Now here is something different.
A media outlet is offering to raise the money to help pay the fines the Canadian Football League levied against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers for publicly criticizing officials following their heartbreaking 44-40 loss to the Montreal Alouettes last Friday.
The CFL fined Blue Bombers’ head coach Paul LaPolice $1,000 and players Phillip Hunt, Jovon Johnson and Ibrahim Khan undisclosed amounts.
It’s estimated the total amount is $2,500 and the Winnipeg Free Press is asking people to help pay the fine.
Now that’s community spirit!
The Bombers, who have been on the wrong end of some disputed calls this year, were incensed by some calls, notably a catch by Als’ receiver Jamel Richardson late in the game. Richardson appeared to make a forward movement after the catch, but fumbled it on contact and the ball was picked up by the Bombers.
The officials decided it was an incomplete catch, which allowed Montreal to continue its late drive, and the Als used the opportunity to score the game-winning touchdown.
In the heat of the loss, the Bombers expressed their anger, disappointment and frustration, with the players claiming the officials wanted the Alouettes to win.
LaPolice, it says here, did not say anything worthy of a fine.
"I hope as a league we can be consistent in our calls," he began. "I thought at times tonight things weren’t consistent. That’s all I’ll say"
He said on one of the Als’ touchdowns, he thought a player was four feet offside. He said the catch by Richardson appeared to be a fumble, but reiterated he’ll have to defer to what the officials saw.
When told some of his players felt the officials wanted the Als to win, LaPolice spoke on behalf of the Bombers when he said: "I don’t think the officials wanted the Montreal Alouettes to win. We have to fight through officials and find a way to win football games. Sometimes plays don’t go your way. You can’t control the refs. We don’t try to."
If anything, I think LaPolice tempered his remarks and spoke professionally and respectfully on behalf of the team.
Ask one or more players a question after a tough loss and it won’t be surprising to find some of them say something emotional and controversial about the officials if that played a factor.
It happens.
Anybody who has watched the CFL will admit the officiating is far from perfect. In that respect, the CFL is not alone. Consider the disputed call in an NFL game earlier this month that cost the Detroit Lions a win against the Chicago Bears because the officials deemed receiver Calvin Johnson did not retain control of the ball after hitting the turf in the end zone.
By most accounts, it was a blown call.
CFL director of officiating Tom Higgins has been upfront in admitting when mistakes are made, but he usually underlines it by saying the officials aren’t perfect and they try to do the best job they can.
Furthermore, he’ll note they are humans and humans make mistakes.
And that’s the key here: An official can make a mistake, it is judged afterward by the league and the offending individual is notified and graded. There is no public notice by the league that the official has been fined. The officials who grade out the best at the end of the year are given plum assignments in the playoffs.
Officials can be weeded out of the league if they are deemed not good enough, but the officiating pool is terribly thin. The resources for training them are a pittance compared to the NFL and the pay is equally small.
The officials do this as a part-time job. The players do this as a full-time job. A mistake made by the officials can effectively end a player’s season and possibly their career.
Think about it: a player is only one injury away from having his career limited or ended. That’s why every play matters and every call matters.
Following the game, a player can be so physically, mentally and emotionally exhausted or enraged they may say something that is offensive to the league or a member of it, be it the commissioner or one of the officials and suffer the penalty. There is literally no free speech – unless of course you have a newspaper willing to pay the fines through its readers.
I’ve never heard of a media outlet paying the fine, so this is new ground.
If the media doesn’t ask the question, the players don’t get themselves in trouble. Or they can act robotic and offer the kind of responses that indicate they are not human.
And this is not exclusive to just coaches or players.
Back in 2007 when he managed the Saskatchewan Roughriders, Eric Tillman was fined twice for separate remarks deemed to be disparaging to the league.
In the second case, head coach Kent Austin was also fined and the team was slapped with a $10,000 hit.
But shouldn’t there be a better form of justice?
Make it known that the league does not support the comments and in, fact, finds them offensive and further such remarks could lead to fines or penalties. This is not unlike the law of the land. You’re given a warning. And I believe in this case it should be made public.
Look, the CFL scale of justice is already under heavy criticism. When it fined Jason Jimenez of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats half of his pay for one game for a questionable hit, and that he would have to attend a private meeting with the commissioner to be read the riot act, then why are players subjected to fines for something far less serious?
Is the league going to be ruined by remarks, particularly by a first-time offender?
I doubt it.
Will it lead to these kind of remarks after every game?
No.
So perhaps a better way to handle this is by communicating better with the teams.
Players, coaches, general managers and team officials cannot say anything they want that disparages the league without some form of penalty, but let’s not slap them with fines and expect the media to pick up the tab.
