Dear Toronto, A Message to You Rudie

Dear Toronto,

I am writing you over a matter that concerns you directly. It comes from the heart of a Hamilton Tigercat fan, and if from that perspective alone, I might well have let sleeping dogs do their thing. But I am also a proud Torontonian. I live this city. I breathe it. I cough out its flegm in the mornings, I savour its sensations in my every step, and I sleep in short spells lost in dreams about it. I believe in this place and its people. And its this faith and passion in Toronto, that compels me to reach out to you now.

Something very strange happened this weekend. OK alot of strange things happened. Our mayor has been evicted, more people were talking Argos than Maple Leafs, and there was a horse inside the lobby of the Royal York hotel.

Canada celebrated its one of its longest standing traditions, with the 100th Grey Cup, here in the self-established centre of the universe, Toronto. It was always going to be a big deal for CFL fans from coast to coast, some 40,000 folks from Halifax to Vancouver (and even some from Baltimore) who annually make the trek across our vast expanse of Tundra to get together and jam down many beers in celebration of their favourite game. I'm amongst that set. I had my ticket since the spring. But I didnt really expect much beyond that. Toronto hosted the game back in 2007 and it was easily the worst Grey Cup I had ever attended. Poorly executed, and lost in the comings and goings of the worlds greatest little city, the sellout crowd at the SkyDome (sorry Ted, you dont get my naming rights for 30 million dollars when we the taxpayer shelled out exponentially more to build the SKYDOME) couldn't help but feel that this game would have been alot better, ANYWHERE else. I'd have put Baghdad on that list.

Now it was never going to be that bad this time. It WAS the 100th Grey Cup. Too important a thing to be left to the lingering downsides to its surroundings, this was always going to be SOMETHING. But then some shit went down. First, a bunch of millionaires and billionaires decided that their pie was unfairly sliced. They took their bickering over who gets the Cherry's and whose stuck with the crust into an NHL lockout, robbing fans of their game, sports networks of their content, and breweries of their most coveted months of beer sales.

Then, as luck, and a conspicuously dropped pass in the endzone in the Eastern Final, would have it, the Argos did the impossible, upsetting the Als and got themselves into the game they were hosting. Its been awhile since this market has had something to cheer about. The NHL strike changed nothing insofar as a Leafs playoff run, the Jays haven't been to the playoffs since Joe Carter, The Raptors might have a tough night against an NCAA squad, and TFC might just be the worst franchise in pro sports. It has been a liesurely stroll through the Sahara Desert for Toronto sports fans. FINALLY, this nearly unknown group of players did what no one else could do in this town. WIN.

It also didnt hurt that the CFL finally got its shit together and joined the 21st Century. I have been harping on this for years, even putting it in front of Tigercats President Scott Mitchell last year. Why were we not producing legacy films ala NFL Films? Why were we not getting latched on to Madden games, when it would cost next to nothing to gain access to it? Then as if on cue, TSN produced the absolutely captivating Engraved On A Nation series and Mark Cohon announced we were close to having CFL content on future versions of Madden. I didnt need the credit. I was just happy to see it happening.

Finally, after 2 days of golfing weather, Grey Cup weekend arrived, with a 20 degree drop in temperature and it was officially football time. Nobody likes cold the way CFL fans like cold. For just about everyone who lives outside of Southern Ontario, the COLD defines our lives in a much more intrinsic way than our careers, our homes or our flags. Its not the Grey Cup without banding together like a bunch of idiots, drinking ourselves numb and screaming away the sensation of our bloodflow grinding to a halt.

It was the perfect storm. For the first time I can remember, people were talking CFL football in this town. There was genine interest. Genuine excitement. At long last Toronto had caught on to what the rest of the country has known for years. Game On!


I spent Saturday night at the Wreckers Ball, the Tigercats party in the Metro Convention Centre. Spent the night drinking and dancing with the players and their wives from the 1999 Grey Cup Champion Tiger Cats. If Danny McManus had the feet of his wife when she's fired up on booze and music, he might never have been sacked his entire career. I got to wear Andrew Grigg's Championship ring. Rubbed shoulders with the fastest man in the CFL, Chris Williams. Gave GM Bob Obilovich shit for the haggard state of affairs on the defensive side of our team. Spent 10 minutes talking transit, wine lists and the temporary home for the Ticats in Guelph with team owner Bob Young. WHERE ELSE DOES THIS HAPPEN? I'd enjoy dancing with Giselle, but I'm not holding my breath on the chance to dance with Tom Brady's better half. But here in the CFL the legends of the game and their spouses get why its a big deal to get down with the little people. To evoke the ghost of the late Rick James, "Its a celebration bitches!" The CFL is like nothing else on the planet. And its ours.

Now sorry to veer off a bit Toronto, because none of this is that truly STRANGE thing that went down. That eerie sense of trouble that has me so concerned.

What worries me, what genuinely frightens me, is that while the home crowd screamed on their suddenly beloved Argos to victory, at home in the biggest game of games....almost no one clad in the colors of the visiting teams, could be heard jeering against those arrogant clowns from Toronto. In fact most clad in Rider green, BC orange, Edmonton green, Winnipeg Blue and Montreal red were openly cheering on the double blue. Aside from the Stamps fans and most (but frighteningly not all) Ticat fans, nearly the whole park was cheering on Toronto.

WHAT THE FUCK?

Toronto, what happened to us? That hogtown swaggar. That strut that evoked our place as centre of the universe. That persona that called forth so much bitter resentment and jealousy from the rest of the nation. Where did it go? I remember those days. The afforementioned Engragraved on a Nation series highlighted it on their film on the 1971 Argos, featuring the likes of Joe Thiesman, Gene Mack and Leon Mcquay. Playboys the lot of them. The most hated team in the country. Hating on Toronto has long been this country's national sport yet, here we were in the midst of a 50,000 strong pity party.

Have we been so bad for so long that Canadians actually feel sorry for us? Have we been embaressed by one two many batshit crazy mayors that we are now the laughing stock rather than the leaders of men? I mean Mel calling in the army for snow removal was one thing, but maybe Rob Ford has taken it to a place no one could have imagined ridiculous could go.

The good news is maybe this very strange weekend gives us our way back. We are winners again. Not the winners I would have wanted (go Cats go) nor the winners most of you would have wanted (happiness and fulfilment will always reside in Lord Stanley's return to Yonge St), but they are WINNERS. Soak that in. Live it. Breathe it. Tastes fucking good. And that hemoraging butt-wound of a mayor can go back to coaching the Don Boscoe team tomorrow, minus the TTC escort of course. Maybe we are on the way back Toronto.

But one thing is clear. We gotta be rude. We gotta be reckless. We gotta be Sinatra at the opera. We gotta be the best. We may have been asleep at the wheel there for a stretch, but this is who we are. May the rest of country get back to sipping on the Hater-aid.

A message to you rudie.

Jess Koncz

Good Night Ivor Wynne Stadium

Saturday was the last time I ever walked through Ivor Wynne Stadium.

I haven't been contributing to the Red Devil Blog for quite some time. That's mostly to do with the fact I have had the most engaging six months in my adult life, both personally and professionally, and with all of that living, there's been precious little time for reflecting. Its reflection after all, what spawns our uniquely human desire for expression. I've managed to keep the Red Devil meme alive through the world of Twitter, which has been a surprisingly valuable tool in keeping a pulse, but this project has always been about long-winded exploration of passions, and getting back to that remains on the horizon. On the horizon because this is not a Red Devil piece. Its a quivering mound of sentimental pudding that I posted on facebook for the benefit of some loved ones. It was only due to the persistant response of those who read it, and the way they shared it to others, that I decided it was only fair to have a proper publication, however innappropriate to the only forum I have to do so. You've been warned.

 Here we are. The end of an era for a community, a club, a family and for myself. Its difficult to overstate the importance this building has had in my life.

Dad and I have been season ticket holders for 3 decades. When I moved to Guelph...then Toronto...no matter how far apart our lives became, 9 weeks a year I can count on sharing time with my old man. That's pretty sacred shit. He is equal parts my hero, my best friend, my teacher and my inspiration. A younger me used to resent his CONSTANT positivity. His unending belief in the fact that things would be better than alright, but exactly as they should be, used to drive me insane. That is before I somehow fell ass backwards into seeing this in its infinite wisdom. And now here I am, annoying the shit out of those I love with the KNOWLEDGE that everything will be alright. I believe in my friends because he believed in me. If I ever con some poor woman into bearing my children this silly process will continue. Onward and upward.

First and foremost this building is about family.

Family and this club are inseperable. My uncle Dennis worked as a vendor at Ivor Wynne when I was a pup. Probably the coolest thing I ever recieved at Christmas, was a signed ball from the 86 Championship team. Every player signed that ball, and that happened because of family. My dad had been going to games since he was a pup. He saw the Golden Era years of the Mosca generation live and in person...hopping over fences and drunk as fuck. Relating to my dad as a young adult, seeing him as he might have been when he was my age...for the first time I began to see that the stupid shit of youth wasn't a sign of incompetance....but of success to come. If my dad was who he was today coming from places I knew so well...Jesus H Christmas I might just be alright after all.

When I played as a kid, where other kids imagined they were Joe Montana in the Super Bowl, I was Mike Kerrigan. I was Pete Giftopolous. I never hoisted the Lombardi on those grasslots, it was always The Grey Cup, won at home at Ivor Wynne.

My 19th birthday was there. It was the home opener. We DESTROYED our opponents. I remember (through the fog of 19 year old birthday haze) running down to the bench to high five Joe Montford and thank him for making my birthday. Later my boys shared a cigar with my dad in a peeler bar, laughing at me while my ass was whipped 19 times on stage.

In 1996 I saw my first Grey Cup there. It was amongst the greatest football games I have ever seen. A snow bowl. With 90 some total points scored. We sat beside the entire Argos office staff...That got heated. Some Simcoe boys were in front of us...hoodies stocked with mickeys of whiskey that were shared in short order.

Two years later Ozzy kicked the greatest game winning kick I have ever seen in the Eastern Final. Over 50 into the blow. It was impossible. I couldnt watch. My head was buried into Dad's chest and in the last second I looked up, saw the ball sail through and ensued a moment so charged with life, with happiness...I don't know that I've ever been quite so excited in my entire life.

A decade of futility has followed. But that just further evokes the passion. Here we remain. Day in day out, the most committed of believers. Here is my religion. My faith. My hope. That in spite of all the setbacks, the weakness, the insecurities...that our day will come. It will be glorious.
I am who I am because of this park. My unflinching loyalty. My passion. My persistance. Its all rooted here.

Now days I see the park from an entirely different view. I spend time with the team President. I meet the coaching staff. Drink in the alumni lounge. I see the place through the eye of a grown man. Its been a strange evolution. But so has my life. It seems even in my recent growth, so grown has my rellationship with my club. Today still a reflection of my very existance.

I love everything about this place. I love its rusty core. I love we make noise ratthling the tin press box. I love that the visitors dressing room has no hot water. Welcome to the jungle. It is so fucking Hamilton it borders on surreal.

Gameday decended upon the city as the rains decended upon the grounds. What a perfect manifestation of the collective sadness in our hearts. I'd think it self-indulgent and absurd if not for the fact that the past months of my life have seen a bizzare set of physical manifestations, both in the positive and the negative. Skeptic I may be I cannot discount the idea our hearts do not manifest in the physical world. I might have to go back to Leonard & Murphy's "Future Of The Body" if this keeps up.

Before kickoff we honoured the Alltime Tigercat Team. The best in their position over the clubs history. Sharing this day with Danny Mac, Troy Davis, Earl Winfield, Rocky DiPietro, Garney Henley, Grover Convington, Paul Osbaldiston and company was the whiskey. That magical poncho of warmth that rendered the rains into irrelevance.

And what a dance our boys gave the old lady. We knocked 2 quarterbacks out of the game. A defence that single handedly cost us a playoff birth, for one afternoon, channelled the ghosts of Mosca, Barrow, Montford, Hitchcock, Schelling, O'Shea, Tiggle, Browne & Zambiasi. And while the rain unleashed its discomfort, the crowd rose above. The 13th man was every bit a force, with noise disrupting no less than half a dozen Bomber snaps. It was loud, hard nosed Hamilton football. Everything this theatre had spent 80 years delivering to the hungry blue collar generations that poured through the turnstyles.

The final whisatle gave way to a thunderous ovation, and as if on cue, the clouds parted, the rains ceased and for the next hour, the sun snuck out for a gander. Again. Perfect.

I had never felt such a somber exit from such a fantastic win.

We shared our goodbyes to our season seat neighbors. Four families that have shared a patch for 2 decades. While the rest of the clan made their way to the car, Dad and I walked the grounds one final time in complete silence. We left alot of shit behind here. Alot. More than a silly essay could convey. More than we could verbalize to each other.

Its just a building right? There'll be a next one.

Tell that to anyone whose ever lost themselves in this place. Something very unique is being lost. We grow, we progress, we build families, but we never, ever replace our first true love. Some things are only done once.

Saturday everything changed. And that's life...so great, Ivor Wynne has one last lesson for me. But it doesn't mean I have to like it.

Good night rust bucket. You've been a thing.