For the love of the game
executive, gushed about the league, and especially its players. “I don’t think you’ll find anyone who will be more proud of the players than I am,” he said, later extolling their virtues as “superhuman” athletes and explaining that he thinks promotion of said super-humans is one of the keys to getting younger fans interested in the CFL.
That the governors have chosen such a passionate CFL guy to lead it is not an accident, and it stands in sharp contrast to the 13th commissioner, Jeffrey Orridge, a New Yorker who was an accomplished executive but was best known in Canada for being the guy who was running CBC Sports when it had the NHL swiped out from underneath it. Orridge’s abrupt departure after just two years cited “differences” with the board, and it is apparent that in Ambrosie the governors decided on someone who sees the CFL’s unique elements as a feature, not a bug. “I’m part of this game,” Ambrosie said. “It’s wrapped into my DNA.”
But, is someone who is an enthusiastic supporter of the CFL the right person to help it overcome its challenges? One of the problems with trying to expand the fan base beyond the CFL die-hards is that the die-hards don’t understand why others don’t share their passion. When it is noted that the league struggles to attract younger fans, or that Toronto remains a black hole, the response can be: Bah. The CFL is great and shame on skeptics for not realizing it.
That’s an understandable sentiment for a fan, but it would be a dangerous one for the commissioner to hold. The CFL’s fan base undeniably skews old, and Ambrosie will need to be more than a cheerleader for the league’s current strengths to change that trend. This is not news to the CFL. Wednesday’s announcement was held at the headquarters of Twitter Canada, a move that seemed entirely designed to show that the CFL was hip to things kids like. (Whether kids actually like Twitter is beside the point.)
Ambrosie, who had said that it’s important for the league to “connect with the next generation of fans” in response to a question about the ongoing off-field struggles of the Argonauts, was asked how, exactly, he would going about making those connections. He responded by noting that we were right there at Twitter HQ.
“Obviously, digital media is a big part of the Millennial culture, so how do we use social media?”
But, social media is a way for people to interact with and experience things with which they are interested; they don’t fall in love with something because it happens to have a busy Twitter feed. Getting young people to care about the CFL is the root challenge, as it has been for several of Ambrosie’s predecessors.
The new guy certainly thinks it can be done.
“Inch by inch, mile by mile, we’ll win the battle for their hearts and minds,” Ambrosie said. He noted later, almost in passing, that when he drives around his neighbourhood, “we don’t see kids throwing the football around like we did when I was a kid.”
That’s fair enough, but Ambrosie certainly has enough else to do without taking on the challenge of reversing the participation rates in youth football. Maybe set out some more achievable short-term goals first.
He said he’s confident the Toronto market will rebound, and cited the commitment of the team’s owners — Bell Media and Larry Tanenbaum — to “slow, steady” growth, which is another way of saying not to panic if business at BMO Field doesn’t pick up soon. The Argos have time, as does Ambrosie.
“This game is fundamental to who we are as Canadians,” the new commissioner said. It’s clear that Ambrosie believes that. His challenge is to get enough of the rest of the country to agree with him.