gbill2004

@CFL_News: #Riders LB Mike McCullough says he's meeting with GM Taman this week and will likely decide to retire. #CFL via @CTVDarrell

@DarrinBauming: #Bombers veteran players spotted arriving at the airport this afternoon. #CFL

He took a lot of bad penalties last year. I sit behind the Bombers bench at home games and recall a few time Creehan screaming at Gilmore for his penalties.

Anything is possible. They could make this roof out of gold and pixie dust too. Never happening. Never say never!

I think the issue was the increase afterwards which is about 1% over four years. Awful. Minimum goes from $50,000 to $55,000 over life of the proposed deal. That's a 10% increase AFTER the year one $5000 increase.

@DougBrown97: The new Rider stadium looks a lot like the new Bomber stadium, only less original.

True. So going forward maybe the Als break even and BC makes a million or so per year.

Cohon said the Als lost money last season and BC broke even.

The players actually asked to remove the revenue sharing in 2010, it was their idea. At least that's the impression I get from Doug Brown and the CFLPA counsel currently and at that time, Ed Molstad. At that point revenue was stagnant and they wanted more real dollars tacked on to the SMS limit. Penton and Toth were giving Doug Brown a pretty good ribbing about it last night. Goes to show how narrow the view of the CFLPA is, and I guess that makes sense since most of them aren't around more than a few years. I also listened to that conversation last night between Toth, Brown and Penton. That's definitely not the impression I got. My understanding was that the PA allowed the owners to go back to a fixed cap because the league was in hard times and that the league would consider a cap tied to revenue in the future if revenues increased. But the hard cap was requested by the owners. I'm sure if the PA requested the removal of revenue sharing last time and now want it back, that the owners would be making a bigger deal about it, during these negotiations.

I like their roof better but looks like they only have one video board in the end zone with no covering.

Why are we extending Greg Peach? Interesting that the Stamps signed McRath.

Don't forget about Boltus! He'll be our starting QB. I suspect that Desjardins would out manoeuvre us for Mr. Boltus. True. He'd probably offer Boltus $450k per season plus bonuses.

Don't forget about Boltus! He'll be our starting QB.

it is. and i'd suspect the guy standing next to buck and cameron is bucks brother, there is a resemblance there if you look close. Let's see....*looks really close*...OH YEAH...they're nose, smile, hair color and head shape are all completely different...they must be brothers. That's his 'wife' not his brother.

Busch Light.

Mike, you got inside info on Laurent signing with the Bombers?

This is a great situation to have. Depth and competition is a great thing. I could see Bombers hiding Robertson on the 9 game IR this season as he's a rookie who will need some time to get used to the CFL game. Could be a contributor mid season or next year.

Bellefeuille, Kelly and Boltus involved in a three-way love triangle?

Interesting read from Lawless: The Canadian Football League Players Association will propose a revenue-sharing formula that arrives upon a salary cap of $7 million when collective bargaining resumes with the league today in Toronto. TSN originally reported the story and a source familiar with the negotiations confirmed the report to the Free Press. The union, which agreed to have revenue sharing taken out of the last agreement, want to see the league adopt a formula where a mix of gate, TV and sponsorship revenues are blended to reach a revenue number that will then be divided by the nine league teams settling on a salary cap in the range of $7 million. The players want portions of the three streams ranging from 40 to 55 per cent. Specifics were not available Tuesday but the example of, "maybe it’s 40 per cent of TV, 50 per cent of gate and 55 per cent of sponsorship which gets you to the $7 million figure," was offered by a source. The current CBA which expires on June 1, sees each teams work under a salary cap of $4.4 million. The rise of $2.6 million coincides closely with the extra money each team could potentially receive from a new TV deal between the league and TSN, which is scheduled to kick in for the 2014 season. Last year’s broadcast deal was worth $15 million spread out over eight teams with each club receiving in the neighbourhood of $1.9 million per season. The new deal is reportedly worth $40 million split among nine teams including the expansion Ottawa Redblacks and would potentially see each team receive a league cheque worth $4.4 million. The new broadcast deal runs through 2018 and rises by $1 million a year until capping out at $44 million per season. A source with a CFL club told the Free Press the league would view a rise in the salary cap to $5 million as a reasonable finishing point to negotiations. The union offer seems to be a bit of a telegraph in that they are asking for the entire share of new TV monies. One could easily read the message from today’s expected offer as the starting point of a negotiation that would get them half of the new TV money or close to a $1.3 million increase to the cap. If ownership wants to get to a cap of $5 million and it appears the players are aiming for an increase to $5.7 million, the two sides should eventually be able to see they are not that far off from a deal. Disrupting the season over a difference of $700,000 would seem to be a waste. Time, however, is beginning to run short with the regular season six weeks away. A strike during rookie or full training camp does not have to equate to regular season games missed. The players, who rely on game cheques, and the clubs who would need to refund gate and sponsorship dollars as well as foregoing any new TV money are both motivated to make sure no games are missed. Getting a deal that works for both sides is still possible. Once games are lost, however, ownership could become intractable. They’ll want to take their losses out of the players’ share and their offer could shrink commensurately which could in turn harden the players’ position. Now is the time to deal. For everyone.

@TSNScianitti: To clarify: #CFLPA's wants share of gate,sponsorship&TV revenue. With each stream PA proposing its share be in the range of approx 40-55%

the only logical reason i can think of why he hasn't been. and regardless of what you me and everybody else thinks or says on this board, he has CFL experience and the other guys do not. That's the only reason i can think of why he hasn't been released. I don't necessarily agree with it but.... that has to be the reason or... he is indeed dating bellefeuille. It's gotta be the dating thing, no other way to explain it

I'm shocked Kelly has been kept this long after all of these cuts.

This is all standard procedure for CBA negotiations. Nothing to see here (yet).

@sportscage: Riders announce the signing of LB Brandon Isaac on the SportsCage

Wow looks like they want all the new TV revenue. I think if they get over 5 million they will be lucky. Does this mean the CFLPA has given up on the revenue sharing concept and is now okay with a hard cap? If so, that's a huge concession and a positive, as both sides are now speaking the same language.