Should Kavis Reed and/or Ed Hervey face consequences for Edmonton’s struggles?

With Friday night's loss to Calgary, the Edmonton Eskimos fell to 3-13 on the season. Perhaps even worse, they finished their home schedule with a 1-8 record. Fans in Edmonton are restless, as you can see from the bag-clad gentlemen above, and there's plenty of dissatisfaction with what this team has done this year. The key question is the organization plans to address the disaster of the 2013 season and turn things around for next year. Should they change assistant coaches, fire head coach Kavis Reed and/or fire general manager Ed Hervey, or stand pat and hope things improve?

The Eskimos have plenty of respected long-time CFL and CIS coaches in the assistant ranks, including defensive coordinator Greg Marshall, offensive coordinator Doug Sams, offensive line coach Kris Sweet and defensive line coach Leroy Blugh, but this group's results have been far from spectacular this year. Heading into Friday's loss to Calgary, the offence was looking terrible almost across the board, ranked second-last in points per game (23.3), last in rushing touchdowns (9), third-last in first downs (290), third-last in completion percentage (59.1 per cent) and third-last in passes intercepted (21). They'd seen some bright spots this year, mostly from the play of quarterback Mike Reilly, but the results hadn't come consistently.

The Eskimos' defence has also had substantial struggles, especially against the run. Heading into this week, they were conceding a league-worst 135.1 rushing yards per game (by comparison, second-worst Toronto was allowing 115.3), and that number's only going to climb after Jon Cornish collected 145 yards on 19 carries Friday. Add in special-teams miscues such as the Grant Shaw blocked punt (perhaps an attempted fake, but a terrible one if so) that turned into a Calgary touchdown, and there's a case that this coaching staff may need substantial changes across the board.

It's definitely not all on the assistants, though, and the leadership of head coach Kavis Reed has been anything but inspiring this season. From consequences rants that didn't lead to anything except Internet mockery to bizarre decisions to play a quarterback recovering from a concussion but limit his playbook to make him extremely predictable, Reed hasn't exactly shown great decision-making. He's also done plenty of curious things in games, and he hasn't demonstrated much ability to make adjustments to counter other team's strategies. Reed isn't the only problem with this team, but he certainly hasn't shown much that would buttress his case to keep his job.

A lot of the blame here needs to go to the top, however, and that's on general manager Ed Hervey. Yes, Hervey inherited a difficult situation, and yes, he made one brilliant move by trading for Reilly in the offseason, giving the Eskimos the best quarterback they've had since they gave away Ricky Ray. Beyond that, though, Hervey's judgement has been extremely questionable. He hasn't done anything to solidify a shaky offensive line that had allowed 48 sacks heading into Friday (second-worst in the league; they gave up another four against the Stampeders, too) and put Reilly under pressure consistently. In fact, he made the offensive line situation worse by publicly blasting Simeon Rottier (violating the CBA in the process) but refusing to cut or trade him. Hervey has also completely mishandled media relations, going on self-imposed periods of silence and then returning with emotional rants that haven't helped the team at all. The Eskimos have plenty of problems, and they're not all about Hervey, but his behaviour this season has been anything but helpful to this club, and there are legitimate questions as to if he's the right man to turn this team around.

Exactly what Edmonton will do this offseason is yet to be decided, of course, and a lot may depend on how they play in their last two games. If the Eskimos are able to finish the year with two solid wins, maybe the offseason changes won't need to be too dramatic. Even if they can put forward impressive efforts and show real progress, that might help to save some jobs. However, at the moment, everyone from Hervey on down should rightfully be concerned for their status, as they haven't exactly shown a lot of great things this season. At the moment, it looks like the Edmonton organization could use a substantial housecleaning, including bringing in a new general manager and a new head coach. There's still time to try and show that things are getting better, but if the Eskimos continue to limp to the finish line, a drastic makeover along those lines might well be required.