Canadian Football League

Canadian Football League
Ligue canadienne de football

Current season	2019
sport	Canadian football
abbreviation	CFL LCF
League foundation	January 17, 1958 in Montreal
Teams	9
Country countries	Canada
Title holder	Toronto Argonauts (7th title)
Record champions	Edmonton Eskimos (11)
Record player	Lui Passlia (408)
Website	cfl.approx

The Canadian Football League ( CFL ; French : Ligue canadienne de football ; German : Canadian Football League ) is a professional sports league in Canada , in which Canadian football is played. The league consists of a total of nine teams : four teams in the Eastern Conference and five teams in the Western Conference . At times they tried to integrate some US teams into the league, but what with the exception of the Baltimore Stallionswas not very successful. The CFL is commonly considered the second best football league in the world after the NFL and is considered the first option for all NCAA players who do not make it into the NFL. The CFL has existed in its current form since 1958.

All CFL games are in Canada on TSN , in the United States on ESPN or ESPN2 and in the UK on BT Sports transmitted. You can also watch the games on the ESPN + streaming service .

The highlight of the season is the playoffs, the final tournament of the best teams in the league for the championship cup , the Gray Cup . The Gray Cup stands for both the championship trophy and the final itself, similar to the Super Bowl in the NFL . The Gray Cup is the most watched annual sporting event in all of Canada . In 2017, the Gray Cup ran on TSN on an average of 4.3 million TVs in Canada. Over the course of the game, 10.6 million people, or 30% of all Canadians , switched to TSN. The most viewed CFL game on ESPN was Johnny Manziel's debut game in 2018, which ran on 406,000 televisions in the US .

Since January 31, 2019, the CFL has entered into a partnership with the German GFL as part of the CFL 2.0 . GFL players can now be drawn by one of the nine teams in the new European format of the annual CFL Draft , the European CFL Draft 2019 . Again, Canadian U Sports and NCAA players will have an easier time playing in the GFL if they fail to make the leap to the NFL or CFL.

history

The first Canadian football teams played in the Canadian Rugby Football Union (CRFU), which was founded in 1884. The CRFU mutated under the name Canadian Rugby Union in 1884 to become the umbrella organization for various leagues. Between the 1930s and 1950s, two of the CRU's minor leagues - the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union from the east and the Western Interprovincial Football Union from the west - developed into professional leagues and together formed the Canadian Football Council , which left the CRU entirely in 1958 and continues acted under the name Canadian Football League .

Meanwhile, the CFL has grown to become the fifth largest sports league in North America and is widely recognized as the second best gridiron football league in the world. In its annual CFL Draft, it draws its players primarily from the NCAA , the Canadian U Sports League and the CJFL , the Canadian Junior Football League . From the 2019 season, players from Mexico will also be drawn in the CFL-LFA Draft and players from Europe in the European CFL Draft 2019 .

In recent years the CFL has attracted attention with a particularly high number of world-famous football players, especially in the USA . These include former players such as Doug Flutie , Johnny Manziel , Michael Sam , Jeff Garcia and Warren Moon , as well as active players such as James Wilder Jr. , Donald de la Haye , Darian Durant , Bo Levi Mitchell , Mike Reilly , Jeremiah Masoli , Trevor Harris , Duron Carter, and Chad Owens . Furthermore, Dwayne Johnson played briefly in 1995 for the Calgary Stampeders .

format

The Gray Cup, CFL championship cup

The regular season begins in mid-June and ends in early November. Each team plays eighteen times in these 21 weeks. A home and away game against each team in the other division, two or three games against a team in your own division. In the middle of the season, there are two game days with only two pairings each. This means that every team has a bye week during the season.

The play-offs begin in November. After the regular season , the leading team in each division is qualified for the division finals. The second-placed team must play against the third-placed team for participation in the division finals. However, if the fourth-placed team in the other division can have a better score, it will take part in the eliminations instead of the third-placed team, which is known as the crossover rule . The two winners of the division finals, the Division Champions , play in the Gray Cup for the Canadian Football League championship.

Teams

team	city	Stadium (-name)	Founded	joined the CFL	Head coach
Eastern Conference
Hamilton Tiger-Cats	Hamilton	Tim Hortons Field	1869	1958	George Cortez
Alouettes de Montréal	Montreal	Stade Percival-Molson	1946	1958 1	Marc Trestman
Ottawa RedBlacks	Ottawa	TD Place Stadium	2010	2014	Jeff Hunt
Toronto Argonauts	Toronto	BMO Field	1873	1958	Scott Milanovich
Western Conference
BC Lions	Vancouver	BC Place Stadium	1954	1958	Mike Benevides
Calgary Stampeders	Calgary	McMahon Stadium	1909	1958	John Hufnagel
Edmonton Eskimos	Edmonton	Commonwealth Stadium	1949	1958	Kavis Reed
Saskatchewan Roughriders	Regina	Mosaic Stadium	1910	1958	Corey Chamblin
Winnipeg Blue Bombers	Winnipeg	IG Field	1930	1958	Tim Burke

¹ Not represented from 1987 to 1995.

Ottawa RedBlacks Toronto Argonauts Montreal Alouettes BC Lions Calgary Stampeders Edmonton Eskimos Winnipeg Blue Bombers Hamilton Tiger-Cats Saskatchewan Roughriders

Former teams

team	city	Years
Ottawa Rough Riders	Ottawa	1958-1996
Ottawa Renegades	Ottawa	2002-2005
Baltimore Stallions	Baltimore	1994-1995
Birmingham Barracudas	Birmingham	1995
Las Vegas Posse	Las Vegas	1994
Memphis Mad Dogs	Memphis	1995
Sacramento Gold Miners	Sacramento	1993-1994
San Antonio Texans	San Antonio	1995
Shreveport Pirates	Shreveport	1994-1995

See also

• CFL Draft 2017

Web links

• Canadian Football League
• CFL vs NFL: Head to Head Game History

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Lui Passaglia battling stage 3 colon cancer. Retrieved February 26, 2017 . 
2. ↑ CFL, CFLPA WORK TOGETHER TO DELIVER SIGNIFICANT ADVANCES TO PLAYER SAFETY. Retrieved October 21, 2018 . 
3. ↑ Five reasons why the CFL needs to scrap the divisions. Retrieved October 21, 2018 . 
4. ↑ HOW THE CROSSOVER WORKS. Retrieved October 21, 2018 .