CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie not thrilled by "embarrassing" comments of kickers, dismisses effect of rule changes

CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie was not backing down from his idea of using micro-chipped balls for the league going forward, even though kickers complained about it and the rule was eventually made non-mandatory. Before this season, balls with microchips were mandated for use by kickers, which has now been reversed.

But Randy Ambrosie did not like comments some kickers had made or supported regarding the initial rule. Sergio Castillo of Winnipeg had complained after their season-opening loss that his accuracy was dropping because of the micro-chipped balls and was fined $250 for his troubles. Ottawa’s Lewis Ward and B.C.’s Sean Whyte agreed with their Bomber colleague on social media and were also deducted undisclosed amounts.

Explaining his reasoning behind these fines despite reversing the rule, Randy Ambrosie said,

“I don’t think anyone wants to be in a situation where we’re embarrassing each other. That doesn’t help the relationship, it doesn’t make us better partners. I’d like to stay away from the ‘let’s try to embarrass each other’ stuff and focus on ‘let’s get stuff done together.'”

He credited back-tracking on the rule as down to letters he received from Brian Ramsay, CFL Players’ Association executive director, Wade Miller, Bombers President and CEO, and Craig Reynolds, Riders President and CEO.

Randy Ambrosie says CFL likely to have micro-chipped balls eventually

Downplaying the effect of the rule change, Randy Ambrosie said it was making the game better and is likely to be introduced again when it does not distract from player performance. The CFL Commissioner added,

“I think it’s about change and you have to do change the right way. In this particular case, I think the intentions were good. What we know for sure is the technology that we have introduced is going to make our game better. It’s going to make the game more appealing to a new generation of fans. We should want all of that we can get, but we don’t want to take away from player performance.”

The micro-chipped balls are helping bring augmented live streams to users. The Sports Business Journal reported,

"Viewers will 'see locators to help them find the ball carrier and a timer that will indicate the length of time it takes a quarterback to get a pass off' as well as calculations for 'how fast a player ran on a play.'"

It seems like Randy Ambrosie is making sure that the CFL is listening to the kickers for the moment while making sure that they are prepared to embrace it when it eventually happens in the longer term.