OUT OF THE TUNNEL: REINEBOLD NAILS IT

BY: RODPEDERSEN.COM STAFF

Canada is a football desert right now. Each week we all longingly look south of the border as pandemic football is being played at all levels with varying results. 

Thus we were looking for anything to give this column the Canadian kiss it deserves and a big beautiful CFL coaching veteran gave us a wonderful gift of an interview on The Rod Pedersen Show on Friday.

No one has summed up the many things that are hamstringing a potentially great league than Jeff Reinebold. 3DownNation did a great summary of the interview but two things really stuck out to us here at Out of the Tunnel: one is something we have been banging the drum for quite some time, and the other is something that has been out there and we have witnessed. 

For those unfamiliar with Hamilton Tiger-Cats special teams coordinator Jeff Reinebold, he has been a football lifer at all levels of the game and has been a mainstay in the CFL since the 1990’s. He has coached under NFL Europe legend Jack Bicknell, CFL Hall of Famer Bob O’Billovich and run-and-shoot guru June Jones. He even helps out those in the United Kingdom understand the game as a NFL analyst for Sky Sports

He is outrageous, outspoken and eloquent all at the same time. He has a giant heart and just loves football at all levels.

The first notable point by Reinebold is that fan and player development go hand in hand. To loosely summarize what Reinebold said: the CFL needs to do a better job of getting everyone of every walk of life playing football. We do see it here in Saskatchewan with the work Football Saskatchewan has done with the flag football programs, women’s flag football in high school and the WWCFL, all of the minor football leagues across the province and how almost every high school plays some style of football. The Saskatchewan Roughriders have done a great job helping these leagues to flourish but more needs to be done at a CFL level.

The same type of local involvement is almost nonexistent anywhere else in Canada. This gets us to eliminating CFL International and pouring the money and people hours into jumpstarting football in Canada. This trickles down into better coaching, better players and tens of thousands of new life-long fans.

The other is the structure of the CFL. Right now the league office just guides the CFL along its main tentpole events but the nine teams run as nine different businesses without a centralized organization above them. We have seen this in person, how many teams will layout their three or five year plan and inevitably there is always a line of ‘how do we do this without having to rely on the league office?’. There is also zero hive-mind sharing in the league. 

Once there is a stronger CFL front office, the league as a whole will be stronger.

Also, more Jeff Reinebold is better for all of football.

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As the pandemic continues to be at the forefront of our lives many of us have had to make major changes and decisions for what is best for ourselves and our families. This has impacted many businesses and the CFL may feel the brunt of this when it tries to return to the field.

We say this as Ed Hervey announced this week that he is stepping down as the general manager of the B.C. Lions for personal reasons. This could be a myriad of reasons but he could be the first of many that needs to take the next step forward in their lives and change vocations to support their families.

The CFL will not return to the field until at least early summer of 2021 and this leaves so many coaches, players, football operations and administration staffs without a paycheque or job.

How many will come back? No one knows that answer but what we do know is there are a lot of great people that won’t and a lot of football lifers that are scared that they will never again be able to make some sort of a living doing what they absolutely love.

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As Canada is a football wasteland, the NCAA is surging forward in the face of multiple postponements of games across the United States.

Currently the SEC, ACC, Big12, Sun Belt, American Athletic Conference, CUSA and a few other teams are playing games. This weekend, we get the return of the Big 10 and Mountain West with the Pac 12 and MAC returning the first weekend in November.

These games will look the same as what we have seen over the past month. Stadiums all with varying numbers of fans, strange football, weird scores on both the high end and low end and Vegas not having a clue on how to handle this. 

This also gives us many more Canadians to watch in the NCAA and we will start with a team that is, for some reason, close to our hearts, the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors:

Nick Mardner (Sr.)
Wide Receiver – Hawaii
6’6” 190
Mississauga, Ontario
High school – Clarkson Secondary

If you are looking for the next Chase Claypool, look no further than the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors’ Nick Mardner. The big bodied redshirt sophomore has a ton of time to develop and grow into his 6’6” frame.

As a redshirt freshman in 2019, Mardner played in all 12 games with one start and he made the best of his opportunities. Mardner showed big play ability with two of his five catches going for 50 yards and another for 38 yards with two touchdowns.

Now in his second season Mardner will be in the starting rotation of the Rainbow Warriors offence who’s offensive coordinator is former Saskatchewan Roughrider quarterback G.J. Kinne.

(RODPEDERSEN.COM STAFF/PHOTO: MCGILL ATHLETICS)