Before digesting the changes coming to the Canadian Football League, I needed a conversation with my inner being, and it went something like this:
“Self, make sure to take your open mind into the reading room. It’s human nature to resist change, and resistance strengthens with age. If changes can make this great game you’ve been watching 60-plus years even greater, accept it. Do not, Self, be an unbending curmudgeon.”
Then I read — with an open mind — about how the CFL field dimensions are shrinking, how the goalposts are being moved (literally not figuratively), how the “rouge” is joining the dinosaur in extinction, how time between plays will be 35 seconds instead of 20… the last one slipped in as part of “team benches on opposite sides” of the field.
For the only game Canadian football fans of my vintage have known: (1) the field is 110 yards by 65 yards, (2) goalposts were anchored right on the goal line before the wishbone structure moved the base a few yards into the end zone, (3) a one-point “rouge” was what we simply called a single, and (4) 20-second hurry-up offences often made the end of games exciting and sometimes impossible to predict. The games weren’t over until they were… thanks, Yogi Berra.
My mind stayed open to all suggested changes, with some resistance – until I heard what Nathan Rourke had to say. After that, friends and colleagues who asked what I thought were directed to a video of Rourke’s remarks with this explanation:
“That’s what I think.”
For those who haven’t heard of Nathan Rourke, he plays quarterback for the B.C. Lions so well he could be the league’s best player. For those who haven’t heard him, Rourke, as a Canadian playing a Canadian game after trying out with four National Football League teams, essentially ripped all the changes, in part because players and coaches weren’t consulted
This, however, is the crux of his stand:
“I don’t think you can make adjustments like this and tell me that you love the Canadian game. What we’re moving towards is not the game that I grew up loving, that I’m passionate about…I came back knowing this is the game for me. The rule changes make it sound like we want to be like that league down south. From the recent past, leagues that tried to be like the NFL haven’t existed very long. The CFL game has existed longer than the NFL, and there’s a reason for that. It’s unique.”
The architect of change is CFL Commissioner Stewart Johnston, who said (among other things): “This really is driven by data and a lot of rationale that’s common sense”…designed to make the game more exciting, with more scoring.
Three unanswered questions:
By my calculation, the field American players always admire for its wide-openness will be smaller by about nine percent — 1,300 square yards…much less space, and more scoring?
Did anybody realize the 35-second rule brings out the worst of the NFL play clock…players sauntering back to the line of scrimmage while the clock is running?
And could there be a worse time to be suspected of Americanizing something as Canadian as the CFL?
