The Canadian Football League expansion team set to debut next year in Ottawa with no name as of yet (at least not officially, but Red Blacks has been leaked) nor a head coach will draft players on Monday that maybe, possibly, hopefully will one day suit up in the colours of the uniform that has yet to be revealed.
If that seems a bit odd, even by the quirky CFL standards, well, that’s what will make this year’s draft so unique. The Ottawa team will be allowed to draft NCAA red-shirt juniors, which is to say players that still have another season of eligibility because they practised but did not play in their first season.
“At least it puts a player’s name in the minds of people who want to follow our progress over the course of the next several months before we get to the (CFL) expansion draft in December,” Ottawa general manager Marcel Desjardins told sportsnet.ca on Sunday. “From that standpoint, I’m excited. Absolutely. I think we’re going to get one or two good players from this process that will be long-serving members of our football team.”
In theory, that is.
Desjardins said there is a list of 20 red-shirts that are eligible. They may not be actively involved in the sport due to injury, academics or any other reason. Moreover, the best of the bunch may be scooped up by the eight existing CFL teams, some of which could be drafting for the future because they have multiple picks and/or they can afford the luxury of waiting on players other than the ones immediately graduating from Canadian college or universities.
“There’s a very limited selection,” Desjardins said. “There’s really only a handful you’d want to draft that would be good enough to make your roster right away.”
Could they start right away? That’s never a known factor in the draft, but who knows what the Ottawa opening day roster will resemble. It will be culled from the expansion draft that will allow Ottawa to select three players from each of the eight existing teams for a total of 24 players. The Ottawa team can select eight import players and 16 non-import players. Ottawa will be able to select a maximum of two quarterbacks and one kicker/punter but cannot take any of these three players from the same team.
It’s not a great system, but better than the last time the CFL introduced an expansion team, which coincidentally happened to be Ottawa in 2002. The now-defunct Renegades didn’t even have the opportunity of drafting a year in advance of debuting. This has been a courtesy afforded to the newest member of lodge, albeit with the ninth and final selection in only the first four of seven rounds. The picks cannot be dealt for future selections in this draft.
So four players will find out on Monday they will be the exclusive property of the new Ottawa team. Who knows if they will ever wear the Ottawa uniform?
“You draft a guy this year and he has a whole year of college left and he could get hurt. A million things could happen,” Desjardins said.
Desjardins, in his second tour of duty as a CFL GM following a brief tenure a few years ago with Hamilton, has loads of experience in the draft process, both with the Ticats and many years as assistant GM of the Montreal Alouettes. The Als have often drafted red-shirt juniors because they had multiple first-round picks or could afford to wait on players they deemed to be better than the ones immediately available from the Canadian college ranks. There are other teams that do the same thing. The teams that have done poorly the year before and are drafting higher usually need to pick players they can immediately insert into the lineup, either for special teams purposes or potentially to start if they prove capable.
There are so many variables that can take place by the time Desjardins makes that first pick. The best of the available choices may be gone.
“What they (the other teams) do is seriously going to impact what we do,” Desjardins said. “In theory, the best (red-shirt juniors) could be done by the time we draft ninth.”
Desjardins has been actively scouting for the Ottawa team since his hiring in mid-February. He has two assistants he hired in mid-March, so the threesome will go on what they know from their own experience in talent evaluation and their individual contacts. It should be interesting.
The CFL might have done the Ottawa team a favour by allowing it to pick first overall in the four rounds, if only to give them a shot at the best prospects instead of waiting for the other teams to get first dibs. The Ottawa team may get a decent pick with the ninth overall choice, but will be extremely fortunate with the 18th, 27th and 36th selections. Then again, this is not an exact science. Who knows what will happen and whether Desjardins keeps all these picks or deals the rights to these players by the time the 2014 season begins. It is a fluid process and Desjardins will need to be both lucky and good.
Not much will be expected from the team for at least its first two years. That’s just a fact. Desjardins may unearth a gem here and there, but the process that begins on Monday will not be easy.
Hamilton has the first overall pick this year and has floated out the idea it may be willing to deal if presented with an offer. Kent Austin, returning to the CFL for the first time since guiding the Saskatchewan Roughriders to a Grey Cup win as head coach in 2007, will oversee Hamilton’s draft as GM/head coach. Austin is a neophyte GM, so you wonder how much his counterparts will try to dangle something tempting for him to deal. For this reason, it will be a historical draft of sorts for Austin and the Ticats.
Austin will at least have a foundation from which to work. Desjardins is starting from scratch. He could have stayed in Montreal, which would have been the comfortable thing to do but not as challenging.
The challenge really starts on Monday, at least in terms of finally taking a player who may or may not become a member of the Ottawa team next year.
One thing is certain: The latest Ottawa expansion franchise will be seeing red, certainly when in its initial draft, even more so when the uniform and logo are presented when the Red Blacks become even more of a reality.