Kevin Sousa/CFL.ca
Larry Butler’s path into officiating isn’t that different from his peers. He just got to the country’s biggest stage a little later than he thought he would.
While growing up in Winnipeg, he played Pop Warner football as a kid. In his mid-20s, he realized he couldn’t commit the time to coaching, but still wanted to be involved in the game. That’s where he found officiating.
A work-driven move to Edmonton didn’t change the passion he was developing for officiating. He continued on in the Alberta capital, working his way up through high school, junior football and the university ranks. He was in his 40s when he made the move to the CFL, with his first game coming in 2004. He may have been slightly older than some of his officiating peers in the league, but the camaraderie that officials build working together filled in any generational gaps.
“I’m 66 now,” Butler said this week from his home in Edmonton. “I’m probably if not the oldest, one of the oldest officials to work in the CFL.”
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Larry Butler worked over 300 games as a CFL official over a 20-year career that included working four Grey Cup games (Timothy Atticus/CFL.ca)
Saturday marked the end of Butler’s impressive run as an on-field official. He had upward of 30 friends and family members in the stands at Commonwealth Stadium, where he worked his final game, keeping both sides honest in the Edmonton Elks and Calgary Stampeders Labour Day rematch. He’ll transition into a game day supervisor role through the Elks’ final three home games, then pick it up fully in 2025.
In his 20-year run, Butler has worked over 300 games and four Grey Cups (2013, 2018, 2022 and 2023). He’s zigzagged the country over the years, getting to see it through the unique lens that only the CFL can provide.
“It was a unique journey. There was a time when I didn’t think I was going to get to the CFL,” he said, remembering being interviewed by the league in 1998 but not getting the call up.
Butler is grateful to longtime Edmonton official Wayne Fleming, who always put Butler’s name forward to the league and encouraged him.
“(Fleming) told me every year he would put my name forward and (moving up to the CFL) didn’t happen,” Butler recalled. “Then in ’04 I got the call and was excited to go.”
Over those 20 years, Butler has done a tremendous job at keeping Father Time at bay when it came to his work on the field. He prioritized his fitness and it became a key component in his success keeping pace with a game played by men in their 20s and 30s.
“When you start that late, fitness is a big part of it,” he said. “I always worked hard on my fitness and took pride in the fact that I could not necessarily keep up to the younger guys, relatively speaking. Fitness is what kept me in there as long as it did.”
A runner for over 30 years, Butler has completed five marathons. He hit the gym looking forward to preseason fitness testing, wanting to get the best results that he could.
While he decided that he’d step away from his on-field work this season, Butler admits it will be difficult to let it go. He was sitting in the officials’ room in Montreal a few weeks back and the other officials were talking about their post-Labour Day schedules. From time to time it’s hit him that his run was coming to an end.
Butler, seen here at bottom right, posing with his fellow officials last year at the 110th Grey Cup in Hamilton (Kevin Sousa/CFL.ca)
“I’m content with my decision. I’m not sure how I’m going to feel on Saturday,” he said.
“It’s going to be a big change. It’s been a really good ride for the last 20 years.”
The four Grey Cups that he worked are jewels in the crown to him. That first one, in Regina with the Roughriders in it, stands out. With hotels at a premium in Regina that year, the officials stayed in RCMP barracks, making it even more memorable.
“We’re all in it to excel, to be the best that we can be,” he said. “At the beginning of every year, your goal is to work the last game. So each of those games has significance for me, each in its own way.”
He’s scanned over fields across the league this year and sees familiar faces, players that were around in his early years as a CFL official who have grown into head coaches. Jason Maas and Mike O’Shea come to mind for him quickly. That on-field relationship is an interesting one and when it has decades to develop from official-to-player to official-to-coach, it makes him smile.
“You could tell somebody like Mike O’Shea, when he was playing was coach material,” Butler said.
“Just a real student of the game and he still is. It’s been interesting to see how these guys go from cerebral players to assistant coaches and work their way up.”
There was a reception waiting for Butler late on Saturday night, after the final whistle was blown on the Elks-Stamps game and the stadium had emptied out. There’s a fraternity-like bond that forms between officials in the years they work together. He celebrated that on Saturday, while processing loosening the grip on something that’s been a part of him for two-thirds of his life.
“I loved the game,” Butler said of what initially led him down this path. “It was a way to be involved in the game. And the camaraderie amongst officials is second-to-none.”
