Riders face their own cutdowns

That is just the employees – the players will find out they will have to renegotiate their own contracts to fit under the newly proposed $2 million cap and it is fair to say not all of them will be thrilled.

As the league stumbles towards 2021, it is likely looking at a number of scenarios including playing with a portion of fans in the stands. You are seeing this in the NFL where depending on the public health situation in various states, stadiums are playing with anywhere from zero to say a 1/3 capacity –in addition to the canned noise being played in the stadiums.

Football teams never really appreciated fan noise until the silence in stadiums made it easy for teams to listen to each others calls and pick up tips on what is happening. The problem with those advocating a return of fans to stadiums is they are ignoring the trend of where restrictions have been loosened in various locales, the rate of infection has gone up.

Whether this means now that we are in the midst of the second wave of the pandemic or not, Even the NFL has been forced to cancel games once a number of Tennessee Titans players and staff tested positive for Covid 19. It was this unknown that apparently prompted the CFL to ask for $30 million from the Feds in order to cover potential losses if the CFL for whatever reason had to stop games in their Winnipeg bubble.

While the Edmonton and Toronto NHL bubbles worked well, in Winnipeg the infection rates have gone up which points out a common theme. Despite people’s wishes to wish the pandemic away – like a puff of smoke – it’s not going to happen without some common sense things like wearing masks.

So while the Riders and the rest of the league go through this budget cutting exercise, they are faced with the problem of how to keep in the public eye in the midst of one of the longest off-seasons ever.

The CFL announced their fan base initiative where for $400 you could get your name engraved on the base for the Grey Cup. It’s more or less a donation to the league and I remember the Riders doing something similar with their fan wall where fans could put up $350 or so and get their names engraved on slabs outside of Mosaic.

I put down Greg Urbanoski Family for that to acknowledge my family on both sides who are football and Rider fans. For this Grey Cup base promotion, I am presented with options of dropping money to get my name engraved on the fan base or paying for Chris DeFrance’s away jersey in the classic Rider design to complete my collection.

You can guess where I am going to go with this.

The CFL model of doing business is changing and amongst the changes are teams may or may not put their merchandizing and promotions in the hands of say, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment – the entertainment behemouth which owns the Argos, Maple Leafs and Raptors.

I get to cruise a lot of CFL websites during the night shift and when this whole thing of MLSE came up a few months ago, I thought I would see just exactly what and how they would handle stuff like marketing. One of the biggest and most interesting things is MLSE provided Raptor fans at the first game following their win of the NBA Title last year with a free championship ring.

It is big and very impressive – not meant to be worn everyday like my Rider Grey Cup rings, but I can see where fans would be impressed to get something that makes them feel part of their team. The Riders have always thrown in freebie stuff with season ticket packages or on other occasion and I suspect the Riders will cut back on that stuff and fans will understand.

Whether the Riders will throw in entirely and let MLSE or some company handle their merchandizing will be an interesting question because the Riders sell more than the rest of the teams in the CFL combined and are number three behind the Maple Leafs and Montreal Canadiens.

The stuff the Riders sell at their stores they get to keep, while the rest sold in other locations is put into a pot and divvied amongst the rest of the CFL teams. The Riders have already closed down a store location in Saskatoon and Regina and whether or not they will close the rest and just operate out of Mosaic Stadium likely depends on how much is left on their leases and how much of a penalty they would pay if they close up those locations.

At this time it may cost more to do that than to keep them going and keep some kind of money coming in. Which may help because it appears the Riders window for winning a Grey Cup, which this team was constructed to do this year, may be closing.

Rider linebacker Deon Lacey, who was an off-season addition and a great get for a team going all in for a Cup run this year, appears to have broken into the Buffalo Bills starting lineup. Guys like Dakoda Shepley with the 49ers will likely get his shot considering the injury situation on his team.

Another thing which may or may not swing players decisions to return to the Riders is the interesting reaction to the players supporting Black Lives Matter. I remember a few years ago taking part in tours of the Rider offices and facilities in the newly opened stadium and one of the players was Johnny Newsome.

This was just after former Rider running back Joe McKnight was shot and killed in a road rage by a white motorist players mentioned while they still encountered racism in Canada, it was not the same as in the States and the players felt safer here.

The deathy of McKnight weighed heavily on the Riders players so it was not surprising for me that they would support greater awareness of how much more common it is for Black players to be killed than say, white players. For some of the Rider fan base, it’s an either or/proposition where if you support BLM, you support violence, or if you don’t – you are a racist.

Which is part of the problem of everything feeling obligated to provide an instant opinion on everything. Players like Jordan Reeves and Shaq Evans were taken aback by the reaction of some Rider fans and considering how it might be difficult to get players here because there is nothing to do outside of practice and especially now with Covid 19 and if you want to put out a message that you disagree with the experiences of Black players and you are not Black, well, tolerance and being able to listen is obviously tools not in your particular toolbox.

With the Rider Grey Cup hosting now moved to 2022 and with the cap being reduced, the Riders will have to face the likelihood they are going to have to reload because not everyone will be back. The Riders released their neg list and former Denver Bronco QB Paxton Lynch is on it.

Lynch is notable for his height – 6’8” I believe, and he didn’t show much in Denver but he does have a great fastball. I wouldn’t necessarily get too attached to the names because CFL teams add and drop players from the list at will depending on their particular situations with their respective teams at the time.

Another way of keeping in the public eye has been done by Rod Pedersen in airing the CFL simulation games on his Facebook show. The games come from the Doug Flutie Maximum Football video game which I understand is currently available for XBox and the company announced it was working with Football Canada to incorporate the Canadian rules and give some exposure to USports teams.

As it turns out, you cannot actually your team the U of R Rams or U of S Huskies, but they give you a name and you can program the players to respond like their stats would suggest. It’s a great move to get exposure and it shows the CFL would be wise to get behind this so that fans can do something with the game to generate interest in the season.

Justin Dunk of 3DownNation reports that CFL teams voted 7-2 to not purse the 2.0 plan while they are getting their house in order and that Ken Derrett is being talked about as the next commissioner of the CFL.

Derrett’s first job with the CFL was director of administration from ’78-’88 where he developed business and operational plans for the Grey Cup. He worked with Labatt’s as the Labatt’s partner with the NFL, Toronto Blue Jays, Canadian Olympic Association, Hockey Canada, Canadian Curling Association and the Commonwealth Games. In addition, he oversaw several strategic relationships for the company including SkyDome TSN and the Canadian Country Music Association.

He also worked with NBA Canada and was brought to the NBA League office and put in charge of Global Marketing where he crossed paths with Mark Cohon, another former CFL Commissioner. He went to the San Diego Chargers where he did team marketing and sales and increased the Chargers revenue from a variety of sources.

He is currently on a marketing committee for the 2021 US Open and has been involved with the tournament in previous years.

Ambrosie’s handling of the Covid-19 crisis, the botched presentation to the House of Commons and the Global 2.0 initiative has probably prompted the speculation and Derrett on paper would be a fantastic grab for the League.

The problem is Derrett would face the same situation that previous commissioners faced – the owners do not like to give the power other commissioners have in othe leagues.

While Ambrosie can be given some leeway for the Covid-19 response since no one had seen this in 100 years, the lack of presentation to the House of Commons revealed the flaw in the current league structure – anyone with any sense would have talked to former CFL people who are now involved in politics to go over what would be required to make a successful presentation.

Ambrosie was likely hamstrung by the private owners not wanting to have their books opened up for inspection prior to receiving public money and that reveals a fundamental lack of understand for the world outside of the CFL website.

So while Rider employees find out today if they have a job or not – they may not be the only ones.

by Greg Urbanoski

Riders face their own cutdowns

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