TrueBlue4ever

But what are the rules for the championship game? It’s not like baseball with a 7 game series and one fundamental rule difference (DH). But I like the idea of an inter league title game. Call it the Global Bowl, then the winner can call themselves World Champions, which would piss off the American “world champion” Super Bowl winners.

If the Jets can bottle that defensive performance for every game, they would be a scary team come playoff time in the North.

I’m surprised that last season and this off season we had so many screaming about the lost season and saying “whatever it takes, just get football back” and now people are willing to just walk away from watching based on the mere potential of altered rules (nothing set in stone yet) or the preference of letting the CFL die forever. I could handle 100 yards field but keep the end zones at 20 yards. Also keep the field width, the yard off the line on the snap, the goalpost on the goal line and not the end line, and especially unlimited motion. And if those rules stay, then 3 downs makes more sense as 4 downs would make it too tough on defences to get off the field. Plus it promotes more passing rather than run 3 yards, repeat, repeat down the field like the NFL at times. And for God’s sake, don’t you dare bring in a fair catch rule. Keep the 5 yard halo.

I guess both versions happened, because I know the TSN thing happened in 94.

So, a) Does Torts last the season at this rate? b) If yes to the first question, does Laine stay or look to get out ASAP?

Don’t remember that, but remember TSN losing their feed during the Gold medal shootout vs Finland in the 1994 World Hockey Championships, and the studio host (I think it was Gord Miller, but it might have been Paul Romanuk) having to do play-by-play from the desk into the camera while watching live on an in-studio monitor, basically like watching someone do a radio broadcast, and was good enough to launch their play-by-play TV broadcast career.

Players sign one year deals now in the CFL. Player continuity will not get worse if you switch to 4 down football. Not sure how those two things are related. But to each their own. I can only speak for myself and say given the choice of no football or Blue Bombers with modified rules, I will happily take the latter. Besides, who says the XFL doesn’t take our rules? They ditched the fair catch for the 5 years halo and added 2 point converts when the NFL and US colleges did not have it, did they not?

No one can really answer your question because it is a matter of your personal preference. But for others, the appeal would be having a home team to call your own to cheer on and have allegiance to, that you could go to games in person for. Some follow the Goldeyes for that reason, because even if it is not the top league it is the only game in town for baseball. The Moose are a tougher comparison because in the IHL years fans were still mourning the loss of something bigger and had no years of no hockey at all to appreciate having something as opposed to nothing. Then they were an affiliate of Vancouver, who could swoop in and take the best players and ruin a season and nothing could be done about it. But if the 3 down game it what pulls you in, then how many university games do you go to in person? I’m betting none unless you are still in school. You will go because the Bombers, whatever rules they play, will be the best version of football here in the city. And you can have a stronger connection to them than a random NFL team in a foreign city. Changing some rules will not change your emotional attachment to the team.

Well, his teammates certainly have been demoralized by the goals he has let in, haven’t they?🙄

Where do you find this?

Exactly. This is all his fault. If only we had a real leader like Wade Miller running this league who.....wait, Wade has said this could be a good idea? I’m so conflicted now. https://www.google.com/amp/s/globalnews.ca/news/7688348/cfl-xfl-talks-winnipeg-blue-bombers-reaction/amp/

Jets making the most of their chances so far. Leafs not so much.

No Olympics? No Moose?

Kentucky: “Hold my beer”. Alabama: “B*tch, please. Lifetime achievement award here”

FIFY. 😁

If people are ready to die on the hill of “if it isn’t 3 downs and 11 players and rouges I am gone forever” then where is the massive support for University football, especially out west? I remember in my younger more insolent days swearing that after the NHL player’s strike in 1995 that I would never watch hockey again because of those greedy players and owners taking us precious fans for granted. That sanctimonious outrage lasted 1 game. Ditto when the Jets left. I did better avoiding baseball after the Expos got screwed in 94, but I did not quit. Fans won’t walk away if the alternative to new rules is no game at all. And the owners and players know it. They have always known it.

😁

Actually, I have never expressed a like or dislike for him. And I think he has had his share of missteps for sure. The public problems with the Als’ sale taught him to keep his cards close to his chest rather than over promise and underdeliver. And that bugs you, because you see a world where these problems are simple fixes, when they most certainly are not. But you wrongly assume that because I challenge your attacks on him that I must like him, when what I am doing is pointing out your overriding bias that removes objectivity from your arguments. And it is clear you don’t like him, that we all get in spades. I have always wanted to know why that is, and why that hate is so passionate and so pre-determined. You have said it is his secretive ways - well here he is being open and you dump on him for that too. When you say “I never will (like him)” you prove my point about hating him without justification or giving him a chance and having no objectivity to the issue at hand. So I am left to believe it is something deeper or personal. But if you don’t want to say, I can’t make you. If the league is broke, it is not all because of him. You just want a scapegoat it seems because you can’t get a saviour. Ambrosie is neither of these things. He is just a guy trying to keep a league afloat and has been dealt a brutally bad hand unlike anything another commissioner has faced in the CFL with the pandemic and Health Canada calling the shots.

Doing NOTHING is different than doing things that you don’t like. I question the wisdom of the global initiative, and I heard him talk at length about it. The past US expansion did not go well, so absolutely I have reservations. My problem with your take is that you have been predisposed to hate him from the word go and never given him any chance. You complain that he doesn’t communicate with fans, so here he is communicating and you still aren’t happy. And there are many valid reasons to question his approach, but I have always asked if it is more than that for you, since going after his scarf wearing and vague complainants about his silence and then ignoring your own criticism when he isn’t silent just paints you as not credible and having some axe to grind on any take. Your own noise has drowned out any coherent argument, at least to me. So that is what I defend him against - the unsubstantiated attack. If you want to argue the merits of a US plan, which you did on part, I am all for that debate and frankly agree with almost all your concerns. But the pandemic was not his fault. And the response of not playing, as sucky as it was, was necessary because in this league playing would have bankrupted the league entirely. I am waking up to the seemingly obvious issue that the league is broken financially, that trying to stabilize franchises that cannot be stabilized (Toronto) is something that is not going to happen in the short term. Ambrosie is doing no worse than every commish before him for 40 years, but his approach is different, look outside of Canada for new revenue. Desperate perhaps, but maybe we are in desperate times and no one wants to face that reality. And he has overseen the sale of the Alouettes, brought in the global initiative, and looked to partner with the XFL, so that is your list of things he has done. Will any of them work, you and I cannot say right now, you choose to give him no benefit of time to see if it will, and I do. We can judge him at the end of his tenure or once these plans have taken hold in my mind. You want to just jump on him right away. So tell me what he could do better? Communicate with fans? Well here he is doing just that, and yet you still pounce. So excuse me if it is hard to look objectively at your complaints when it is your default mode. https://www.tsn.ca/cfl/video/ambrosie-reveals-more-details-of-cfl-xfl-collaboration~2157583

I don’t know why you think this league was all hunky dory and thriving and Ambrosie is the sole author of its misfortune. Clearly it has been bleeding for a long time and the pandemic has just brought it to a tipping point. Ambrosie has said that the old way of doing business could not be sustained and that he was open to exploring new sources of revenue. Maybe that pisses off the purists around here who will “never watch football again if we switch to 4 downs, no Canadian players, smaller field” (news flash - for all that principled pontificating, here’s betting that given modified football or no football, lots of the traditionalists will opt to watch the new brand - and by the way the league cares more about bringing in new fans who don’t watch now than hurting the feelings of die hards who talk a good game but are probably pretty safely re-upping their tickets and don’t need to be wooed) but it seems pretty clear that new ideas, even radical ones, need to be explored or the league will collapse. Toronto can only be a black hole for so long. We’ve been talking about Atlantic expansion for 40 years now - if it was going to happen it would have already. Adapt or die, folks. Dave Naylor lays it out pretty well in this article. https://www.tsn.ca/cfl-fans-should-brace-themselves-for-a-wave-of-change-1.1605580

Don’t worry. There’s always the “PoMo must go!” brigade, and from some of the early comments, Dubois is not going to be given much of a grace period by some fans around here.

Doesn’t take a lot of reading between the lines in hearing Naylor in that video to surmise that the CFL is in major financial trouble and may essentially be dead.

Who knows what rules might be implemented? Could be like last time with CFL rules still in play. Big concern is that the XFL has failed multiple times, so not the best stability as a partner. And maybe the people at play realize that Americans who want 4 down football will watch the NFL and nothing else (how many failed spring US leagues do they need to hammer home that point?), so it could stay at 3 downs and Canadian rules. The big problem will be like last time where the US labour laws will not allow for guaranteed Canadian jobs in the US markets. So there again will be an unfair playing field where American teams get to field full American rosters and will have better back-up talent than a Canadian team forced to field Canadian ratios, unless they do away with that requirement. But again, lots of speculation and very few facts at this point. I will just add that the last time this happened it was because the league was going to die for certain if not for the influx of US cash, so the optics would suggest that the CFL may be bleeding to death again because of the pandemic and this is a Hail Mary last resort. Hope that is not the case but wouldn’t be surprised.

Did you both quit the CFL during the last US expansion? Legit question, not being snarky. I don’t like the thought of it at all, but it won’t stop me from going to games. I wonder if you truly mean it when you say you will stop going? The league is betting on “no”, and may have the last go-round as proof that fans will still come. But let’s just see what the plan is before losing our minds.