fans and that is something that cannot be replicated by the army of impersonators.

So come on Hamiltonians. Run a comb through that mullet get out there and demand that someone wear the bowler hat full time. At the very least it'll take your mind off of the other on field product.  It's hammer time.

"The Kissing Bandit" - not the new Argos DTWhen we heard that the Argos had signed The Kissing Bandit, we were admittedly a little surprised, as according to a number of different sources, Morganna the Kissing Bandit retired over 7 years ago.

Sadly, delving further into the story of the Argos signing, we found out that the new defensive tackle is an imposter. Which is a shame, really.  If there's one thing that the CFL needs, it's a person with absurdly large breasts running around kissing people.  

OK, someone who is not Etienne Boulay. 

With our four-day Winnipeg binge drawing tantalizingly, alarmingly close, there's only one way to get into the spirit - fuzzy reminiscing about drunken moments at Grey Cup parties, Grey Cup afterparties, and maybe even Grey Cup games. With gophergate dominating the nation's headlines, today's edition answers the age-old question: Can mascots talk?

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If you know us even a bit, you know we love us our mascots. So it goes without saying that we're thoroughly enjoying the epic battle that's ensued from the Stamps' decision to ban Gainer the Gopher from Sunday's West Division Semifinal. As if the outcry wasn't enough, now we've got Ralph Klein wading in - and really, what better cause to take up in your final days in office than opposing another city's rodent. But what intrigues and inspires us most is Gainer's television appearance in which he let a provincial minister answer an interviewer's questions, refusing to do anything more than stoically shake his head.

What does this have to do with a Grey Cup moment? Well, see, we've always assumed that the mascot code explicitly forbids them from talking, which makes sense - if you're looking at a giant gopher, dog or inflatable bird, it's a little disillusioning if it speaks in the voice of the poor bastard who's stuck inside. But as we learned at Grey Cup '04, not every mascot has Gainer's admirable self-control.

Allow us to once more set the scene. Having just exited the restroom at the Spirit of Edmonton party, we're moving through a narrow throughway when the entire Roughriders cheerleading squad comes through moving in the other direction, cornering us in one spot as we wait for them to pass.

We glance beside us, and standing there is a Ticats mascot - not Pigskin Pete, sadly, but the oversized cat known as Stripes. Our eyes meet, and we nod at each other in that manly way that men and felines always do when they're surrounded by a pack of tiny women in equally tiny skirts. "Hello," we say, because we can't think of anything else to say. "Hello," Stripes replies in a decidedly human voice. And as we do some more awkward nodding, we detect a hint of shame on Stripes' part, realizing that he had violated the mascots' sacred code.

Reassuringly, we're reminded the next day that some mascots have better restraint. Striding up to the Argo Bounce (R.I.P.), we attempt to goad him into talking. When he holds firm, we inform him that the Hamilton mascot talks. This earns us only a curt nod, and the Argo Bounce promptly makes his escape, on to thrill the masses with his silent charm. And we nod, this time in approval rather than lechery, knowing that this is a mascot.

This has been your Grey Cup moment. 

While this year's Argos games have been extremely enjoyable, there's been something missing. That something? Well, as we've hinted at previously, it's obviously Scully - the loveable Argos mascot from the mid 90s. 

Scully provided everything one could want in a mascot: his own go-kart, the ability to squirt water out of his ears, a good passing arm for mascot football, and the wherewithal to avoid getting arrested. Sadly, Scully was released by the Argos after the 2002 season for reasons that the team has refused to disclose to this day.

With rumours swirling that Scully had suffered a nervous breakdown after being released by the club and had gone into seclusion, we decided it was up to us to seek him out and try to cheer him up.

This edition's stop: Midland, Ontario.  Population 16,700.

We were tipped off that Scully had moved to Midland in order to be close to the water, and because of the ample go-kart parking in the city's downtown.  Sadly, as the below picture with Lady Rusty (which beat out Rusty Lady as a nickname in a landslide 1-0 vote) shows, all we were able to find was this restaurant named in his honour, apparently by an alcoholic crab.

Come back Scully! 

(Incidentally, if anyone knows where the  Scully costume is, please let me know. Seriously. I need a Halloween costume.)

The first time we laid eyes on Pigskin Pete was 13 years ago, when we inexplicably ventured down the QEW with a couple of high school friends for the East Semifinal between the Ticats and the Ottawa Rough Riders. Most of the game was spent heckling Dexter Manley, which in hindsight we feel kind of bad about, but we distinctly remember watching a somewhat older gentleman using his bowler hat to lead an incomprehensible chant, and wondering what Dave Thomas was doing in Hamilton.

That was much better than one of our final encounters, at last year's Labour Day Classic, where we cringed in horror as the drunken, cigar-chomping Argo fan in front of us insisted on bellowing "FORESKIN PETE" every time the genial Ticats booster took the field. But in all the games we went to at Ivor Wynne in between, we had more than enough opportunity to appreciate Pigskin Pete as a legitimate CFL treasure. And we were secretly hoping for a meeting between him and other mascots, if only to watch him give Touche and Blitz the thrashing of a lifetime.

We have to be honest, though: Until last Friday, when he announced his retirement, it never occurred to us that there might be more than one Pigskin Pete. We'd just assumed that some guy named Pete had started doing impromptu cheerleading in the stands - sort of like Dancing Homer in that early Simpsons episode - and the team had decided to give him a regular gig. Now we find out that there were two Pigskin Petes before him - and that, shockingly, none of them were born with either "Pigskin" or "Pete" as their given names.

Anyway, all this leads us to the matter at hand. See, the Ticats have already given word that they'll be launching the search for Pigskin Pete IV in the off-season. Better still, Paul Weiler - that would be Pigskin Pete III's real name - will be actively involved in choosing a successor.

You know what you have to do. As soon as auditions are announced, bust out your best bowler hat, hire a choreographer to make sure you know just how to elicit the apprioriate "Oskee-wee-wees" and "Oskee-wa-was" from a crowd, and get your ass to Hamilton. Anyone who does so and regales us with a full account gets two free passes to the inaugural J-Dubbs Film Fest. 

So many questions surrounding the Ticats' turfing of Greg Marshall in favour of Ron Lancaster. (What does this say about Paopao? How long until the Lil' General tries to trade for Danny McManus?) But since we're bloggers, not Ticats fans, the more relevant question is whether online chatter had anything to do with this.

 The consensus in recent weeks from folks in the know seemed to be that Marshall deserved more time, but pressure from fans and media in Hamilton might force management's hand. Now, with all respect to our friends in Steeltown, it ain't exactly the media capital of the world. There's one newspaper, one TV station and no sports radio. So where exactly were all these voices of dissent being heard?

On the Ticats' official website, naturally. To its credit, the team provides fans with a forum to vent as they see fit. And so we start getting discussions like this one, wherein somebody named "Garthman" proclaims that the Ticats "stink like the sulpher blowing off the steel mills." Considering that Bob Young is apparently fond of perusing these forums, it's entirely possible that the likes of Garthman helped pull the trigger.

That's unfortunate for Marshall, but potentially fortuitous for us. Not to overestimate our powers, but if Garthman is able to help dictate his team's personnel decisions, then we'd like to think we can do likewise.

So let's start in the most obvious place: with this guy.

Having had season tickets to the Argos for an alarmingly long time, I've seen Scully shoot water from his ears, which was at least unique (if a little gross). I've seen that weird Bounce family introduced a couple of years ago, which (as you'll note from the photo at left) was at least good for molesting the Ticats' T.C. while other mascots looked on in delight. I've seen mascot football - far and away the world's greatest halftime sport. And most memorably, I was there when some sort of a large dog representing a previous incarnation of AM 640 was decked by a drunken fan - then insisted on being carted off the field in full costume, because taking off his canine head would "scare the kids."

In other words, I know from mascots. And unless Jason is at least prepared to use his size to shore up the O-line, it's time for him to go.