Nov 23, 2017
Commish Ambrosie not afraid to think big
Being CFL commissioner has long been considered one of the toughest jobs in professional sports, but Randy Ambrosie took on the league’s top positon this summer with two things his predecessors did not have: a business resume that stands up to that of those who employ him and an understanding of the game and business of pro football from his days as a player, TSN CFL reporter Dave Naylor writes.
By Dave Naylor
When Randy Ambrosie steps onto the podium Friday morning of Grey Cup week for the annual state of the league address, it’s going to be obvious that this Canadian Football League commissioner is a little different than those who have preceded him.
Which isn’t so much meant to besmirch any of the CFL commissioners who’ve held office over the past quarter of a century as it is to suggest that the league’s board of governors may have finally found a leader who they are willing to give their unqualified trust.
As anyone who has followed the CFL over that time can attest, that has been an issue for this league. Which is why the CFL has seen eight commissioners come and go over the same span that Gary Bettman has been atop the National Hockey League.
Coming straight out of a successful career in the financial industry, the 54-year-old Winnipeg native doesn’t need the job, neither for the money nor the resume. Which is only the first thing that makes him unique, but hardly the last.
Being CFL commissioner has long been considered one of the toughest jobs in professional sports.
Commissioner of the league that isn’t always sure what it wants to be, commissioner of the league where occasional rogue owners have been the norm, where public and private ownership, home grown players and imports, football guys and business interest have traditionally come to the table clutching their self-interests as if it were part of a life-and-death struggle.
Of course, it’s tough to make stakeholders see the big picture when you don’t have their full confidence, an obstacle almost every commissioner of the past quarter century has faced to some degree.
Ambrosie, however, arrived at this positon this summer with two things his predecessors did not have: a business resume that stands up to that of those who employ him and an understanding of the game and business of professional football from his days as a player.
For better or worse, previous CFL commissioners have mostly operated with various degrees of cautiousness, which made it often seem as though they didn’t quite have the courage of their convictions.
That seemed to stem largely from the fact they arrived at their jobs as outsiders to both the CFL as a sport and a business, people who had little or no engagement with the Canadian Football League before being handed the league’s top job.
And that’s also where Ambrosie is different.
He remembers the bad old days of the CFL, entering the league as the second overall draft pick by the Calgary Stampeders and them immediately being approached to buy season tickets to help “save our Stamps.”
He played a game in Montreal’s Olympic Stadium when security guards outnumbered fans. And in his last season, he played at Hornet Field in Sacramento, Calif., on the leading edge of the league’s abysmal attempt at U.S. expansion.
Ambrosie isn’t afraid to think big, to imagine a league that stretches from Vancouver to Halifax, has a strong presence in Southern Ontario (where he has lived since 1997) and engages the wave of new Canadians who right now rarely turn up in CFL stadiums.
He wants to build a business model that can be its foundation across the league, recognizing regional differences but based on principles that work in each and every market.
He wants to concentrate less on how to divide the pie and more on how to grow it, whether that means finding ways to reach the younger generation or targeting new Canadians.
Can one person make that much of a difference?
Consider, if you will, his first four months on the job as CFL commissioner.
Ambrosie engineered a mid-season rule change that limited teams to one challenge per game in response to games that were unreasonably dragging on, worked with the players association to eliminate padded practices and condensed schedules that had teams sometimes playing three games in as little as 17 days. He sped up the league’s “Diversity is Strength” campaign to make a statement in response to what happened in Martinsville, Va., forced the Hamilton Tiger-Cats to withdraw a job offer to former Baylor University head coach Art Briles and found a way to pump the brakes on Johnny Manziel so that the former NFL bad boy would have to prove he deserved a chance in the CFL.
Oh, and he’s helped usher in what appears to be an honest-to-goodness credible effort at putting in place what he call the missing piece of the puzzle with a franchise in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Not bad for a guy who didn’t take office until the season began, when it would have been convenient to say he was going to use the season to step back and learn before making any real decisions.
And what do his bosses think of someone who’s acted so boldly, so quickly.
Apparently they love him. Which is why, as he gets set to begin what he calls the “business season,” there is palpable excitement across the league about the kinds of things he’s prepared to do.
It’s been a long time since a commissioner walked out of his office for the very last time, leaving behind a league that was substantially different than the one he inherited.
The 14th commissioner of the CFL, just months on the job, has already given the impression he intends to do just that.