Roughriders extend contracts of O'Day and Dickenson
Now face daunting task of re-signing players to paycuts
The Saskatchewan Roughriders have their football operations department set — now all they need are players.
The Roughriders announced Monday that the contracts of vice president of football operations Jeremy O'Day and head coach Craig Dickenson have been extended through the 2023 CFL season.
Dickenson has also retained his entire coaching staff with the exception of one — running backs coach Tim Prinsen.
O'Day and Dickenson will have a daunting task in front of them.
They would like as many players as possible back from the 2019 roster, but their pending free agent list is 28 players long — not including three players who opted of their contracts this summer: linebacker Cameron Judge, punter Jon Ryan and kicker Brett Lauther. The Roughriders still retain those players' rights.
The chore of re-signing players has been made even more difficult, because O'Day will be asking all of them to take pay cuts.
"They're going to have to understand our environment." said O'Day.
"Those discussions have been going very well and we will be looking to the next coming weeks before we start having some announcements."
O'Day has been given his marching orders from team president Craig Reynolds. He has been told to work with less.
"I don't think that's a terrible ask from our organization to ask us to do that, with the impact the pandemic has had on our organization," O'Day said.
The CFL's salary cap dictates a floor and a ceiling for what teams can spend on players.
O'Day said the Riders will be somewhere in the middle and that their top priority will be to re-sign quarterback Cody Fajardo, who has yet to play a game under his current contract.
The Roughriders' football operations department is working on the assumption the 2021 season will start on schedule in June.