By Rod Pedersen,
CFL.ca
From Assiniboia to Zenon Park, Saskatchewan, the Grey Cup trophy is racking up the prairie miles this CFL off-season.
The Saskatchewan Roughriders snapped an 18-year championship drought, the CFL’s longest, with a 23-19 win over Winnipeg in the Grey Cup game in November at Rogers Centre.
The celebration back home still hasn’t stopped.
“Virtually from Day 1 after we stepped off that flight home from Toronto, the Grey Cup has been active every moment of everyday,” said Roughriders marketing director Steve Mazurak (pictured). “I reckon between four and five individual visits per day. I wish I was that Cup sometimes because it has some stories. Too many maybe because the old girl’s getting a little beat up and needs to be back at the Hall of Fame February 2.”
To date, the Cup has already made over 300 community appearances including special “Grey Cup Nights” at games of all five of the province’s WHL teams as well as shopping mall visits, Christmas parties, school and church events and dinner parties across Saskatchewan. It’s making the journey zipped inside a Reebok hockey bag.
“We’ve got a wonderful team that’s booking the visits but for every one community or school that we say ‘yes’ to, there’s at least 100 more that we have to say ‘no’ to so it’s a bittersweet exercise. But it’s everyone’s Cup and we’re doing our best to get it to all four corners of the province and everywhere in between.”
Crazy Cup stories? How about the day of the Riders’ Grey Cup parade itself?
In bone chilling -40 degree temperatures several Rider players were somehow left behind at the Provincial Legislature. They started to walk back to Mosaic Stadium with the Cup hoping to thumb a ride. Passers-by only honked their horns and gave the players a “thumbs-up” in return and left them to shiver on the side of the road!
Finally, a city transit bus pulled over and the driver asked the players if they needed a ride. He couldn’t believe his good fortune in rescuing the Riders and took them all back to the bus garage where they gladly spent the afternoon signing autographs. The driver then drove the players to the stadium.
Roughrider staff say the most popular line from fans when they first see the Grey Cup is “is that really it?” The second most common statement is, “it’s lighter than it looks.”
One amazed fan at an appearance at a furniture store said, “I’d love to drink from it but I can only imagine what’s been in there!” Try babies, kittens, small dogs and several beverages.
“We only have the Cup for 45 days and we have 20 players who live here year-round and we try to get them the Cup for at least a day,” reported Mazurak.
The zaniest player story could be Rider fullback Neal Hughes who booked the Cup for Christmas Eve just so he could wake up in bed with the trophy Christmas morning!
“It’s been to just about every type of function,” said Mazurak. “Today it started at a networking breakfast meeting, then the Pioneer Village retirement home, then another school after lunch and the Roughrider Alumni will have it for a function this evening. We’re trying to get it out to everyone across the province. The ‘S’ stands for Saskatchewan, and this team and championship belongs to Saskatchewan.”
Rod Pedersen is the Voice of the Saskatchewan Roughriders and Regina correspondent on The Score. Check out his daily blog at www.rodpedersen.com.
(The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily of the Canadian Football League)
