The winds have been changing for a few years now. But now, more than midway through the 2024 campaign, the balance of power feels like it has shifted to the East Division. After more than a decade of Western domination, the East currently boasts the league’s only three teams with records above .500.
I guess that will end the mindless drivel about combining all the teams in One Division for a year anyways
This is a good article with one hugely glaring omission concerning the Montreal Alouettes. The brains behind the building/hires and draft choices is Danny Maciocia…full stop. His name is not even mentioned in this story, while both GMs for Ottawa and Toronto are. I think that Danny Maciocia deserves an article on the CFL site entirely dedicated to his massive totally game changing contribution. Football in Montreal has completely turned around with the stadium full now on a regular basis!
No it won’t and it’s not mindless drivel, just a different and well reasoned opinion.
I think the majority of members of this forum would prefer to see playoff qualification and seeding based on actual regular season play instead of geography. I know I would and many in the East do as well. You make the mistake of assuming this is an East vs West debate. It’s not. It’s about competetive integrity, something I find to be rather important.
As the article says, it’s been over a decade since the East was dominant. I haven’t checked but once every 15-20 years seems about right so those frothing at the mouth about how good the East is need to chill. It is usually the West that gets screwed come playoff time, but it looks like the East will be getting screwed this year.
If the standings hold Ottawa won’t be seeded second despite racking up perhaps a 13 win season. Instead an inferior Western team that wins the division with say 10 wins will get an unearned bye while Ottawa must play an extra playoff game they should not have to. Toronto has won more Grey Cups than they should have because of the free unearned pass and tremendous advantage they frequently have received, such as two years ago when they had not earned the right to host the GC play in game and should have travelled to BC to earn their way into that game. Last year was one of the rare years where seeding turned out to be appropriate.
So it looks like that this year it is finally the East’s turn to not be rewarded for their regular season performance. This is wrong, no matter whether it happens to the East or the West. This has been argued numerous time over numerous threads, with the logical conclusion being that separating teams into two divisions in a 9 team league and then basing seeding on geography is ridiculously unfair. Especially since teams now play a relatively balanced schedule.
I don’t see how anyone can agree with the premise that playoff qualification and seeding shouldn’t be based on regular season record rather than longitude, witchcraft, tradition, sorcery, ouija boards or whatever other lame explanation is given for the current unfair set up that does not respect competetive integrity. I take no solace in the fact that it appears that it will be a team in the East for once that will take it in the nether regions this year. Let’s not ever have to live through this arbitrary and grossly unfair playoff set up again.
Well being a Cats fan it doesn’t really matter either way . No matter if you put us in one division or two or even throw us into the West for whatever the reason , we are still the shittiest organization and team out there .
Not likely - there are those who think the current system is unfair. Last year, in fact, we had, points wise, #1 & 2 with the bye, 3 played 6, 4 played 5 so the “preferred” system worked out.
I have always maintained that to be the best you have to beat all comers in sudden death contests. As we saw the past 2 years the best regular season team doesn’t always win. In the CFL you have the advantage of having a bye AND playing a ONE game match before your home crowd to get to the championship game. If you’re #1 in the standings & you can’t do that - tough. If you’re the BEST, then you should be able to beat the other opponent in the Grey Cup which, more often than not, is on neutral ground. The winner, regardless of anything before, deserves the title.
Last year the KC Chiefs won the Super Bowl having to win a Wild Card game, then beat the Buffalo Bills, the overwhelming Bowl favourites Baltimore Ravens, both on the road, before beating the 49’ers. The Chiefs were underdogs in all of the post WC rounds. Are the Ravens still crying about it?
It is no different in all major sports whether it be MLB, NBA, NHL, World Cup, Cricket, whatever. Being ranked #1 for 4 years in soccer means nothing when you play for the trophy, There is a trophy for being West & East champions - half of a Maple Leaf, when placed beside each other form a whole. Not good enough?
Until there are 10 teams, & each team can play every other team the same # of times, you have an unbalanced schedule. And the “purists” calling for a fair contest for the Cup will always have something to complain about. So until that happens - just stop already.
Yeah, Danny deserves his flowers, for sure. He’s built a great team in Montreal on the field and a great football ops staff as well. I have no doubt that guys like Lavergne and Edmé will get serious consideration in years ahead for other CFL teams looking for GMs…
Edit: I hated Danny’s hiring when it happened, but he slowly won me over, forcing me to admit that I was wrong.
I remember when there was lanterns and pitchforks out when Danny got hired . I also recall a lot of grumbling about Mass when they brought him in . Ditto for Fajardo . Hell I even remember a thread calling for the firing of Thorpe . Funny how certain things work out when you look back on them sometimes .
Oh I had the pitchforks out for Danny, no doubt! We all remembered how his time in Edmonton ended and were terrified that he’d do the same thing in Montreal. But he has evidently learned from his mistakes. I think his biggest improvement is knowing how to surround himself with good football people and not trying to make it a one-man show.
The Fire Thorpe threads are legendary in the Als forum. I thought they were funny even though I rarely agreed…
The Maas hiring was interesting. I didn’t like that it looked like a field of candidates handpicked to make Maas look better – all internal candidates (AC, Thorpe, Bolduc, Archambeault). But again, just like Danny, Maas started to win me over with his “grind it out” attitude. He’s not throwing clipboards anymore either. He’s learned to manage his emotions.
On Fajardo: I would have preferred Trevor Harris to Fajardo right up until the 2023 Grey Cup game. That game turned me into a Fajardo believer. 
While I agree that you have to beat whomever is in front of you, your position completely ignores the fact that the seedings are usually completely arbitrary and render the regular season meaningless much of the time. Why not just have a coin flip tournament with ties decided in a skills contest like in soccer? The schedule is basically balanced now and is the best balance available with 9 teams, so pretending it isn’t is a red herring and it is far worse to award geographical seedings.
All other sports seed. And there is no point in trotting out the baseless argument that other sports have divisions based on geography, like Dallas with Philadelphia, New York and Washington because they are all in the East. 
It is completely different in 32 team leagues and any one season anomalies tend to rotate if they even happen at all. Tennis and golf particularly rely on seeding based on actual play. You don’t see Djokovic seeded ahead of Nadal because he comes from an country more to the East! Ludicrous that would be, yet you advocate for that exact system for the CFL.
Once again it’s not east vs west, but competetive integrity and obtaining proper playoff reward for the best regular season performance. Why are some advocating the participation ribbon thing and enhanced standing for those that are close? Maybe every team should get a Cup, with the winner getting the biggest one and 2-9 getting progressively smaller ones like Russian nesting dolls? Then those who finish 4th but get elevated to 2nd will feel even better about themselves when they lose.
But this is professional sports, not coddling children. Man up. You are what your record says you are. 4th is not 2nd. Deal with it. Then let the best teams win in the properly seeded playoffs. No need for compass and sextant aided placings.
As I think of it further, I can’t think of a professional sports league that actually has a more balanced schedule than the CFL. Only two games unbalanced. Near perfection short of having a 10 team league.
So using the standings as they are today and grouping everybody into one division the standings and playoff seedings would look like this .
#1 Montreal (10 - 1)
#2 Ottawa (7 - 2 - 1)
#3 Toronto ( 6 - 4 )
#4 Saskatchewan (5 - 5 - 1)
#5 Winnipeg ( 5 - 6 )
#6 B.C. ( 5 - 6 )
#7 Calgary ( 4 - 6 )
#8 Edmonton ( 3 - 8 )
#9 Hamilton ( 2 - 9 )
Byes : Montreal , Ottawa
1rst round : BC @ Tor / Winnipeg @ Saskatchewan
And under the present geographical playoff model Ottawa would host Toronto in the first round. That would be the #2 and #3 teams in the league while the 4th placed team would get the unearned bye. Your turn to bend over this year Ottawa.
In fact because I think that since Montreal is the most northern of the eastern teams that they should automatically be placed in 5th. This was told to me by a Tarot Card reader. Remember, regular season placement in a balanced schedule league doesn’t matter in the CFL.
I always like to look what a division winner with 3-6 format looks like too.
#2 Saskatchewan (5-5-1)
#3 Ottawa ( 7 - 2 - 1)
#4 Toronto (6 - 4)
#5 Winnipeg ( 5 - 6 )
#6 B.C. ( 5 - 6 )
#7 Calgary ( 4 - 6 )
#8 Edmonton ( 3 - 8 )
#9 Hamilton ( 2 - 9 )
If we had a draft lottery that remains the same 
Bottom line Jon is you never get a balanced system with 18 games & 9 teams. The Bombers got to play 8 games vs the 3 bottom feeders in the West - nearly half their schedule, 6 vs the Alberta teams, 2 @ home vs Edm. And TO at home vs the 2nd squad. Nice to be able to play the Elks an extra game @ home rather than face TO only once & not in TO.
The setup as it stands is known in advance & so far no team is protesting them as unfair. So what’s your problem here. It’s nonsense to say that the seedings are arbritary. Or meaningless. The seedings are based on a formula - how you finish in your division. What is “basically” balanced? If the schedule maker has you play Montreal & Toronto 3 times instead of the 7th & 9th “seeds” it’s just as balanced. You have to play “someone” 3 times.
There are clear guidelines not some haphazard scattering. Give me a break.
Huh? I wouldn’t expect a team to be “protesting” the set up nor did I say they should be.
It’s just fundamental fairness in an almost perfectly balanced league. You haven’t explained why better teams should be seeded lower because of geography and I don’t think you can.
In any event this concept has been discussed many times on the forum so I don’t intend to belabour it further if you wish to have the last word.
My point is, since it isn’t clear enough, if the teams are OK with it, why aren’t you? Fundamental fairness, AGAIN, cannot be had in an unbalanced league. Since you brought it up I think it should be clarified
I do have a suggestion we both can agree upon. Geography!! Wpg is the most central city in the league & can go either way. IMO the most Eastern city in the West should be back in the East where they can deal with the Als & Argos 3, maybe 4 times a year. Easy peasy schedule. Who’s for Victoria joining the CFL? I wasn’t not that long ago but I’m on board. 
We don’t know that the teams are okay with it.
Presumably, if they were okay with it, then Ambrosie wouldn’t have floated the idea of change.
The idea didn’t pass for undisclosed reasons. CFL needs a super majority to pass these types of things. 3 teams can stop any change in the CFL even if 6 are on board.
I think Covid derailed any serious talk of following through with these ideas.
Afterwards, expansion became the new path they’re looking at to balance the division/schedules…but that’s another series of threads worth of discussions
All these dreaming scenarios, the CFL won’t change their East/West payoff format for the betterment of the league, it’s just the way it is. The CFL will never get unanimous consent across the board to change as each club has their ideology to what gives their franchise optimum return. If you really look at the CFL, its a small minor league and will remain that way for the foreseeable future unless some drastic change happens like a merger with other_maybe some cities along the border like Grand Forks and Fargo North Dakota who have excellent domed football facilities) or the addition of three more Canadian cities in Atlantic, Quebec, Saskatoon, Sk) region.
As I always say when this silly topic of one division comes up: point me to a pro sports league that tries to eliminate regional qualifications in a similar way, rather than fostering them. You can’t because they don’t exist.
The NFL doesn’t do it.
The NBA doesn’t do it.
The NHL doesn’t do it.
MLB doesn’t do it.
So why would the CFL do it? To be different? To make fans of western teams feel better?