Fajardo believes CFL players want to feel more valued; team staying sharp

Cody Fajardo knows firsthand that when you come up to play in the CFL in your first year, it doesn’t leave a lot in your pocket.

“It was hard. My first year up here in 2015, I came up halfway through the season and I was on the practice squad in Toronto. After transferring (salary) over (to American dollars), I went home with $2,000 in my bank account,” the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ quarterback said Tuesday after a player-led workout at SMF Field in Saskatoon.

“It’s frustrating (not playing right now). The guys just want to feel valued. I’ve been in this league where I’ve made the minimum and it’s hard to make a living on that.”

The players are currently on Day 3 of the first players’ strike since 1974. The Roughriders have cancelled all training-camp practices in Saskatoon until further notice.

The CFL and CFLPA weren’t able to get a new collective bargaining agreement in place ahead of Sunday’s deadline.

Fajardo said there are a lot of factors that go into a person’s contract, such as inflation.

“I think it gets overlooked sometimes that if things are drastically changing in the economics of the world, we should be drastically changing as well in our contracts,” Fajardo said.

While Fajardo has one of the more lucrative contracts in the CFL and agreed to restructure it earlier in the off-season, he said he’s participating in the strike to help future CFL players.

“I’m doing this to help guys for the next five, 10 years because I know when I was a rookie and not making very good money, it was tough on me and my family,” Fajardo said.

“The CFL is a great game (and) we have a lot of incredible talent up here … We’re very blessed to play in the Canadian Football League. Like I’ve said multiple times, if there was no CFL, I wouldn’t be playing football.

“We just want to feel valued in the sense our young guys and our rookies can come up here, leave their families at home and feel like they can put food on the table for their family.”

For now, Fajardo and other Riders are getting together to hold practices and walkthroughs where and when they can, such as the one they did at SMF Field on Tuesday morning.

“What I like most about this is it’s a low-pressure situation — nobody is yelling at you and we got a lot of reps (in). We got the full turnout, every guy on offence came, and that just comes from a group text message,” Fajardo said.

“What I like is guys can ask questions. You don’t have to feel like you have to do everything perfect because no one is riding you. You can just be like, ‘Hey, I’ve got a question,’ and you can slow the drill down and it’s very beneficial.

“I know if I was a young guy, I would love to have this before camp just because this gives you a kind of flow into training camp.”

Fajardo also believes things could get figured out on the labour front sooner rather than later.

“We just have a couple more things,” Fajardo said. “I don’t think we’re too far off. I think we will get a deal done here soon but honestly we just want to play some football and every year it has been something since 2019 and guys just want to get out and have a full year.”

But for now his message to the fans is to stay patient.

“I’ve seen these happen year to year and things happen really quickly. We want to play but we want to be valued,” Fajardo said. “We appreciate the fans who have supported us, we appreciate you guys and we just want to play some football. When we do get back on the field, I think everyone is going to forget about this.”