‘It was kind of more normal’: O’Day looks back at his off-season

Saskatchewan Roughriders general manager Jeremy O’Day has been generally managing his time well this CFL off-season.

Speaking with Jamie Nye and Drew Remenda on the Green Zone on Friday, O’Day said he has definitely noticed the shorter-than-normal off-season. The 2021 regular season went into December instead of ending in November as it usually does.

“You could tell, in particular going into free agency, that the amount of time was reduced,” O’Day said. “But it was kind of more normal, which was nice after coming off the last couple of years of having some uncertainty and going through lots of meetings on what was going to happen with the season.

“It’s nice to get back and have some normalcy, even going to the regional combines (and) the main combine. Then in the next month or so, we’ll be getting out to do some free-agent camps.

“It’s nice to be back out doing some normal things.”

O’Day took over as the team’s GM in January of 2019 after Chris Jones left for the NFL, but the former Roughriders offensive lineman has worked in Saskatchewan’s front office since 2011 following his retirement as a player. That means O’Day is well aware that when the games end, his work isn’t done.

“The off-season is really our season in personnel,” he said. “At the end of the season, everyone thinks there’s time for a break. I would say that’s the case for the players and, in some cases, the coaches, but the people who are in personnel, that’s where it really takes off. You’re trying to start shaping your roster almost immediately after the season is over and starting to evaluate the players.

“When you get close to training camp, when your roster’s pretty much set, you’ll always have some surprises that happen late that you maybe weren’t expecting, but the heavy lifting is done prior to training camp.”

O’Day knows he can face some curveballs in the early days of camp — players may not arrive in time or may decide to retire instead of reporting — but he says his workload tapers down as training camp begins.

Before that happens, though, he has the CFL draft for which to prepare and league meetings to attend. O’Day participated in those meetings last week, when possible rule changes were bandied about.

“The focus is just trying to make our three-down football as exciting as possible and obviously (there were) lots of conversations about trying to create excitement,” he said. “That was kind of the gist of the meeting.”

More meetings will be held before any potential rule changes are finalized, but the league already has nixed the idea of moving to four downs.

One thing O’Day doesn’t expect to address anytime soon is a contract extension for quarterback Cody Fajardo.

The Roughriders and Fajardo agreed to restructure the QB’s deal this off-season, but he’s going into the final season of his contract.

“We’re not in discussions on an extension at the current time,” O’Day said. “Obviously, there would be an appropriate time for us to do that.

“But it’s more of a situation where there’s a new collective bargaining agreement coming up, we thought it was in the best interests of both parties that we would just restructure the contract, move some things around with his, help us a little bit on the salary cap and then let’s revisit it when the time’s right.

“We certainly feel good about Cody as our quarterback and hopefully he feels the same way about being here still, which I believe is the case.”