Punish those cheaters! Without a salary cap there is no CFL!

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A four-pack of mini-columns:

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ONE: The B.C. Lions should just say they got the date wrong.

Insist they were working ahead under the CFL’s 2025 salary cap, as were the Toronto Argonauts, Saskatchewan Roughriders and Ottawa Redblacks — the four (of nine) teams being disciplined for overspending 2024’s salary cap of $5.525 million.

They weren’t really cheating, those conniving Lions. Wink! Wink! They were just ahead of the curve, being innovative. They knew the collective bargaining agreement with the CFL Players’ Association was adding a half-million bucks to the amount each team could pay this coming season in player salaries.

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So they spent it early. Now the Lions don’t have to re-negotiate those hefty contracts that lured quarterback Nathan Rourke and defensive end Mathieu Betts in a fiscally irresponsible, but ultimately futile, attempt by new owner Amar Doman to win a hometown Grey Cup in Vancouver. That’s partly why the Lions, according to the CFL, exceeded last year’s cap by $347,889. Toronto overspent by $87,103, Saskatchewan by $40,121 and Ottawa by $22,914.

The bottom three must pay matching dollar amounts for their transgressions, but B.C. will be fined about $600,000. B.C. also loses two draft picks, both awarded to the Calgary Stampeders in a goofy rule that needs to be changed.

So the Lions spent nearly $1 million extra to pursue a Grey Cup. That’s a major sin in a league famous for its uncontrolled spending, where teams go broke trying to keep pace.

Thirty-six years ago the CFL implemented its first salary cap, presciently knowing the league’s mix of community- and privately owned teams couldn’t survive without spending guidelines. There were often struggles trying to enforce the cap, but the recent addition of an administrative cap shows the league is committed to adding cost certainty.

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Being fiscally responsible helped the CFL generate an extra $18 million in revenue last season, part of which went to the players. Irresponsibility needs to be punished.

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TWO: The Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League playoffs started without the Notre Dame Hounds again. And the Hounds, who hadn’t won a playoff series since 2017, will never reappear in the postseason because the beleaguered franchise is being re-established in Warman, where the new Wolverines have started a campaign to sell 1,000 season tickets for their 2025-26 debut.

Administrators from Athol Murray College of Notre Dame in Wilcox, where there has been a junior team for more than 50 years, said the team rarely iced players lately from the school and was no longer viable in a small community with severely limited fan and corporate support.

Unstated was the notion that it has likely become harder to recruit players to Notre Dame. Known for decades as a hockey academy that produced numerous NHL players, Notre Dame has had three sexual assault suits filed against it by former students.

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After a story detailing the suits appeared in the Leader-Post, three other students contacted the newspaper to discuss their experiences at Notre Dame and ask how they could get involved in the legal process.

Notre Dame plans to focus on its elite minor programs.

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THREE: When an Ontario politician resigned from Premier Doug Ford’s inner circle in early 2024, social media said he was going to be the next CFL commissioner. It didn’t make sense initially, but somebody evidently knew Randy Ambrosie was going to be pushed out after seven years as commissioner.

A replacement could be announced any day and, in a departure from usual CFL practices, potential candidates haven’t been revealed.

No pro league gives its commissioner less authority than the CFL, where the power rests with the governors. What’s needed for the job? Political connections? A legal, financial, media or playing background? Yes! And most importantly, someone with the strength to not get pulled in nine directions.

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FOUR: It was hard being a Milwaukee Brewers fan during the opening series of the MLB season, when the Crew got torpedoed by 15 New York Yankees home runs while being outscored 36-14 in a three-game set. Nine dingers came in one game, 11 in 12 innings, three on the first three pitches of a game.

Yankees slugger Aaron Judge is reportedly using regular bats, but many of his teammates are deploying “torpedoes” that were re-designed by a physicist to shift some of the weight closer to the bat’s label. The bats conform to size restrictions and still have an acceptable taper into the handle. Milwaukee’s Jackson Chourio and Christian Yelich need to order some torpedoes.

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