MADANI: ALOUETTES EYEING MACIOCIA AND REED FOR MGMT POSITIONS

By Arash Madani
Sportsnet.ca

If Andrew Wetenhall gets his way, the Montreal Alouettes will structure their football operations in three tiers, similar to an NHL team, yet ownership will make all the hires.

Sources tell Sportsnet that the Alouettes want to devise a model that will include a head coach, general manager and president of football operations.

The Als have had lengthy talks with Kavis Reed about potentially being their new general manager, devising a hierarchy that would keep Jacques Chapdelaine as head coach – but add a president of football operations, that the organization hopes will be Danny Maciocia. The hires of each position would be made by ownership – the Wetenhall family – which opens up concerns on who has final say in football decisions, such as trades and making draft picks.

Because ownership would be hiring all three titles, there remain questions of who has the power in the organization.

Chapdelaine and Reed worked together last season in Montreal – and Reed remained Chapdelaine’s special teams coordinator when the Als went 4-2 down the stretch. The pair teaming together appears to be a marriage of convenience: Chapdelaine believing he’ll have more control on the roster and football operations; Reed getting the GM title, and securing employment for at least two seasons beginning in 2017.

Sources said the Wetenhall’s have been enamored with Reed for quite sometime, even though he has no prior experience as a general manager. Reed represented the Alouettes at league meetings in Winnipeg earlier this week.

Conversations are continuing between Alouettes ownership and Maciocia, who is still the head coach at the University of Montreal.