Things aren’t quite what they seem as CFL enters 2019
The Canadian Football League deserves credit for attempting a PR strategy that Major League Baseball has done for years – keep the league in the news when the season is over.
The problem the CFL and NFL have is their offseason is a long one and the NFL has attempted to keep interest alive by publicizing their college player combine workouts, player draft and even the odd practice. The CFL has made its own inroads with the introduction of CFL Week two years ago, and combining that with the CFL player combine to make it a fan-friendly forum.
Of course this year CFL Week was cancelled due to concerns the players would boycott it because negotiations will soon be underway on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement between the league and the CFLPA. However, the CFL Winter Meetings where coaches and GMs gathered in Quebec were again open to the media and provided a lot to ponder as the final weeks of the NFL season play out.
CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie continued to sell his vision of the CFL 2.0 which will unfold with a players combine in Mexico to check out players and perhaps conduct a draft of players which might be ready to come to Canada. When the CFL schedule came out, a proposed game in Mexico City was not on the list, but in broad strokes the idea was to encourage Mexican players to come to Canada and Canadian players to go try Mexico to get valuable playing time.