SPORTS TALK: Command Centre is an embarrassment

By Greg Buchanan

“Embarrassing.” “Bush league.” “Unwatchable.”

All words that are consistently being used regarding CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie's supposed “funnest, fastest, most entertaining football league.” The commissioner can't have it both ways as long as the Command Centre continues to become a bigger part of the game.

The issue is not the product on the field that has become unwatchable, but the half dozen people sitting in Toronto during a CFL game who review plays, rulings, and challenges to the point where we might as well be watching two guys play a video game version of the CFL—if the CFL ever created one. But I want the standard to be what it says in the actual CFL rule book.

The Rule says the following;

"The objective of the replay rule and the Command Centre is to support the on-field staff, increase the overall performance of the officiating, and protect the integrity of the game without causing significant delays to the flow of the game."

"The direction provided to the replay staff is to subject each decision to the developed clear and obvious decision-making process."

Based on these descriptions in the league's rule book, they're failing. Nothing halts the flow of the game more than having an official make a ruling on the field, the ball is set, the clock is blown in, and the Command Centre says to stop the play.

The players throw their hands in the air, the fans ponder if the refs know what they're doing, and on television … click, I'll see what's going on elsewhere.

A league that claims to be fast and exciting but allows the Command Centre so much power to halt play at usually the most crucial juncture of games is counterintuitive to the league's mission statement. If I had it my way, the Ottawa Redblacks would have been the victors.

I don't say this often, but the NFL has it right. In 2019, the NFL tried to do what the CFL continues to do when they allowed challenges on pass interference. It was a failure because they were as inconsistent in review as they were on the field. Yes, there was the one play in the playoffs that the refs missed, but the NFL felt one egregious mistake by the refs was a lot more palatable than the delays and frustration that were becoming a weekly, if not almost game-by-game, problem.

So, they turfed it.

The CFL gives its replay officials even more power to look at other subjective calls, and we saw both defensive pass interference and roughing the passer reviewed and called—things that wouldn't happen in the NFL. The Redblacks would have won that football game if they had the NFL review rules, and I would have been just fine with that.

A few years ago, Ambrosie changed the rules in the CFL in the middle of the season, reducing the amount of challenges and later getting rid of illegal contact on a receiver out of the mix of reviewable plays.

We applauded him.

Now, it's up to Ambrosie to step in again. Immediately. The Command Centre was supposed to be a resource for officials and coaches to utilize to overturn egregious missed calls or overturn scoring plays and turnovers.

Oh, that old Command Centre is no longer a resource.

It's a hindrance, and it's an embarrassment.