After a full season without a working drug policy, the CFL and its players association "have agreed on a new program that will see increased testing of players and stiffer penalties for those caught cheating," according to Paul Friesen of the WINNIPEG SUN. The policy calls for a "significant increase in the number of tests conducted, from just 35% of the number of players in the league to 100%." Players caught using a banned substance will "face two-game suspensions for their first failed test, nine games for a second, one year for a third and a lifetime ban in the event of a fourth." Friesen notes the changes come after "nearly a full year of criticism of the league's toothless former policy from world leaders." Testing "is expected to resume Week 1 of the coming season." But while the CFL and the players are "touting the policy as on par with other North American pro sports leagues, it still falls short of the NFL's four-year ban for first offences." The Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport will "once again oversee the testing." CCES President & CEO Paul Melia said, "In terms of North American professional sports, it's getting close to being on par with the others" (WINNIPEG SUN, 4/22).
HIT TO THE WALLET? In Winnipeg, Paul Wiecek wrote the $1B the NFL has agreed to pay former players as part of its concussion settlement "should be absolutely terrifying to any fan of the CFL, which is currently being sued on multiple fronts by its former players over the same concussion issue." For the CFL, the "scariest part of the NFL’s concussion settlement might be this: it was the NFL, not the players, that fought hardest to get it approved, and it was the NFL, not the players, that was celebrating loudest this week." While $1B "isn't chump change -- even to the NFL -- the feeling in most circles was the NFL got off cheap." Wiecek: "So if a US$1-billion concussion settlement between the NFL and former players is considered cheap, what’s it going to take for the CFL to reach a similar accord?" Even a number approaching the legal fees the former NFL players' lawyers "are demanding would be an existential threat to the CFL." Wiecek noted sooner or later, the CFL "is going to have to reach some kind of settlement," and it is "going to be really expensive" (WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, 4/20).
