Tag: 1990s in Canadian Football

  • Robokicker Dave Ridgway Retires

    On April 24, 1996, one of the most prolific kickers to play the Canadian game announced his retirement. Dave Ridgway played every game throughout his 14-year career in the Canadian Football League with the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Born in England, his family came to Canada in the 1970s. Ridgway played college football at the University of Toledo. In 1981, he was drafted by the Montreal Alouettes but didn’t make the team. The following year he signed with Saskatchewan as a free agent.

    An account in the Regina Leader-Post of Saskatchewan head coach Joe Faragalli praising rookie kicker Dave Ridgway in 1982.

    In 1987, he was traded to Edmonton then subsequently traded to Montreal. After the Alouettes folded prior to the season, the Roughriders once again signed him. Clearly, fate wanted Ridgway to be a Rider.

    On September 6, 1987, Ridgway kicked a then record 60-yard field goal in the Labour Day weekend game against the Winipeg Blue Bombers. It was probably the second biggest field goal in his career; we’ll get to the biggest one shortly.

    Playing a whopping 238 games in the CFL, Ridgway was known for his accuracy and ability to get the job done in clutch situations. He scored 574 field goals and a total of 2,374 points throughout his career. His 78% all-time field goal accuracy helped earn him the nickname “Robokicker.” This stat is even more remarkable when you consider the length of his playing career as well as the fact that half of those games were played at Taylor Field in Regina which was known for its often windy conditions.

    Dave Ridgway kicking the game winning field goal in the 1989 Grey Cup.
    Dave Ridgway kicking the game winning field goal in the 1989 Grey Cup.
    (Photo: Canadian Football Research Society)

    Now, let’s get to that biggest field goal. And this one’s tough to talk about as a Ti-Cat fan. But one must give credit where credit is due. In the dying seconds of the 1989 Grey Cup game versus Hamilton with the score tied at 40-40, Dave Ridgway booted a 35-yard field goal to win the game for the Riders. It was a dagger in the hearts of Tiger-Cat fans but a hard fought and well-deserved victory for Robokicker and the Green and White. The kick (or better known as “The Kick”) secured just the second Grey Cup championship for Saskatchewan.

    Prior to the 1996 season, Dave Ridgway was traded to Montreal. But rather than continue his career with the Als, he opted to call it a day and announced his retirement on his 37th birthday.

    Regina Leader-Post article by Darrell Davis about the glorious career of Dave Ridgway (25 April 1996)

    I reached out to Rod Pedersen, the former longtime voice of the Roughriders, to share his thoughts and memories of one of the CFL’s best. Rod was just nine years old when Ridgway arrived in Regina. “I was living in Milestone, SK collecting Roughriders trading cards from the local RCMP detachment which would’ve included Ridgway’s rookie card. My Dad was a Rider season ticket holder and took us to the games,” he recalls.

    Ridgway’s loyalty to the Roughriders was clearly evident. “Dave’s a smart guy and realized quickly that the place you want to play in the CFL is Saskatchewan. The Riders weren’t very good back then (they were in the midst of missing the playoffs 11 years in a row) but the fans’ love for the team was real, and the players knew something special was being built by Rider management,” Rod continues.

    I asked if there are any particular plays or special moments that stand out for him. “Well, they call him “Robokicker” for a reason, so it was nice to know, as a Rider fan, that generally anytime Ridgway went out for a field goal, he was going to make it. I mean, it’s an incredibly difficult task but Dave made it look easy. That didn’t ease much of our anxiety when he lined up a 35-yard field goal to win the 1989 Grey Cup, but we should’ve known. Ridgway’s accuracy made “The Miss” in the 1992 Western Semi-Final all the more unbelievable, and it lives in Rider lore to this day. That was also the last game Bob Poley and Roger Aldag ever played. There wasn’t any one single Ridgway kick that stands out, other than ’89, but he holds all the major records like most field goals in a season (59), most field goals in a game (8), and the longest field goal streak in Rider history (28).”

    Rod’s mention of “The Miss” is a gentle reminder that even legends can falter. I remember watching that game on TV and seeing Ridgway slip on the natural grass at Edmonton’s Commonwealth Stadium on the final play of the game, dashing any chance of a Saskatchewan game-winning field goal.

    Was Dave Ridgeway one of the greatest Riders off all time? Rod thinks so. “I think all the records I listed tells you that he is. Having his retired, going into the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in 2003, these things all point to his legacy. More than anything though, in my role with the Riders I got to be around Dave a lot, interview him multiple times, and he’s always first class and very obliging. That means more to me than all the records.”

    So, here’s to the man who gave Rider fans something to cheer about (and a championship to boot!) for 14 seasons. Thirty years later, the records still stand. And the legend of Robokicker lives on.

    Sources:

    Canadian Football Hall of Fame profile for Dave Ridgway
    The Regina Leader-Post, 8 June 1982
    The Regina Leader-Post, 8 September 1987 
    Riderville heads back in time to honour Ridgway and ‘The Kick’

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  • The CFL’s Early Websites

    At high school in the mid 1990s we were asked to use a new technology called the “World Wide Web” for a research project. Yours truly balked and wanted to stick with the tried-and-true volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica. I told my friend that I would give it a go but that the Internet was nothing more than a mere fad, something that would surely pass. Over thirty years later, here I am writing an article online publicly admitting that ridiculous prediction of mine.

    I slowly came around to the web. The early web was an imperfect place full of imperfect homepages and websites. There were no algorithms, no ads, and no AI. Ah, serenity! Over time, I became fascinated with it, eager to “surf the web” and explore new things on the so-called information highway and to connect with others across Canada and around the world. The CFL’s presence on the World Wide Web played a large part in my gradual acceptance and adoption of this new technology. I was a new football fan, and I wanted to consume football content.

    CFL Homepage 1996
    The CFL’s homepage in 1996

    The Canadian Football Leagued launched its CFL.ca website just prior to the 1995 season. Like most websites of this era, it consisted largely of blocks of text with some limited graphics. Remember, people connected to the Internet via dial-up in those days. The site comprised simple static pages featuring team information, schedules, game scores, and statistics. The Saskatchewan Roughriders were the first team to launch an official website. The Riders went online in May of that year, a site that would eventually become riderville.com.

    Saskatchewan gets a website
    Article in the Regina Leader-Post about the Saskatchewan Roughriders becoming the first CFL team to have its own website (31 May 1995).

    Several other teams had unofficial webpages, usually designed and maintained by computer hobbyists who happened to be fans of the team. For instance, the Calgary Stampeders’ website was designed by two teenaged brothers Mark and Ryan Ciampa. Often, these webpages had convoluted URLs that seem so awkward today but were not out of place in the 1990s.

    Stampeders the class of surfin' CFL
    Edmonton Journal article praising the Calgary Stampeders’ website designed by brothers Mark and Ryan Ciampa (16 Nov 1995)

    In 1996, the CFL partnered with Slam Sports to launch a revamped website in line with its Radically Canadian marketing campaign. This site featured a hotspot graphic with links (a trendy web feature for the time) on the homepage and included an e-commerce store as well as the first online forum or message board for fans to connect and discuss the league. The forum was called the “Huddle.”

    Column in the San Antonio Express about the early CFL websites (21 July 1995).

    A working copy of the CFL’s 1996 website is available on the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/19961221174534/http://www.cfl.ca/

    By 1998, all CFL teams had an official online presence although the sites had their own look and feel to them. In the 2000s – especially after Bob Young purchased the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in 2003 – the CFL began to incorporate a consistent theme for all CFL websites. Young’s MRX company eventually took over the design and management of CFL.ca and team sites. This led to the launch of the CFL.ca Network in 2009, with a focus on video content and social links. The Web 2.0 era had arrived. All CFL and partner websites were now under one umbrella.

    Call it nostalgia, I guess. But there’s something special about looking back at the early CFL websites. It takes me back to a simpler time when I first became a CFL fan.

    So, if you are a football fan who grew up in the early web era and want to relive it or if you simply want to explore these retro CFL websites, here’s your opportunity. Keep scrolling and happy surfing.

    Here is the type of content you could expect to see on the CFL’s early website. A simple table with text.

    The first website for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats used the domain www.tigercats.on.ca and included a virtual Roar Store.

    The Toronto Argonauts’ official website in 1997 was crunch.net and reflects the look and feel of websites in the mid 1990s.

    By 2000, the CFL website was a little more polished and included content such as video that more web surfers could view thanks to faster internet connections.

    Now, for the really fun part…check out the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/
    Enter the cfl.ca URL into the search box and you will have the opportunity to play around with the old CFL websites from the 1990s and 2000s. You can try the URLs of your favourite team, as well. Keep in mind that some of the content may not load and some of the links may not work. But it should give you an idea of what surfing the CFL website was like in the “early” days.

    Sources:
    The Edmonton Journal, 16 November 1995
    The Regina Leader-Post, 31 May 1995
    The San Antonio Express, 21 July 1995

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  • CFL Ends U.S. Expansion, Retreats Back to Canada

    On Friday February 2, 1996, the Canadian Football League officially ended its American expansion efforts. During the CFL’s annual winter meetings, the league announced that the Birmingham Barracudas, Memphis Mad Dogs, San Antonio Texans, and Shreveport Pirates were ceasing operations. And the Baltimore Stallions, having just won the Grey Cup a few months earlier, were relocating to Montreal.

    Canadian Press article on the end of CFL U.S. expansion.
    Canadian Press article on the end of CFL U.S. expansion.

    It was game over for the CFL’s grand vision of becoming a North American-wide professional sports league. The promised windfall of expansion fees and the hope of a multimillion-dollar U.S. television deal (all in American dollars to boot) never materialized. I suppose the only silver lining was that U.S. expansion had thrown the CFL a lifeline. For a few years, there was some new blood and some new interest generated. Personally, I enjoyed watching the American teams come to Ivor Wynne Stadium to play the Tiger-Cats. It was sure better than watching the Ti-Cats play the Rough Riders and Argos four times. It added variety and a bit of intrigue.

    The take in the Edmonton Journal (3 February 1996).
    The take in the Edmonton Journal (3 February 1996).

    The writing was on the wall for the CFL’s demise in America once the National Football League announced it was returning to Baltimore. That move ultimately spelt the end for the Stallions in Baltimore. The other chips began to fall.

    The Pirates attempted to relocate to Virginia but were unable to secure a stadium lease. A new group tried to purchase the Barracudas and move them to Shreveport, where the CFL enjoyed at least modest support, but were rejected by the CFL. Memphis, despite having one of the wealthiest owners in Fred Smith of FedEx fame, was dead in the water. The Stallions, having run out of options in Maryland, considered a move to Houston, Texas. When they decided to move to Montreal instead, that left the San Antonio Texans as the lone U.S.-based team remaining. “It’s over!” admitted a dejected Fred Anderson, the Texans’ owner. With no other team south of the border, he wasn’t going to go it alone whether he wanted to or not. The CFL was done with its American clubs.

    Ed Tait's column about the new, old CFL (Saskatoon Star Phoenix, 3 February 1996).
    Ed Tait’s column about the new, old CFL (Saskatoon Star Phoenix, 3 February 1996).

    The CFL didn’t close the door permanently on future U.S. expansion and hinted that American teams could possibly return to the league in 1997. But most agreed that was unlikely and that the CFL was going to stick with its new, old all-Canadian lineup.

    The players signed to the now folded American teams were put into a dispersal draft and divvied up amongst the nine Canadian teams. San Antonio’s quarterback David Archer was chosen first overall by Ottawa. A special expansion draft was held as well to help stock the reincarnated Montreal Alouettes with Canadian players.

    Top 20 players chosen in the dispersal draft held (Ottawa Citizen, 8 March 1996)
    Top 20 players chosen in the dispersal draft held (Ottawa Citizen, 8 March 1996)

    The 1996 CFL season kicked off on June 23 in Regina. Four days later, the first CFL game played in Montreal in almost a decade saw the Toronto Argonauts defeat the Alouettes 27-24.

    With the CFL’s exit from the U.S., the league launched a bold new marketing campaign highlighting its Canadian roots and unique brand of football. The American dream was no more. The CFL entered its Radically Canadian era.

    Sources:

    Edmonton Journal, 3 February 1996
    Montreal Gazette, 3 February 1996
    Ottawa Citizen, 8 March 1996
    Saskatoon Star Phoenix, 3 February 1996

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  • Pirate Ball Comes to the CFL

    Of all the U.S. cities that the CFL awarded teams to as part of its American expansion in the 1990s, Shreveport had to be the most obscure choice. Whereas the other cities had teams in the defunct World League of American Football (e.g., Sacramento, San Antonio, and Birmingham) or were brought onboard after failed NFL expansion efforts (e.g., Baltimore and Memphis), Shreveport seems so random when you think about it.

    CFL Shreveport Pirates coverage in the Shreveport times
    Shreveport team gathers support in Canada
    Articles by Shreveport Times sports writer Kent Heitholt about the CFL coming to Shreveport.

    I suspect most Canadians had never heard of Shreveport, Louisiana until the CFL set up shop down there. But for two years the CFL put Shreveport on the map – at least for us Canadians. And you know what? The city seemed to really embrace the Canadian brand of football. In fact, I would argue that Shreveport was the most successful U.S.-based CFL team outside of Baltimore. At least from a business perspective.

    So, how the heck did Shreveport land a CFL team in the first place? Well, the Shreveport story actually starts in Ottawa. In 1991, Bernie Glieberman, a Detroit-based real estate developer, purchased the struggling Ottawa Rough Riders. His son Lonie oversaw the day-to-day operations as team president. It seemed like an uphill battle, though, and the Gliebermans found themselves at odds with Ottawa’s city council, an impatient fanbase, and a sceptical local media. They threatened to move the team. But rather than relocating the Rough Riders, the CFL arranged for them to be sold to local interests while granting the Gliebermans an expansion franchise in the United States.

    CFL's Pirates call Shreveport home
    CFL makes it official with the Shreveport Pirates (front page of Shreveport Times, 19 February 1994).

    Why Shreveport? I asked that question directly to Lonie Glieberman. Hearing his rationale for the Shreveport market almost makes me think the CFL should go back there. OK. Maybe that’s a bit of a stretch. But Lonie speaks highly of Shreveport. “Shreveport was a football town. We had hardcore fans. We were important. The Mayor and city council supported us,” Lonie says. The fans supported the CFL, too. They had over 12,000 season ticket holders and averaged about 17,000 fans per game, which is not bad considering the team’s poor on-field performance. “It was more than some of the teams in Canada,” Lonie points out.
    One of the main reasons Shreveport was chosen was the favourable rent agreement for Independence Stadium. The city charged Glieberman only $2500 per game to play at the 40,000-seat stadium.

    Steve Effler worked in corporate sales and stadium operations for the Pirates. He, too, couldn’t say enough good things about the Shreveport market when I spoke to him. “We were the big fish in a small pond. People supported us and we were everywhere in the media,” he said. I can attest to that. A quick browse through the local Shreveport newspapers paints a picture of solid media penetration for the Pirates.

    I was a bit surprised that Steve still follows the CFL. It turns out he was actually a CFL fan long before expansion and considers the job he had in Shreveport a dream come true. You can definitely tell he likes the CFL, and he possesses volumes of Pirates-related content. His YouTube channel has game day coverage and includes a must-see music video called “Pirate Ball.”

    Shreveport Pirates ad for home opener vs. Toronto
    Shreveport Pirates advertisement for home opener vs. Toronto.

    Shreveport’s soon-to-be CFL team was officially branded as the Pirates on January 21, 1994. Lonie says he and his high school friend decided on the name. The runner up nickname was the Jackrabbits. “We were kind of limited by what we could do with Jackrabbits but you can do a lot with Pirates,” he said. The team logo was unveiled about four weeks later when CFL Commissioner Larry Smith formally welcomed Shreveport into the fold. And while Lonie wasn’t entirely sold on the Pirates logo, he was a huge fan of the team uniforms. “We had the best the uniform in the CFL, the best uniform in all of football besides maybe the Raiders,” he boasted. Pirate Ball was now a thing.

    Heartbreaker at home
    Shreveport Times article about the Shreveport Pirates’ home opener loss to the Toronto Argonauts (17 July 1994).

    The Pirates got off to a rather rocky start in training camp. Head coach John Huard was abruptly fired and was replaced by Forrest Gregg. The home opener at Independence Stadium saw the Pirates lose to the Toronto Argonauts by a score of 35-34. A respectable crowd of 20,624 attended the game.

    Pirates win one
    Shreveport Times photo of Forrest Greg and Uzo Oke celebrating the Shreveport Pirates’ first win (17 October 1994).

    The Pirates sat in last place in the East Division throughout their inaugural season. They had a dismal 0-14 record before finally picking up their first win during a torrential rainstorm over Sacramento. They managed to pick up two more victories to end the season with a 3-15 record. Their final game of the season resulted in a 28-24 win over the Ottawa Rough Riders before a huge crowd of 32,011 at Independence Stadium. Lonie relished that one, no doubt.

    Article in the Shreveport Times about the Pirates' season finale win over Ottawa.
    Articles in the Shreveport Times about the Pirates’ season finale win over Ottawa.

    The Pirates were back for their second season in 1995. They still struggled on the field, finishing in last place in the South Division (a five-team division comprising the CFL’s American clubs) with a 5-13 record.

    And then, it was over. In February 1996, the CFL ended its American expansion. The Shreveport Pirates, along with the other U.S.-based teams, ceased operations.

    A lot can be said about CFL expansion to the U.S. Some thirty years later the subject can still stir emotions and generate a good debate. I’ll tell you this, though. I don’t believe you will find a bigger booster for the CFL in the U.S. than Lonie Glieberman. In contrast with some of the other American owners, he had no interest in changing the name of the league or the rules.

    “No one in Shreveport complained about the rules,” he said. “The Canadian rules were not a problem. In Shreveport, the heat was a problem…not the rules.” He adds that CFL brand was respected, had legitimacy and credibility. “I told Larry Smith that changing the name or the rules was the stupidest thing I ever heard of.” You can’t get any more pro-CFL than that.

    I have no doubts that the Gliebermans truly had a passion for the Canadian Football League and wanted nothing more for expansion to work. Unfortunately, it didn’t. But Lonie is adamant that the CFL’s expansion into the U.S. could have ultimately panned out had time been on their side.

    “In the end expansion didn’t fail. We just never gave it enough time,” he concluded.

    Sources:
    Shreveport Times, 22 January 1994
    Shreveport Times, 19 February 1994
    Shreveport Pirates, 15 July 1994
    Shreveport Pirates, 17 July 1994
    Shreveport Times, 17 October 1994
    Shreveport Times, 5 November 1994

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  • A Fan Remembers the Baltimore Stallions

    Baltimore Stallions logo
    Baltimore Stallions logo (SportsLogos.Net)

    Doug Phillips was just five years old when his father took him to his first football game at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland. He got to see the Johnny Unitas, the legendary quarterback of the old Baltimore Colts NFL team. Sadly, the Colts left for Indianapolis in 1984, leaving the city of Baltimore without professional football for a decade.

    After being spurned by the NFL for an expansion franchise twice, Baltimore turned its attention to the Canadian Football League. In 1994, Baltimore was granted a CFL team, a team that would be a smashing success on and off the field.

    Doug was delighted to welcome the CFL. He (and many others in Baltimore) were livid at the NFL for not only allowing their team to leave but also denying them the opportunity to rejoin the league. Add in a baseball strike in 1994, and the perfect storm was created for Baltimore sports fans to embrace something new. Baltimore was ready to welcome their new football team – albeit a team that played a different kind of football than they were used to and against teams from places like Saskatchewan and Winnipeg instead of New York and Miami.

    The team was unveiled as the Baltimore Colts. When the NFL initially pushed back on the moniker saying it would create confusion, the team added “CFL” to its name to become the Baltimore CFL Colts. “I was elated they were called the Baltimore CFL Colts as were thousands in Baltimore. Of course, the NFL ruined that as well,” says Doug. The NFL filed a court injunction to prevent any use of the name Colts by the CFL team.

    Doug attended every preseason and regular season game at Memorial Stadium. The first preseason game in Baltimore in 1994 against Winnipeg was played in “typical Maryland weather for the time…hot and humid,” he recalls. The CFL game was different, of course. “It was wild trying to figure out the rules.”

    Baltimore CFL fans were known to travel well. I remember seeing many Baltimore fans at Ivor Wynne Stadium when they played the Tiger-Cats. Turns out Doug was at the game, too. He also made the trip to Toronto to see Baltimore’s CFL debut. He recalls an amusing moment when an Argo fan at the SkyDome was yelling that the “Colts” name belonged to Indianapolis. “I said, well let’s call them the Baltimore Roughriders and you’ll have three teams with the same name. Yeah I was aware of the Roughriders and the Rough Riders…just American humour.”

    Baltimore fans at Ivor Wynne Stadium in Hamilton. Photo: Doug Phillips

    I asked him if he had a favourite player. Always a tough question, I suppose. “I cannot designate a favourite. The team was all over Baltimore at various functions and rallies. They were so kind to all the fans,” he tells me before listing off some great names. “My favourites if I had to single some out were Tracy Ham, Iggy (Donald Igwebuike) in ’94, Carlos Huerto in ’95, Mike Pringle, Shar Pourdonesh, Neil “Big Country” Forte, and Elfrid Payton.”

    Doug was a member of a group called the Special Teamers. They were a fan support group for the team. After Baltimore won the Grey Cup in 1995, owner Jim Speros allowed a few of the Special Teamers to actually take the Grey Cup trophy home for a few days. Doug proudly shared with me photos of him and the Grey Cup.

    Doug Phillips and the Grey Cup
    Doug Phillips and the Grey Cup. Photo: Doug Phillips
    Doug Phillips and his mother with the Grey Cup
    Doug Phillips and his mother with the Grey Cup. Photo: Doug Phillips

    Doug told me another story that I found absolutely fascinating. In 1975, his father bought him and his mother season tickets for the Baltimore Colts. The Colts started off 1-4. On November 2nd of that year in a game against Cleveland a fan (after a few beers) got up and started spelling C-O-L-T-S by contorting his body to fit the letters. His name was Len Burrier and he became a Baltimore legend known as The Big Wheel.

    Len Burrier did the cheers until the Colts moved to Indianapolis. But in 1994 he started the cheer up again and performed the famous C-O-L-T-S at CFL games. If you watch vintage CFL games played in Baltimore you will hear the C-O-L-T-S cheer amongst the crowd at Memorial Stadium. In 1995, once the team was officially branded as the Stallions, Burrier lead the Baltimore crowd into an S-T-A-L-L-I-O-N-S cheer.

    When the Hamilton Tiger-Cats travelled to Baltimore, Doug reached out to Ti-Cat fans and set up a tailgate party for them. It was here that he introduced Len “The Big Wheel” Burrier to Paul Weiler, who at the time played Pigskin Pete, the iconic Hamilton cheerleader who led Tiger-Cat fans in the famous Oskee Wee Wee cheer. It was a meeting of two cheerleading legends.

    Pigskin Pete and the Big Wheel
    Pigskin Pete (Paul Weiler) and the Big Wheel (Len Burrier) at a tailgate party in Baltimore. Photo: Doug Phillips

    It’s been over thirty years since the CFL Colts/Stallions came and went. “There are a number of folks that remember the Stallions fondly. Sadly, over time it will be a footnote,” he admits. But for those two years, the CFL was embraced by the good people of Baltimore. I am glad the CFL gave them their football fix even if was too brief. And I’m glad football fans like Doug Phillips were able to experience something special and be a part of Canadian football history.

    Thanks, Doug, for sharing your story.

    Do you have your own CFL story (e.g., your first game, meeting a player, a Grey Cup memory, etc.) you would like to share? If so, please reach out.

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