FIFA Women's rankings:
1) USA
2) England
3) Germany
4) Canada
5) France

And so the story begins. Will it have the Doug Flutie or Vince Ferragamo ending? Will people buy the shirt or reject it. Will ratings increase beyond one game? Will the US media keep following this story? Stay tuned!


https://i.imgur.com/8xYZhoP.jpg
Photo courtesy cfl.ca

Very good showing for the 'non-soccer playing' nations.

Here's hoping he can perform. I imagine there will be an adjustment period, but I believe he's sincere in his desire to commit to the game and play at a high level. I expect a good competition between him and Masoli.

I understand he has spoken to Doug Flutie and if he takes his advice Johnny Football's future will have a happy ending. Coach Jones previously was effusive with his praise so he's likely going to get a shot when he's deemed to be ready.

Earlier I used Vince Ferragamo as an example of how things might turn out, perhaps I should have used another Vince, Vince Young.

Sticking to the raison d'etre of this thread, I am wondering what this will mean to the Hamilton football fan, are they going to buy into this? Are they going to buy jerseys and newspapers etc, will any folks down the road in Toronto pick up on this. I understand the press conference was packed.

Johnny Manziel: ‘I’ve decided to sign with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats’
Drew Edwards 3downnation May 19, 2018

According to his Twitter, Johnny Manziel has signed with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.

https://i.imgur.com/s79ddsP.png

“I’m here today to make a big announcement for my life. I’m formally signing in the CFL. I’ve decided to sign with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. I’ll be up here for what looks like 2 years I’m getting back to playing ball that’s what it comes down to. it’s what I’ve missed doing,” Manziel said in a video posted to Twitter.

“I’m somewhere, I don’t even know where, on the Canadian border trying to figure this whole thing out and figure out I guess how to play football in Canada. Big day for me. I’m no longer unemployed and I’m happy about it.”

https://twitter.com/barstoolsports/s...50809131008′

Also included in Manziel’s Twitter announcement was a new partnership with Barstool Sports that will include a “Comeback Season” podcast.

This guy has 2.2 million Twitter followers, not sure how that will benefit the Ti-Cats or league but I don't think it can hurt.

My main question for the CFL folks would be: What's the best outcome for the Manziel experiment in Hamilton?

How does the CFL look if he's able to step onto a team on Day 1 and completely dominate? If he doesn't do well and crashes out, does that say anything about the quality of the league? I'm assuming there needs to be some balance between the CFL being a good league and Manziel doing well in his own right. It wouldn't look good to fresh American eyes if he was able to step in and throw 4 TDs a game and make the league look weak by comparison, at least IMO. I'm guessing the CFL needs to balance providing a good environment for Manziel to do well in while also proving that it's a strong league comparatively to the NFL. Curious what the best case scenario is here from an exposure standpoint.

Yeah, the other outlier in the Women's Top 10 is North Korea - the rest of the countries that Canada is ahead of are pretty standard countries to see near the top (Australia, Brazil, Sweden, Japan, etc.)

That's a good point, I hadn't thought of that. Yes I'd like him to be successful so as to attract attention, but I wouldn't want him to dominate, nor do I think he will. I find the talent gap between quarterbacks in the CFL seems to be smaller than it is in the NFL, bu I'd like him to be in the top tier somewhere. If he can play like a Bo Levi Mitchell, I think that'll be just fine.

I guess my question may be answered, they're selling.

To succeed, Johnny Manziel must fully embrace his CFL reality
Drew Edwards 3Downnation May 20, 2018

The Ticats are certainly on board. There were No. 2 Manziel jerseys hanging in the team store at Tim Horton's Field before the press conference was over and almost two dozen were sold in just the first few hours.

https://i.imgur.com/M1wSPDj.png

I can't think of anyone who has "dominated" to the point of embarrassing the league or it's teams. Doug Flutie would be the best example of anyone coming anywhere near that and he has been about the best ambassador the league has ever had (save Pinner)

He has stated on numerous occasions how much he loved the league and would have kept going, but he had to prove to himself he could get the NFL monkey off his back and succeed there. And of course the money doesn't hurt but at that time he probably had a personal services contract and was making big money anyway.

All Manziel has to do is do exactly what Flutie did, learn to love football again, make a career in the CFL, and then let the chips fall where they may.

‘You couldn’t tell me winning a Super Bowl would feel any nicer’
Doug Flutie Sports Illustrated Monday Morning Quarterback June 24, 2014

I miss playing in the CFL, no doubt about it. Boy, it was a lot of fun. People in America have no clue what goes on up there, or about the quality of football we had. That’s what made the experience for me. Most of the guys were NFL-caliber talent, but were undersized or just didn’t fit the mold in one way or another.

...

Has any big name American import torn up the CFL like he was playing against a bunch of amateurs? I can't recall that happening
Ever.

Ironically, at one point I thought that might have been the Wunderkind Jesse Lumsden, but injuries derailed that, plus he wasn't American.

But to answer the question, I'm quite sure it has never happened.

Has there been any/many "big name American imports" who joined the CFL without having busted or been washed-up in the NFL first?

And of the best players in the CFL today, how many couldn't make the NFL?

Vince Ferragamo. Pretty loaded question (by design I assume). Why would anyone leave somewhere where they were successful, if not for more money which since the advent of large US TV contracts in the 70s, the CFL can't match. We don't have 300 million people to provide unreal ad revenue.

The only other way was a personal services contract which some stars had before the advent of the salary cap.

How about we rephrase that in a fair way instead of your biased anti CFL way (again by design)?

If you weren't so virulently anti CFL you might have asked how many players have gone from the CFL to the NFL? And just to rub it in how many USports players are now getting invited to NFL camps. I don't think the NFL would bother with shitty Canadian players if there wasn't some degree of talent, don't you think?

Raghib Ismail finished second for the Heisman and chose the Argos over the NFL. He was hardly washed up. Ismail was great but he did not look like Ronaldo playing with a bunch of kids. Or even the Vegas Golden Knights in the 2018 NHL.

Other NFLers have come the CFL in their prime for reasons unrelated to performance like legal issues etc.

Some have been good some not so good. None have totally dominated.

I had to Google who Manziel was. I'm a big football fan but had never heard of him.