MISSING GREY CUP WEEK IS TOUGH TO TAKE
It's the most Canadian of all sporting events and another reminder of what has been lost
It is minus-4 and foggy in Regina on Tuesday morning.
I know that because I checked the weather, and the seven-day forecast, like I do every year on the morning I leave for Grey Cup.
For me, it's always a morning flight. It doesn't matter to which city. You want to get there early. You want to take care of the details like checking in, getting your working credentials for the week, figuring out what is being held where.
This is a time in our lives when a lot of us are feeling out of sorts. A time when we've been home too long, lived too many days that feel the same, eaten too many of the same meals, seen the same faces and heard the same voices over and over again. Our own COVID-19 version of Groundhog Day, without the humour of Bill Murray.
But as a creature of habit — and a lot of us are — I felt like I should be heading to the airport Tuesday morning, getting on a plane, getting ready to cover the 108th Grey Cup, because that's what I do, every year, every city, every Grey Cup Week I can get to.
We got through the Stanley
Cup Playoffs and the NBA playoffs and the baseball playoffs and the World Series and none of it seemed the same, maybe because of time of year, maybe because of shortened seasons or extended playoffs, maybe because we have more important things to grouse about right now than sports.
Hell, even the Masters, the seemingly untouchable Masters, had its lowest television numbers in memory, which tells you just a little about the challenge sports is having being its relevant old self in a pandemic world.
Normally, I'm on the road about 90 days a year. A lot of cities, a lot of concierge lounge breakfasts, a lot of time wasted in airports waiting for a flight delayed or trying to figure out what to do about a flight cancelled. I don't miss airports. I don't miss planes. I certainly don't miss hotels.
Today, I'm missing Grey Cup. Not the game but the week. Because it's so different and so much fun. Because it's unlike anything else on the schedule of sports media members. Because, and this isn't meant to be hokey, it's ours. Super Bowls aren't a whole lot fun to work. The mornings are early. The days are late. The bus rides are aplenty. There's too much media chasing too few stories and on the way we all trip over each other, bang into each other, and it's a great event if you're not working it and if you're rich.
I've never been rich and I've never been to a Super Bowl I wasn't working. I don't remember any of them being much fun. I do know that on Wednesday night and Thursday night and Friday night I can find out about all the parties I haven't been invited to and the events that cost hundreds of dollars to get into.
Super Bowl Week is a rich man's game. It's a corporate game. It's a week to reward your sales staff or your best customers with a bonus of sorts.
The dinners are expensive. The tickets are ridiculously expensive. The parties make the tickets look cheap.
Grey Cup Week is anything but corporate. At Super Bowl, you see a lot of Gucci. At Grey Cup you see a lot of green: the green of Edmonton, the green of the famed Roughriders, and maybe some blue or double blue of Winnipeg or Toronto. You see jackets and toques and jerseys in team colours, and even from teams that don't exist anymore, like the Baltimore CFL franchise or the still not existing Atlantic Schooners.
That's the dress code. The drink of choice is beer. The music of choice depends on which team-sponsored event you might attend.
What happens almost every Grey Cup: I make friends with people I never knew before. There are those you see every Grey Cup, but never in between. People from all over Canada, coming together: And honestly, there isn't much in this country outside of Olympic participation that brings people together.
The last time I saw CFL commissioner Randy Ambrosie in person was early Grey Cup Sunday. I was walking through the outdoor 8th Avenue Mall in Calgary and Ambrosie was heading to his final pre-game event, with music blaring from the streets. He smiled, we shook hands, and had a brief conversation about the terrific week we'd experienced.
Who knew then there wouldn't be a Grey Cup this year?
Who knows what the future will bring for the CFL? I do know I miss Grey Cup Week terribly right now. The week more than the game.
I have tried to be smart during COVID-19. I have stayed home. I have avoided gatherings. I have worn a mask when necessary. And for the first time in a long time, I feel like I want to go somewhere, to Regina of all places. But that somewhere and that something isn't happening this year.