The membership of the Canadian Football League Players’ Association has voted to ratify the league’s new collective bargaining agreement, according to a report from TSN’s Farhan Lalji.
3DownNation‘s John Hodge first reported that the CFL and the CFLPA had reached a tentative agreement on a new CBA on Thursday afternoon. That deal was almost immediately put up for a vote by the membership in order to comply with the league’s imposed deadline of midnight ET to ratify their final proposal.
The two sides had previously struck a tentative agreement last week, but that was voted down by the players on Monday. The two primary reasons it was defeated were the proposed changes to the ratio as well as the lack of a ratification bonus.
The new deal includes a ratification bonus worth approximately $1.225 million, up from the $1 million the league offered late Monday evening.
The ratio will remain unchanged in 2022 — as was also the case under last week’s tentative agreement — before allowing two veteran American players to rotate with Canadian starters for up to 49 percent of snaps in 2023.
The league also has the option to increase the number of veteran Americans who can rotate with Canadian starters from two to three in 2024. That was the number originally proposed in the previous agreement.
As a safeguard, the two teams with the most number of snaps played by Canadians in a season will be awarded an additional second-round CFL Draft pick.
The CFL had indicated that if a new deal was not passed by Thursday, the league would stop feeding and housing players. Rejection of the proposed agreement would have resulted in the cancellation of preseason games and the resumption of strike action.
The deal still must be ratified by the CFL’s Board of Governors, but the CFL season is now expected to proceed as normal.
