PLAYERS SEEK ASSURANCE CFL TO RETURN IN 2021
Ambrosie hedged his bets during latest round of interviews
It could be a short season in a hub city.
It could be the full 18 games for each team, all played in empty or half-full stadiums.
Or it could be back to regular operations.
“That's the variable part,” said Brian Ramsay, executive director of the Canadian Football League Players Association. “We understand the variables that the pandemic has put forward.
“Playing the game in 2021 can't be a variable. It has to be a certainty.”
This isn't a shocking stance, nor is it remotely unreasonable. When CFL governors voted on Aug. 17 to kill the prospect of a six-game season in a Winnipeg hub, plunging the league into at least temporary irrelevance, Ramsay made it clear that he and the rest of the CFLPA brain trust thought the league did the wrong thing. The right thing now, in their estimation, is to declare the 2021 season a certainty, then find a way to make it happen.
There are hundreds of players and thousands of fans who feel the same way, especially after watching the American Hockey League, National Lacrosse League and other sporting entities put firm dates on plans to restart.
Instead, CFL commissioner Randy Ambrosie hedged his bets during media interviews conducted on Thursday in conjunction with the launch of Grey Cup Unite, a virtual celebration of a championship game that won't be played.
Ambrosie didn't identify an opening date for 2021 training camps or a regular season. Instead, he stayed on familiar territory.
“It's the intention of our league to be back on the field. Do we have absolute certainty how this is going to play out? Well, no, none of us knows exactly what path COVID will take. But there is an enormous effort being undertaken by this league to get back on the field in 2021, and I'm going to share that message with our fans.”
The league and the players went down a long and winding road together last summer — hammering out a new collective bargaining agreement that would make it possible to play a short season in a Winnipeg hub — before the league unilaterally grabbed the wheel and drove the
entire enterprise into the ditch.
Governors pulled the plug because, in the absence of federal funding, the hub city plan wasn't financially viable. Heck, the league itself wasn't viable. In fact, it had rarely seemed more vulnerable.
This realization entered public view in May when Ambrosie announced during a Zoom call with members of a parliamentary finance committee that the league as a whole routinely suffered annual losses of $10 million to
$20 million. The pandemic, he said, could quadruple those losses
The CFL'S business model, which relies so heavily on gate revenue and in-stadium spending, was suddenly under the microscope. Something has to be done, everyone agreed. Months later, something still has to be done.
Grey Cup Unite, while seen as a positive and worthwhile initiative, doesn't distract from the larger picture of a league with an uncertain near-term future. Players will happily engage fans and stakeholders later this month, because that free and easy interaction is practically baked into their DNA and that of the CFL. There will be a CFLPA state of the union address, select players will participate in a racial diversity round table discussion and media availabilities, and they will make as many connections with fans as time and technology allow.
What those players and fans want most from that league now is a commitment to being back in business, a commitment that football will be played in 2021.
For that to happen, the league must be able to operate in a vari
ety of less-than-optimal scenarios and without federal funding, because there's no guarantee the federal government will act differently in 2021 than it did in August. Changing the way the CFL does business, therefore, is imperative.
“When the commissioner speaks on points like (addressing the business model), and I talk about viability, I think those go hand in hand,” said Ramsay. “Speaking on behalf of the players, we wanted to play football in 2020. If those conversations are going to increase the viability of that happening, so we don't end up in the position we're in right now, then yes, those are conversations that need to happen.
“I think what the membership desires is to see a viable CFL.”