Crazy Schedule

Hamilton Tiger-Cats
#1

OK - could somebody explain to me why it is that one of the teams in the East - that did not request road games or bye weeks for the first 3-4 weeks of the season - due to new stadium issues - is now the team that has the ridiculous competitive advantage of having a bye week and then four consecutive home games - and five of their last six at home???

Yes I'm talking about the Argos.

There is no way this schedule should have passed scrutiny by the other teams. I know it balances out in the end but we all know that games down the stretch take on a certain amount of more intensity than early season games - because of play-off implications. And IMO it is simply not right that one team going down the stretch should have a schedule that has them get a bye week, followed by four consecutive home games. That is simply ridiculous and not right.

How did a schedule like this get approved? The schedule should be as balanced as possible for all teams between home and away games spread as evenly as possible through the season. Anything else is not fair.

#2

Didn't the jays/rogers screw the argos out of a lot of potential home dates on the weekends this summer and forced the argos to have 4 home games in October?

#3

Rogers.

The Skydump is booked every weekend from mid-August through the end of September, mostly with boo jays games.
They had no choice but to bunch up the argos games in October.

#4

the argos are the red headed step child of rogers centre. They've had 4 different practice facilities this year. They played 4 straight away games because they were basically kicked to the curb by rogers and the blue jays. They have been essentially homeless. There is talk the coach is going to quit because of the logistics around the team.Their schedule is shit for them. They are the ones at a DISADVANTAGE. I almost feel bad for them. This is why they need out of the Rogers Centre.

And the schedule got approved because it is take it or leave it. If the CFL says no to the schedule Rogers laughs at the Argos and CFL and tells them to take a hike and find another place to play. Best case scenario for Rogers is the Argos have no place to play and it cuts into the ratings of TSN owned by BELL, Rogers' biggest competitor.

When big bad Rogers owns your house and you pay rent to play there nothing is going to be fair. Life isn't fair.

#5

I don't think you can blame Rogers and the Jays for this. The Jays were on the road Tuesday September 2 through Sunday September 7th and then again on the road Monday September 15th through Sunday September 21st - inclusive.

So Argos could have played at home on Saturday September 6th (after playing in Hamilton Labour Day). Or they could have played a home game Thursday, Friday or Saturday of this weekend.

Their last home game was August 17th - and with the bye week next weekend they don't play at home until October 4th. How do you build up a ticket buying fan base when you don't play a home game for 47 days in the middle of a season and then play four home games within 22 days. Ridiculous!

#6

Even if Rogers said no to every date from August 18-October 3rd (which I doubt) - then in my opinion the league should have insisted the Argos be the home team for a game somewhere else. Moncton? Halifax? London?

From a fair competition perspective the CFL looks totally bush - allowing a team to be home for 5 of their last 6 games.

#7

Yes the problem has already been well identified. You can't build a ticket buying fan base. Which is why there is such a push to get the Argos out of Rogers Centre.

And yes you can blame Rogers. Rogers wants the CFL to fail. They can easily say these are the dates available to you. We don't care if the dome is sitting empty. You can't have them.

Do you think the Argos and Braley willingly chose this scheudle? with no late summer home games and mid week games?

#8

and who would pay for the costs of two away teams travelling to the maritimes and setting up temporary stands?

what would ticket sales be like?

also have a look at the Rogers Centre Schedule. All weekends were booked. Keep in mind it takes 36 hours to set up the football field

http://events.rogerscentre.com
#9

Don't forget though on Labour Day the Argos played us coming off a buy week. We'd already had two, whereas the Argos hadn't even had one. We had two games on the Argos at that point. Forcing them to continue without a buy wouldn't be fair either.

Anyway, its a 9-team league and in a 4 team division you've got two teams who needed extra time to build stadiums and another who's always had difficulty getting dates to play. That's not easy to deal with. I'm sure there was a lot of thought put into this schedule and this was the best compromise.

Hopefully its a bit better next year with no stadium issues apart from the Argos.

#10

Ticket sales would probably be about what they get at Rogers Centre. :stuck_out_tongue:

#11

exactly, add to that the costs of flying out two away teams, setting them up in hotels and setting up and taking down temporary stands and you have yourself a massive losss

#12
8) I guess the ultimate payback is that the joke Jays will miss the playoffs once again !!! :lol: :P
#13

and thank goodness for that. because the Argos would yet again be homeless if they had a home playoff game. talk about bush league and unfair advantage

[url=http://www.thestar.com/sports/argos/2014/08/13/argos_could_be_without_home_in_october_if_blue_jays_make_playoffs.html]http://www.thestar.com/sports/argos/201 ... yoffs.html[/url]
#14

If playing in someplace like London or Kingston - bussing there from Toronto - that doesn't cost them much more at all. Or have them play at U of T if you have to.

From a fair competition perspective - this is wrong - having one team sitting at home for five consecutive weeks (one bye, four home games) during the most critical stretch of the season - that is not a fair competition. That's my beef - and that is why this looks so bad IMO.

And Tipper - God forbid if the Jays had made the post season - as this would not be a discussion about Argos having four consecutive home games. This would be a discussion about - where are the Argos playing some of these home games with Rogers Centre unavailable because of Jays post season baseball.

#15

yes but you were also concerned about the league looking bush league. Kingston's stadium is half condemned lol. talk about bush league and looking bad. Pick your poision. both situations look bad.

And nobody is arguing that 4 straight home games is an unfair advantage. Thats the reality of the situation. Nothing can be done about it untill the Argos get out of Rogers Centre. If you have the team play at a university stadium that looks bad as well AND will cause increased losses.

Also the unfair advantage the Argos have in the last weeks of the season is counter balanced by the unfair disadvantage they had playing away from home for over a month and practicing at high school football fields and city parks this year lol. that looks reallll bad

#16

I still have doubts as to the validity of everything in that whole article. No way the Jays can boot out the Argos like that unless the Argos signed a contract that explicitly says they can do exactly that. Signing a contract that says the Jays have first dibs on dates in absolutely no way means getting to cancel the other's events at two days notice.

Also, if you look at the MLB post-season schedule the dates do conflict, but it also says the whole thing is subject to change, for exactly reasons like these. Football games are once a week and easy to work around, pretty sure the Jays would have just moved one or two games a day forward or back.

#17

Travel Pat - the Argos had no choice in the matter. There were many articles in the Toronto media talking about this same topic. Both of the weekends you mention that you said they could have played were booked long in advance.

Sept 6 was the Womens Weekend to End Cancer

Sept 20 was the weeklong Blue Jays baseball academy that they run every year at the dome

Until they have a new stadium, they take what they can get. You mention it’s an advantage but Scott Milanovich did not like this schedule one bit. Months away from home, on top of practicing all over the GTA, is not ideal. They would trade their schedule with any of the other 8 CFL teams in a minute.

#18

Rogers moving playoff games to accomadate the argos? no way. 1. they want the best dates possible. 2. certain days are on certtain times for TV reasons. the reason they say "subject to change" is because they want to ensure the best match up gets the prime time time slot on American National TV. MLB decides when and what time the games are played not the Blue Jays. This is the same as Late NFl regular season games that subject to the NFL's flex scheduling.

Im sure if you asked Bud Selig if he could pretty please change the time and date of a playoff game so the Argos could play he would look at you like you have 3 eyes.

#19

I agree with King. The Jays games would have been played when Fox and ESPN dictated they be played. Argos be damned.

If I'm the Argos - knowing that I'm stuck at Rogers Centre again next year - now that the Jays 2015 schedule is already out I'm telling the CFL right now to tell the Rogers Centre what couple of dates the Argos need in late August or in September for next season - before anything else gets booked into the Rogers Centre. Don't wait until the rest of the CFL schedule comes out a few months from now. By then other things might be booked into Rogers Centre.

For example assuming we keep the Argos at Hamilton for Labour Day - already looking at the Jays schedule for 2015 the only possible home dates for the Argos late August thru September would be August 21st, 22nd or 23rd and September 11th or 12th or 13th and then on October 2nd, 3rd and 4th. If I'm the CFL I'm firming up at least two of those three weekends for the Argos NOW before something else gets booked - so we don't have the Argos in the same situation next season.

#20

I'll say this again. There is no way, unless the Argos signed a contract that explicitly states that the Jays have a right to do so, that the Jays can just cancel Argo events at will. MLB doesn't have this right. FOX doesn't have this right. ESPN doesn't have this right. Doesn't matter how much more big and powerful these companies are than the CFL, they're not above contract laws, nor were they back when half their teams shared stadiums with the NFL.

The article says this: "Under the Argos’ lease agreement with the Rogers Centre, which expires at the end of the 2017 CFL season, the Jays have priority in selecting dates."

In no way whatsoever does that give the Jays the ability to cancel Argo games on short notice.

The article follows on with vague quotes from Chris Rudge that suggest that nobody's ever bothered to put much thought into this.

There could be a fear that the Jays will just breach contract, pay a penalty, dare the Argos to sue them, whatever, these are "permutations" that may have come to Rudge's mind when posed with the question, but in the end, MLB plays playoff games every day of the week and worked around NFL schedules for years. They'll just move a game by a day.