The CFL is right in accepting that it can be wrong
The league realized that video review had become too much and did something about it. Hopefully other sports take notice
By being willing to be wrong a little more often, the CFL got it right.
Randy Ambrosie, the league’s brand spanking new commissioner, thus became the first North America pro sports leader to say, “Enough!”
No more letting video review incrementally encroach on professional sports to the point it becomes more of an annoyance than a dispute-resolution mechanism.
“The last thing we want to have in place is an artificial impediment to our fans’ enjoyment,” said Ambrosie.
Bravo, and well said. Now if only other sports and leagues will take notice.
Video review had gone from “getting it right” for the CFL to “making me throw up” for fans at home. They were spending more time cursing the league’s com- mand centre than cheering for their team, appreciating the league’s stars and feeling passionate about the competition they were watching. The eye in the sky was creating more controversy and discontent rather than less, and becoming a total distraction.
In other words, there were more headlines about Glen Johnson, the CFL vice-president of officiating, than Bo Levi Mitchell, the Stampeders’ superstar quarterback.
There was little debate that the system as it was wasn’t working. So Ambrosie, despite having been on the job for less than a month, acted swiftly and decisively. He didn’t shelve the matter until the end of the season, or refer it to a factfinding committee, or fill the air with a lot of wishy-washy double talk designed to avoid saying anything because, you know, you don’t want to be interpreted as slagging “the product.”
Instead, he said this isn’t working, and we’re going to change it. Now. Mid-season.
The reaction has been very positive, although that will likely last as long as it takes to have a poor officiating call not overturned by video review. Like most sports that have embraced video review, the CFL is still letting too many different types of calls be subject to that process. But at least Ambrosie has reduced the number of coaches’ challenges to one per game so that, hopefully, there will no longer be a seemingly endless series of coaches throwing flags to halt play and examine in minute detail plays that shouldn’t be examined that way.
The Argos-Stampeders game Thursday had a great example of that. Toronto defender Cassius Vaughn was flagged for holding, grabbing and generally impeding the ability of Calgary receiver Marquay McDaniel to catch the football downfield. It was the right pass interference call, but Argos head coach Marc Trestman challenged it, the game was stopped and we all waited for a result, which was that the original call was upheld.
In other words, a complete waste of time that brought the game to an unnecessary halt on a play that was a judgment call in the first place. That’s the problem other sports, particularly hockey, have run into as well. Once you start down the path of using replay for discretionary calls it becomes a rabbit hole with no bottom.
Video review has worked best in tennis, one of the first sports to turn to using replay, but that’s primarily because tennis never expanded its use. It was instituted 11 years ago on the pro tours to aid in line-calling as the speed of the ball had started to increase to levels beyond the ability of the human eye to discern.
But tennis never expanded replay review. It kept it black and white, in or out, and that’s the only way video review really works well.
The NHL has certainly found that out after expanding video review to include offside calls and goalie interference. Half the time the review does anything but provide a clear and indisputable conclusion. The offside calls are the absolute worst, with goals waved off by debatable decisions on whether a player who had nothing to do with the play had his foot a quarter-inch off the ice. Ridiculous.
Worse than that, every time a goal is score these days, the first TV shot afterwards is of the coach whose team has been scored on going to his tablet to decide if he wants to chal- lenge it on some pretence or another. Anything will do.
In the NBA, permitting officials to go to monitors at courtside to determine things like flagrant fouls and who touched the ball last has created more delays for a sport that is already insufferable at times for the way in which the final 45 seconds stretches to 20 minutes of actual time. Baseball is struggling with the issue, too, including creating an issue of whether players sliding into second are able to keep their foot or hand on the bag. It wasn’t designed for that.
The CFL, it seems, is ahead of the wave in backing off its reliance on replay review, or at the very least trying to limit, rather than expand, its use. Ambrosie is the first former player to inhabit the commissioner’s office since Larry Smith 20 years ago, something that doesn’t guarantee success but ideally gives that person insight that others might not have.
Ambrosie already has demonstrated a greater feel for his sport and his league than his predecessor, former television executive Jeffrey Orridge.
Limiting the use of replay, of course, means wrong calls will stand from time to time, and the CFL has for years been struggling with the quality and consistency of officiating. But expanded use of replay review hasn’t made it better. It’s something Ambrosie needs to tackle, but probably through more training and greater salaries and benefits to attract better people.
Still, the CFL thrived long before replay review, and the suspicion is replay review isn’t crucial to whether people watch or don’t watch, buy tickets or don’t buy tickets. The same is likely the case for the NHL, NBA, MLB and NFL.
This isn’t being regressive, or being anti-technology. It’s understanding that trying to impose perfection on sporting events may come at too high a cost. Damien Cox is the co-host of Prime Time Sports on Sportsnet 590 The FAN. He spent nearly 30 years covering a variety of sports for the Star. Follow him @DamoSpin. His column appears Tuesday and Saturday.