Commissioner's Performance

While there hasn't been much news for the CFL (missing the Labour Day Classics), maybe we should take the time to rate Randy Ambrosie's performance.

Is he the right man for the job? Would he be back or he will chose not to renew.

If this is part of another topic please feel free to merge them together.

Thoughts?

B+

Ambrosie gets an extension to overcome the pandemic problems that have currently plagued the league.

Ambrosie has tried to get a franchise in Halifax, the ownership group is still there. Brought new ownership in Montreal. The CFL 2.0 is working, but slowly. He is following the orders of the Board of Governors.

I find that Randy has done a better job than Mark Cohen would've

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A solid and total F .

This Randy would do a better job of running the show than Ambrosie has done .

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I feel the same only because of who he reports to.

Inspite of the BoG, he’s managed to harmonize the schedule, release the schedule before Christmas :christmas_tree: and at least started with the CFL 2.0 initiative.

Another topic should be how should we rate the BoG’s performance.

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How long is his contract?

If he's gone it will be him leaving as opposed to the board going in a different direction.

Since the board hired him and also he was he runner up when they went with Orridge, they knew well who they were hiring. Ambroise's failure would be a bigger failure on the board's part.

Saying that, I would give him a C.... maybe a C+. No other commissioner has ever faced a challenge like this. As others have said, got new ownership for Montreal and the Halifax bid has never come this far. The stadium deal may have been done by now if it wasn't for Covid

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I found him woefully under prepared in that first meeting with the government. It appeared that he just walked in off the street and asked for $300,000.

I'm not a formal guy but he looks like he buys his clothes from Value Village.

Just doesn't seem to have much presence about him. I find myself thinking that I just don't don't really believe in him. And I really want to. But I wouldn't fire him necessarily now.

That would just add to the chaos. There is just too much we don't know about what goes on behind the scenes. It's just too bad that Wally B or Hugh Campbell weren't 15 years younger and interested in the job.

At least Randy looks human. I’ve seen worst looking commissioners like the NBA’s Adam Silver who looks like the bat child photo from “News Of The World” or NHL’s Gary Bettman that resembles a large bipedal weasel

Ambrosie's arrival was like the one of Napoleon. The ex-player that will make us forget about Orridge, be able to negociate with the CFLPA and expand the CFL to a next level.

However, even before the pandemic, he got problems that hurted his resume. CFL 2.0 is a must from my point of view because there are not 36 solutions to expand CFL's revenues. However, this is a long term project and I see little to no benefits from this if we can't expand our 3 down rules to other leagues in the word.

The Alouettes sale was a mess. Sure a lot of it was due to some groups using the medias to push their cause, but they almost all agree that it was in part because of Ambrosie's deficient management. Best part of it was the Lenkov Brothers who were even present in the player's cloakroom after Montreal's victory over Edmonton. All that then came to an end last january when Gary Stern was chosen after he learned that the team was on sale during the Grey cup.

Worst part of it was his relation with the CFLPA, wich came to it's limit at the first meeting with the government.

His best moves were his activeness for creating an expasion franchise to Halifax and at least for having the idea of CFL 2.0, but it is a slim trophee when compared to the bad side.

C-

I can’t see him renewing after this contract expires.

Hard to please the BoGs as they are stuck in their ways.

Do you know when his contract is up?

It's interesting how well trained the guys working in the NBA commissioners office have been.

Like him or not Bettman has done extraordinarily well in the NHL. He came from the NBA office under David Stern.

So did current NBA commissioner Adam Silver , imo the gold standard of all commissioners. Not that the CFL can afford that talent.

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Not sure myself. I assume it will the 5 years that a standard deal would be.

Doesn’t hurt to look to them (NBA) for some insight.

Larry Tannenbaum is the chairman of the board of the NBA so they have that insight already in house (MLSE). Calgary’s ownership of course and to a lesser extend Ottawa owns teams in other leagues with long term commissioners so I would think they would know the value of stability there even when things are not going well.

Leagues with more teams and they figure out how to work together. IMO there are not enough of those thinkers in the board here.

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Bettman has had three lockouts under his reign including not crowning a champion in 2004. His stubborn decision to place a team in Arizona is flawed. Hardly acts of extraordinarily accomplishments

Fair enough. But he has done very well by getting the owners what they want from him. Control of expenses and payroll. He is not hired by fans or the players. During his decades long tenure the teams values have increased 10 fold. And so has the income of the players. But fans hate him no question.

I would give Randy a B. Like his 2.0 and also getting a new owner in Montreal. New team in the Atlantic looked promising before the you know what happened. He had a bit of a slip up with respect to the Government and Players but that can be improved. No one is perfect but you can see Randy has a passion for the CFL when he talks. With respect to the BOG I would give them a big fat FAIL. The BOG is one of the issues the CFL has to resolve.

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But yet in that lockout season of 2004-2005, the owners backed him by a margin 30-0. If anything, the division was in the players ranks.

While on the owners side they were unanimously behind Bettman (and likely instructed him to take such actions), there are questions on if the union leadership really was acting in the interest of the majority of the membership.

Infact, if IIRC, the union didn’t even hold a vote on the offers made by the league.

Based on what Bob Young mentioned on his interview, he was willing to bankroll the whole hub city season.

Not sure if it was realistic but there seems to be some disagreement between the BOGs themselves as to the plan.

I still think it was a huge mistake to go to the feds period.

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I don’t know if it was a mistake but it sure pointed out the lack of prep that RA did. if i was a lender I’d have laughed him out of the room. I don’t think the gov’t ever felt comfortable with them again. It was embarrassing to say the least.