DOWN TIME BECOMES FAMILY TIME FOR QB
With CFL on hold then cancelled, Redblacks’ Arbuckle and his wife get to enjoy their baby
The disappointment of a lost CFL season weighs on Ottawa Redblacks quarterback Nick Arbuckle’s mind.
Also in his thoughts are the financial hardships of some of his CFL brothers, something he can relate to. While chasing his football dream, he worked minimum-wage jobs such as cleaning pools, while his nowwife Zakiyyah worked three jobs to help make ends meet.
But while waiting through a pandemic, he’s got a chance to be a stay-at-home dad, spending priceless and precious moments with Zakiyyah and three-monthold daughter Aaliyah.
Arbuckle, 26, can’t wait to start his first game for the Redblacks — he signed to be their starting QB early this year — but there’s nothing that can replace the pure joy of holding your first child, watching the mannerisms and the personality developing while soaking in milestone after milestone.
“It’s been better than either one of us could have imagined,” Arbuckle said Wednesday, two days after the CFL pulled the plug on its 2020 season. “To not miss a moment has been incredible. It’s been really important for Zakiyyah and I to have this time together. Without family being able to cross the border and without a support system, it’s been really important for us to support each other. One of the things we love the most is how excited (Aaliyah) gets when she sees us, her ability to recognize us. When she wakes up from a nap, we go running in and as soon as she sees us, she lights up and starts smiling and laughing.
“I didn’t know really what to expect about having and raising a baby. I was the youngest in my family and I was never really around babies. So this is the first diaper I had to change, the first time I’ve held a baby. But it’s been absolutely incredible. I don’t know if there’s anything really to practise being a dad other than doing it.”
It hasn’t been easy for Nick and Zakiyyah in COVID-19 times. With an infant daughter, they’ve stayed pretty close to home, other than walks around the neighbourhood.
“We still really haven’t done anything,” Arbuckle said. “I would consider our lifestyle still to be at Stage 1 of the quarantine. We can wear masks, but we can’t put a mask on the baby so we don’t really feel comfortable taking her out around people. Right now, it’s all about keeping Aaliyah safe, even if means us starving for some other adult interaction.
“The thing that’s helped me was getting to the stadium a couple weeks ago, going twice a week in the mornings (leaving home at 6:15 a.m.) to be on the field since they re-did the turf.”
They’re hoping to make a decision soon on whether they will leave Ottawa later this year.
“We’re still discussing it,” Arbuckle said. “We plan on being here for the next few months until winter hits. Then we’ll re-evaluate depending on what’s going on in the U.S. with the coronavirus and the borders. We really want our families to meet Aaliyah and see us and hold our baby before she gets to be a year old. If they still can’t come up here, we’ll look into something where we can see them. I definitely want to be here, especially for the fall and I can get outside and interact and engage with the fans in a safe and fun environment.”
Financially, the family is fine. Arbuckle got a $210,000 signing bonus, softening the blow of a cancelled season.
“I know what it’s like to be in a situation where finances are a struggle,” he said. “A lot of these guys were dependent on the league and their salaries, especially guys who are veterans who have a roster spot pretty much secured. They were planning on having income that the season would provide to take care of themselves and their families. I hope players get financial aid. It’s not easy for guys to try to stay in shape year-round to be professional football players while trying to pay the bills.”
Getting to the finality of a season being gone was a roller-coaster ride. When the CFL finally seemed to connect with its players association in recent weeks, there seemed to be at least somehow, some way a season could happen.
“Optimism and skepticism would go back and forth,” said Arbuckle. “It seemed like the news would completely change every 24 to 48 hours. At the beginning of summer, I was really optimistic something would get done. As the weeks and months went on, you started to feel a little less hopeful. When some of the deadlines were missed in July — when the league and players association were waiting on word for the government — I started to think I saw the writing on the wall that it wouldn’t work out. I still held out some hope as I trained. As much as you suspect a season might get cancelled, hearing the news and the realization of it hits you pretty hard. You always want to be prepared for the worst, even though you’re hoping for the best.”
Even if a $30-million loan from the federal government had materialized for the CFL, there still would have been some health and safety concerns.
“It’s not the football players I was really worried about,” Arbuckle said. “Yeah, the virus can do a lot of horrible things to your body. Even if doesn’t end up being fatal, it can still have lasting effects that can affect player careers. But every team has coaches and trainers and equipment managers and football ops people, some of them fall into the high-risk category. To think about those people having to leave their families and put themselves into an environment where their lives could be much more at risk than a bunch of us healthy and in-shape 20- to 30-year-olds, that could have been scary. No amount of money and the entertainment of football on TV is worth somebody’s health or life.”
As for next year, Arbuckle said: “I have a lot of hope for the league and the players being able to formulate a strategy that’s going to allow the CFL to continue to thrive in 2021 and for many seasons beyond. We have the stadiums, we have world-class athletes, we have great organizations and most importantly we have fans.”