CFL.ca
TORONTO — As the CFL season nears, commissioner Randy Ambrosie has been making the rounds speaking with various members of the media not only on the upcoming season but some of the changes to the business side of the game that have been realized this past off-season.
In an interview with Dave Naylor, Ambrosie spoke to the evolving conversations with teams and their presidents about putting a cap on non-player salaries. This would include coaches, general managers and administrative staff.
“One of the things we did this winter is a complete breakdown of our financials coast-to-coast, really looking at where are our revenues, where are our expenses. And what we found is there are some incongruities in the way we operate our business,” Ambrosie said in an interview with TSN’s Dave Naylor. “For example, as you said, our players’ salary costs are capped but we had other expenses that were growing significantly faster than our revenues so we started to dig in and look at those.
“What I’ve been really pleased with is how our team presidents have leaned in, recognizing that our non-player football operations costs have been growing much more quickly than other expenses. So we’re going to put some budget controls in place to make sure that we run that part of our business in a rational way.
“The thing that I’ve learned coming into the game is [that it’s] a little bit like an arms race. Somebody hires a person for another position and then somebody wants to match them, so it’s this game of ongoing escalation that we need to bring to an end. Team presidents have been great, the governors have been fantastic and all of it’s because we want everyone who’s in this league to know that we’re doing our best to run the best Canadian Football League possible.”
To see the full interview, click here.
The CFL season starts on Thursday, June 14 in Winnipeg when the Blue Bombers host the Edmonton Eskimos.
