Sharon Higgins
CFL.ca

At the start of the football season I had the supreme pleasure of being the first female to watch a live football game from the newly instituted Command Centre at the CFL offices.

Upon arrival I was surprised that the tone in the room was so serious.  Several people dashed about in preparation of the game, making sure screens were polished, sound dials tuned, cables connected and headsets working. 

I received a quick lesson on the system launched by DV Sport (dvsport.com) and what I should watch for during the game.

There is a 42” HD TV, which plays the game in real time, as well as three HD monitors. The room is black and bold everywhere you look, filled with boy toys!

A trio of small screen HD monitors, supported by two computers stored underneath, sits in a row and has two operational technicians at the very least.

The left monitor displays the game and is used by a technician to select, capture and send each play to the middle monitor. The middle monitor is a real gem with a touch screen and the ability to encapsulate the raw footage of each play, all of the replays, and then organize and store details including time, down, distance and play number. What a multi tasker!

Jake Ireland sits in front of the third monitor and uses it as a play back unit of sorts. Jake is a former CFL referee with over 30 years of on field experience. His job is to make the final decision on all challenge plays that occur during a game.  

Challenges can take place in one of two ways.  The first is when the Head Coach throws out the challenge flag, indicating that he does not agree with a particular call made by the officials. (I think he’s just not happy)!

By doing this he is requesting the Command Centre to take another look at the play in question.

The second way a challenge can occur is when the Command Centre wants to challenge a ruling on the field.  This is done during the last three minutes of the game and during overtime.  To get the Officials attention to do this, a system is in place whereby Jake tells the supervisor at the stadium to buzz the Officials who are wear a vibrating pager.  As we know from experience this year, sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t.  As with any new system, there are always bugs to be worked out.

Jake uses his knowledge of the rules and experience, and is assisted by the technology from the three monitors to either allow the call to stand or overturn it from the images he sees.  Jake asks the technician for particular replays to be sent to his monitor.

Using a jog shuttle, he can move a play forward or backward one frame at a time viewing every available angle of the play. There are approximately 10 cameras in a stadium (up to 31 for the Grey Cup) and each camera has a slightly different angle for each play, all of which are stored in the middle monitor.

There are so many possible angles to view one single play, make a correct decision and all the while 25,000 plus anxious fans wait in the stadium and more than a million people wait in front of their TVs at home.  Now that’s what I call pressure!

I know that with nearly a season under its belt, the technology in the Command Centre has knocked off an average of 40 to 60 seconds per challenge.  By speeding this process up, the flow of the game has been improved for coaches and players and it has created a better viewing experience for our fans.

As I settled in to watch the game, it was all business for those around me.  No cheering, booing or cursing.  Breathing was only allowed during commercials, when there is a strict rule that the TV must be on mute! It’s not how I am used to watching games but I did persuade them to let me have popcorn…  I was relegated to the back row to munch on it.

Watching the game from the Command Centre reminded me that football is more than just a game.  It’s an efficiently run business.  There are high expectations for the Command Centre to improve the business of the CFL. 

I think it’s accomplishing that.