THE CANADIAN PRESS
At first Randy Ferbey had his doubts.
But the more the former world champion skip listened to Olympic gold medallist Brad Gushue’s idea, the more sense it made.
Ferbey, from Edmonton, will join Gushue’s rink from St. John’s, N.L., next season to compete in major cash bonspiels. It’s still up in the air whether the rink will be eligible to play in the Brier playoffs.
"It has the potential of being very good for me," Ferbey, 50, said in a telephone interview from St. John’s on Thursday. "Playing with a great young team, prolonging my career on a top-level team, gets my juices going.
"I don’t know how many more years I am going to be playing. This gives me an opportunity to get to the top again."
As far as Gushue is concerned, having Ferbey join his team would be like Bono asking to sing with your band, or Sidney Crosby wanting to play on your hockey team.
Basically, a no-brainer.
"He’s one of the best players to ever play the game," said Gushue, 29. "Of all the options that we had, when we put them on paper and looked at them, this we felt gave us the best team and the best chance of catching up to Kevin (Martin) and Glenn (Howard) and becoming the best team in the world.
"It’s a good fit. I think Randy and I will work together."
Like he’s done most of his career, Ferbey will call the shots during the game and throw third rocks. Gushue will throw the final stones.
"When it gets closer to my shots, I am going to have the final say over how we play the end," Gushue said. "I have to be comfortable with what shot I’m left with.
"I am going to revert to him early on in the end and let him call the shots because he is fully capable."
Some logistics still have to be worked out. Neither skip is sure whether the rink will play under Gushue or Ferbey’s name. There also is the little matter of over half a continent separating the cities where they live.
"When it comes to bonspiels you are flying to these events anyways," said Ferbey. "We do have some issues to solve with the practice and communication part of it.
"It’s an on-going battle. I know over the next few months we are going to try and solve those problems."
Gushue is checking the rules to see if the rink can represent Newfoundland-Labrador at the Canadian championships even though Ferbey still lives in Edmonton.
"We are going to try to make it work," Gushue said. "If we can follow (the rules) and even exceed them, we will probably proceed.
"We want to make sure, at the end of the day, no one is questioning what we are doing."
Rounding out the rink will be Mark Nichols at second and Ryan Fry at lead.
Ferbey’s current rink of Dave Nedohin, Scott Pfeifer and Marcel Rocque will play together for the last time at the World Curling Tour’s Players’ Championship next week in Dawson Creek, B.C. Together they won four Briers and three world championships.
"It will be very emotional," said Ferbey. "We’re still going to be great friends off the ice."
Nedohin, Pfeifer and Rocque have all decided to take next year off.
It’s not the first time Gushue has teamed up with a veteran skip. Russ Howard was a member of the team the St. John’s native led to Olympic gold at the 2006 Turin Games.
Gushue hopes to learn from Ferbey’s experience.
"We get to see him play and see what he does to prepare and learn as much as we can," he said. "I think it’s going to help in the long run.
"The limited time we played with Russ helped. Anything you can take from the guys who have had success in the past, you try to do that."
The new team will play together for the first time next September. The plan is to enter about 12 events during the season.
Whether the team remains together long enough to compete for a spot at the 2014 Olympics remains to be seen.
"I have to play this game one year at a time," said Ferbey. "It’s not only physically draining it’s emotionally draining.
"We will see where I am in a year or so to see if I still have that desire and want."