Chris O'Leary, CFL.ca
I made my way up Bathurst Street the short distance from King to Adelaide, sending texts along the way.
“I’m a few minutes away. Should I look for an Alouettes hat?” I asked.
“Of course you should,” the response said.
I walked into a brewing company and looked around. It was Saturday afternoon and the place was quiet.
It wasn’t until I saw Chris O’Leary in his Alouettes hat seated at the bar that I realized how difficult this intro might be.
What do you say?
Hi, name twin.
Chris?
Chris O’Leary, it’s me, Chris O’Leary.
I ran through those scenarios as I ran out of steps. I quickly settled on sidling up next to him, extending my hand and saying, “ Mr O’Leary,” in a tone that sounded far too much like Agent Smith. We were off and running.
This same-named meeting has been eight years in the making. Chris followed me on Twitter in 2010 and since then we’ve found out that we have a lot of funny little things in common. He’s a Boston Celtics fan and when we started talking I was obsessed with the Kevin Garnett-led Celtics. His dad’s name is Don and my dad’s name is Dan. We both played hockey growing up and as we abandoned the game in our youth, both basically forgot how to skate. Small things, but enough to keep a casual conversation going online for years.
But what’s really connected us and why we met up on Saturday, was the CFL.
That sounds strange…maybe it is strange, considering that Chris is American. He grew up in Rhode Island and lives in Brooklyn. He’s never lived in Canada, but he was close to the border with his first job when he got out of school, living in Vermont. With nothing much happening sports-wise in the summers, he started going to Alouettes games in the early 2000s. Anthony Calvillo, Ben Cahoon, Jamel Richardson, they all pulled him in and hooked him. He’s kept tabs on his team through the highs and the lows (thanks to an ESPN+ subscription) and was very curious this year when the Als traded for Johnny Manziel.
When he said he was thinking about coming up to Toronto for the Cask Days beer festival, I saw that it lined up with the Argos-Als game. The plans were finalized. While it may not have been the most palatable matchup, given how both teams’ seasons have turned out, Chris was happy (not speaking in the third person here). He’d get to see his Alouettes in-person for the first time in seven years.
After having a quick sample of drinks, we made our way to BMO Field. Chris got the true Toronto experience when a streetcar closed its doors in our faces and left down Fleet Street without us, forcing us to walk to the game. We got into the stadium just in time to see short-yardage king James Franklin squeak in from a yard out for the game’s opening touchdown.
While the Argos and Als went about chasing their fourth win of the season, we chatted some more. It turns out that Chris’ grandfather John was a pretty good running back at Brown back in the day. When he was done school, he had a lot of NFL offers. His family found offer sheets from a handful of teams and an actual contract with his name on it. He was signed by the Boston Yanks (pay: $150 per game) for the 1944 season.
While Chris was holding out hope for the Alouettes to come up with a game-winning play, I was hoping for the middle ground. I’d picked a tie for this game and actually had a shot at it, as Franklin led the Argos up the field in the game’s final two minutes. Of course, neither of us got what we were hoping for. Franklin snuck in from a yard out and the Als went away from Manziel on their final drive, leaving a cold Antonio Pipkin to get sacked on the game’s final play.
After a quick walk at field level post-game, we shifted our focus to the other thing that’s connected us over the years. Beer. Chris edits Brew York — I’ve said in the past that I like beer and he loves it — and has been to hundreds of breweries over the years. We made a pre-beer fest stop in Liberty Village, and it was here that I found out that my name twin is a magnet for absurdly kind people.
He tells me that while visiting a brewery in east Toronto earlier in the day, the owner offered him a ride to his next stop. While we’re sitting at Big Rock, a guy came over to us, saw Chris’ Als hat and bought a round for a fellow Montreal fan. They made quick consolidary talk — it’s been a long year — and we hopped in our Lyft to get to Cask Days.
I can’t outright recommend meeting people with the same name as you on the internet, but if you’re going to do it you can only hope that the person you meet is a walking encyclopedia of beer, the beer-making process and has tickets to a beer fest with almost 150 different beers on tap.
I feel like whatever background info I supplied during the game — funny stories and tidbits about players, coaches, the league, etc. — Chris reciprocated tenfold at Cask Days. I like beer, but as I told him, I don’t really know what I’m buying. I know what I like and beyond that, I just guess or let the look of a can or a brand name guide me. Chris gave me the breakdown of almost any brewer we went to and could tell me all of the details on why things tasted the way they did, what brewers were doing right and wrong in making their beer. The best football comparison I can think of would be if you had Chris Jones at your disposal to break down film.
I’m certain that the information swap wasn’t even on the night, but it was a ton of fun to finally meet someone that I already kind of/sort of knew online for a long time. We don’t have specific plans to meet again, but I think the next logical stop for the two Chris O’Leary’s tour should be the Grey Cup.
