`It sucks for everyone': Riders' practice goes on as labour impasse lingers
That mess of a labour dispute banged around in one corner of their brains on Tuesday, and football in another, while life went on as usual at Griffiths Stadium.
The player strike was over, at least for a bit, and Roughriders quarterback Cody Fajardo — generally up for any question — made it known before he met the media that he would answer no queries about the imbroglio between players and the CFL.
“Good luck asking me CBA questions,” he reiterated with a smile as he settled in before the cameras and microphones, and sure enough, the first question was about the CBA. You've really got to ask it, of course, and Fajardo was quick with a response:
“I think it's been a great week of practice. I've been really excited with our receivers ...”
When you seen men traipsing around a field, in helmets, working out in position groups, footballs flying, it's easy to forget about the small and dramatic things happening behind closed doors.
Publicly, they'd rather discuss the game and their place in it, and that's natural. Privately, it's a safe guess that labour issues are a steady talking point.
Roughriders' kicker Brett Lauther is the team's player rep. He couldn't give himself the luxury of deferring answers on Tuesday. He stood in, and answered every question at length, expressing hope that things would soon be settled, and disappointment that the issue was still out there.
“I hate being in the media where it's not something to do with what I love to do,” Lauther said. “But the guys voted me in to do this, and this is why I'm here. (When) it's settled, it's settled. Hopefully it is soon, and then a week or two past it, we play some pre-season games, no one's talking about this anymore, everyone's forgotten and we're back to playing Rider football.”
Lauther noted that “end of the world” rhetoric is happening in some quarters, but he said he's heard that many times during his CFL career. At some point, he said, everybody gets back to playing football — but he did not discount its impact on fans, and the way they perceive the game.
“I don't want to lie about anything. It sucks for everyone, and they're caught in the crossfire,” Lauther said. “The fans out here are the best, and everyone knows that.
“I don't want to be the face of this, where people think I'm the one saying yes or no to stuff. I'm just one of the hundreds of votes. I'm just trying to give guys correct information. They didn't like it; they voted it down as a group across Canada — not just our team — and hopefully (fans) stick with us, because it's not good. It's not good at all. And hopefully when this one's done, it is a little longer term. I don't know if it's the third or fourth time in the last few years, but it's obviously getting tiresome.”
So the Roughriders will practise at Griffiths Stadium until they don't, and they've got a pre-season game coming up until they don't, and they've got counter-offers to ponder while walking that tightrope between football and boardrooms.
“Obviously, we're not just going to continue to keep practising if nothing gets done,” Lauther said. “These pre-season games are coming up pretty quickly, so we'll see what happens. The next couple of days will be very telling.”