CFL PLAYERS HAVE LEVERAGE IN CBA
TWO NEW SPRING LEAGUES SOUTH OF BORDER GIVE PENDING CFL FREE AGENTS ANOTHER
It was a none-too-subtle shot across the bow of the Canadian Football League. Jeff Keeping, president of the players’ association, was asked about the league directive that teams not pay off-season player bonuses until a new collective bargaining agreement is ratified. (The current CBA expires when the Grey Cup ends on Sunday.)
Keeping said it was a “very aggressive bargaining tactic” and one that was “very short-sighted.” He noted “the changing landscape of pro football” and said it would be a shame if the league’s approach backfired on it.
The CFLPA president, without actually saying it, was alluding to the emergence of two spring leagues in the United States. One, the Alliance of American Football, is to begin play in February, and the other, the reborn XFL, is to launch a year after that.
What Keeping meant is that if CFL free agents find themselves unable to make any bonus money this off-season, they will have other professional options. He’s not wrong. While it’s unlikely that any of the league’s pending free-agent stars, including quarterbacks Bo Levi Mitchell and Mike Reilly, would take a flyer on a league that hasn’t even begun play yet, it’s certainly possible to imagine players making closer to the CFL minimum of $54,000 deciding to jump to the AAF, which is set to offer US$250,000, threeyear contracts.
That fact alone could make this upcoming CBA negotiation one that the CFL hasn’t witnessed for a long time, if ever: one in which the players, emboldened by the presence of some actual leverage, hold out for serious concessions from the owners.
Keeping, who plays for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, and CFLPA executive director Brian Ramsay, formerly of the Edmonton Eskimos, were speaking on Friday afternoon, a few hours after Commissioner Randy Ambrosie delivered his State of the League address at the same downtown Edmonton hotel. And while the CFLPA wasn’t exactly spoiling for a fight, nor did it sound like it was in a mood to roll over. Keeping acknowledged the players association has had problems in the past getting itself sorted out and able to present a united front in negotiations. “Are we stronger now? Yes,” he said.
Aside from the obvious sticking points over wages and the share of revenue among owners and players, the CFLPA again finds itself fighting for better healthand-safety protections. It is fighting this on a number of fronts: a grievance filed last spring that seeks payments for former players
THEY DON’T WANT TO DEAL WITH IT (INJURY COMPENSATION).
who are dealing with the effects of long-term injuries, and a newer campaign to have professional athletes covered by workers’ compensation laws. (Provincial laws exempt pro athletes from normal protections).
And while Ambrosie and his predecessors have said often they understand that at some point better protections and payments will have to be offered, this is a matter that has often been pushed down the road, even as the NFL and NHL have come to terms with former players seeking injury-related compensation.
“They don’t want to deal with it. That’s the easiest way to put it,” Ramsay said Friday. “We’ve talked about it, we’ve asked about it, and they continually don’t want to find a solution.”
Peter Dyakowski, a recently retired Tiger-Cats lineman, said the CFLPA began its push to change labour protections at the provincial level because it kept getting rebuffed at every other avenue. He added these changes shouldn’t take place through the cut and thrust of a CBA negotiation.
“The idea that we would go and bargain for player health care and rehabilitation coverage, when it’s already afforded to every other employee in Canada, is ludicrous,” he said.
Whether such strong talk would survive a protracted labour stalemate remains to be seen. CFL players aren’t paid anything close to what the average NHL or MLB athlete earns, so they would have a harder time holding out for a better deal if negotiations drag into next spring. Historically, the league has got what it wants.
Keeping and Ramsay say this time will be different. “The players are unified in this,” Keeping said.