The Weekly Say: Celebrating Canadian football

CFL.ca Staff

TORONTO — Canada Day is here and if you’re looking for ways to celebrate this country’s unique place in the world, look no further than how we play football.

Canadian football stands on its own. There are 12 players on a 150-yard long, 65-yard wide field, which boasts 20-yard end zones and uprights hovering over the goal line. Along with three downs, pre-snap motion and the national treasure that is the rouge, Canada has put its own rugby-infused twist on the game and it’s become a fixture in the Canadian sports landscape.

With the holiday weekend here, CFL.ca’s writers offered up their favourite aspects of the Canadian game, their favourite players past and present and the most Canadian things they’ve seen in their time around the CFL.

What is your favourite aspect of the Canadian game?

Matt Cauz: I love the fact that the game looks different from most collegiate programs and the NFL. As a fan of all forms of football I like having as many different aesthetic options as possible when it comes to watching the game. As someone who grew up watching the NFL in the plodding, run-heavy early 1990s, having quarterbacks like Doug Flutie, Tracy Ham and Matt Dunigan light it up with six receivers racing all over the field was a delightful juxtaposition.

Marshall Ferguson: The need for an elite second-down passer to win games. There’s nothing better in Canadian football than dominating second-and-long through the air to get your team out of a tough spot.

Don Landry: All the motion and the running head start for receivers prior to the snap. It just adds so much hellfire to every play. Every single football league on planet Earth should have it.

Jim Morris: I always liked the way the clock stops in the final three minutes of the second and fourth quarter. It allows for far more exciting finishes and scoring plays, as opposed to the NFL calling timeouts and running up to the line to spike the ball.

Jamie Nye: The best part of the Canadian game is the motion on offence. Everyone but the seven on the line can move anywhere and in any direction before the snap of the ball and it adds a great element to the game. Visually, the pre-snap motion is far superior than any other football league out there.

Chris O’Leary: For me, it’s the rouge. When I watch NFL games, I take great pride in being that annoying Canadian that will scream ROUGE! every time a kicked ball trickles out of the end zone, or when a field goal is missed and not brought out of the end zone.

Who is your favourite current Canadian player? Your all-time favourite Canadian player?

Cauz: Favourite current player is Mathieu Betts. I don’t remember the last time I saw a defensive end dominate Stanley Bryant like what we saw in the Lions victory over the Bombers last week.

Is it cheating to pick Pinball Clemons as my favourite Canadian player of all-time? The man lives in southern Ontario and has been an official Canadian citizen for nearly a decade.

Ferguson: Brandon Revenberg is high on the present list for me: a classic road grader who looks like he was born and built to play guard in the CFL. All-time? Duane Forde.

Landry: Past, Chris Schultz. I loved watching the big man do his thing on the field for years. Then, so very fortunately, I got to know him. He was great at football, but even better at kindness. Present: Bo Lokombo. The Bo-listic Missile is everything, everywhere, all at once. So much fun to watch.

Morris: Winnipeg’s Brady Oliveira is my current favourite player for what he does on the field and also for his off-field work in animal rescue. For someone who grew up in Saskatchewan, Ron Lancaster and George Reed were always heroes. I remember Reed talking once about the discrimination he sometimes faced in Saskatchewan and it opened my eyes to something I thought only occurred in the U.S.

Nye: He’s injured right now but Kian Schaffer-Baker was impressive last season and was doing it through a hip injury. When he was 100 per cent healthy, he showed he could get up and catch the ball, break tackles and even was used in the run game last year.

As for my favourite Canadian ever, growing up in Saskatchewan in the late ’80s and ’90s, it’s Ray Elgaard. In fact, KSB is drawing comparisons to the Rider legend. And when Ray dunked that ball behind his back for a touchdown celebration, we all started doing it on the playground.

O’Leary: I’ve loved watching Cam Judge be an agent of chaos on the field in Calgary. Favourite ever? I can’t pick one, so here’s a short list based on skill, impact on the game, good naturedness, etc.: Nathan Rourke, Alex Singleton, Jon Cornish, Shamawd Chambers, Ryan King and Calvin McCarty (as a community-minded tandem), Russ Jackson and Frank Cosentino. The list can go on and on.

What’s the most Canadian moment you’ve seen in the CFL?

Cauz: Being at Ivor Wynne Stadium watching Doug Flutie and the Argonauts dummy the Tiger-Cats and the crowd started chanting “Leafs suck.” Such a smart (and angry!) crowd.

Ferguson: Watching my friends, teammates and competitors from University football work quietly, earn a roster spot and score a touchdown in big games. It’s my favourite story to tell and happens all the time.

Landry: Big-bearded lumberjack John Gott chugging a beer after an Ottawa touchdown, then crushing the can on his helmet. Hundy P, my friend. Hundy P.

Morris: Any time a big game is played in the snow it strikes me as very Canadian. I remember the 2017 Grey Cup where Toronto beat Calgary in the falling snow. Shania Twain being brought in for the halftime show by dogsled was very Canadian.

Nye: I have two. The 1994 Grey Cup. Lui Passaglia kicks the field goal with the Canadian flag waving as the ball goes through the uprights to beat Baltimore in the first Grey Cup to feature one of the American expansion teams.

OR when the Tiger-Cats invited the anthem singer from Las Vegas to come up and re-sing O Canada after he butchered it in Vegas when the Posse played the Roughriders (Dennis KC Parks aka Greg Bartholomew).

O’Leary: I saw the Lions beat the Argos on a rouge once and it might as well have rained maple syrup from the sky, while a herd of moose galloped across the field.

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