Eskimos speak out about turning off microphones
They may have had their offensive amps cranked to 11 on the field, but the Edmonton Eskimos hit the mute button on the airwaves when it came to the CFL’s Live Mic broadcast Monday.
While Montreal Alouettes quarterback Rakeem Cato and head coach Jacques Chapdelaine could be heard on the field between plays, there was only static from their Edmonton counterparts, Jason Maas and Mike Reilly.
“Neither one of us felt comfortable with it all week. We were told to do it and we were going to do it the whole week,” said Maas, the Eskimos head coach. “And then when we got to the stadium today, we felt like it wasn’t the right thing to do. We worked too hard to get to this point in our season to do something we both aren’t comfortable with in a big game.
“The rest of these games are big as well, so it was just a coming together to say we aren’t going to do it today. We felt like it was going to be a disadvantage for us moving on and, ultimately, we weren’t comfortable with it.”
The problem is, none of the seven other teams involved were 100 per cent supportive of the idea.
And the Eskimos knew just how much of an advantage listening in on the opposition can be thanks to the program’s test run between the Calgary Stampeders and Hamilton Tiger-Cats on Aug. 28, even though they couldn’t translate it into a win over their provincial rivals in the annual Labour Day series that followed.
“If you’re a football coach and a football player and you’re uncomfortable doing something someone’s asking you to do, at the end of the day, we get paid to play and coach and that’s what we wanted to do,” Maas said.
The question is, what makes the Eskimos different?
“They just said eight of the nine teams are doing it and we said, ‘Why can’t we be the second team to not do it?' ” Maas said. “Then it was, ‘Well, you’re doing it.’
“We just made a concerted decision to say we weren’t doing it. They can’t hold a gun to your head to make you do it. It’s what’s right for our football club, not what’s right for other people. We decided between Mike and I not to do it and we’ll live with the consequences.”
What those could end up being remains to be seen.
“I’ll let the heads and the presidents of the clubs, the CFL and TSN get together and decide what they want to do with that,” Maas said.
But Reilly isn’t expecting any sort of hit to the pocketbook for this one.
“I was told by my players association that it was my decision,” he said. “I never signed any contract to put on a microphone like that during a game.
“Had I felt comfortable doing it, I would have been more than happy to do it. It’s not like I wanted to put anybody in a bad position. But to be honest with you, this is October football, I’m here to win football games and I don’t feel like I would have played a very good game had I had other concerns.”