Somewhere, his football career ruined, Danny Brannagan is doing something else.
Do you remember Danny Brannagan? He was once a star quarterback at the Canadian University level for the Queen’s Golden Gaels.
He began his university career in 2005 and improved every year, culminating in a 2009 Vanier Cup win for Queen’s in which he was named MVP.
Since then it has been downhill all the way. He was signed by the Toronto Argonauts the following year and suffered the shameful fate all Canadian quarterbacks get in the modern day CFL.
Brannagan played in one game against the Montreal Alouettes on November 7. That was the first time a Canadian quarterback took a snap for the Argonauts since Frank Cosentino in 1969.
It was also the first time any Canadian quarterback took a snap for a CFL team since Larry Jusdanis dared ventured on the field for Montreal in 1997.
Needless to say, after that career “highlight”, Brannagan was released by the Argonauts in 2011. He has been out of CFL football ever since.
Not even the rebirth of football in Ottawa, with its glorious memories of legendary Canadian quarterback Russ Jackson, could induce a call of interest and a tryout at a training camp.
Why? Some say that Canadian quarterbacks are far behind their American counterparts when they try out for CFL teams.
If that is so, does that imply that quarterbacks in the CIS are taught irrelevant garbage? Is the Vanier Cup to be belittled because the quarterbacks call “unprofessional” plays that are the equivalent of a local park touch football game?
Or is it that there are some rules in the CFL that put a stigma on all Canadian quarterbacks and do not give them an “equal opportunity” if they try out for a CFL team?
Either way, it is not smart business for the CFL to tell Canadians, the very people they are trying to market its football to, that they can never be good enough to play at the most important position in CFL football. Canadians do not get treated this way in NHL hockey.
Why were Canadians like Jackson and Cosentino good enough to play regularly in the CFL in the 1960s, but their younger counterparts are not good enough now? Were Jackson and Cosentino freaks of nature?
The CFL wants to increase its popularity, attendance, and television ratings, and expand elsewhere in Canada, but the Canadian quarterback situation is hurting these prospects.
What would be a happy ending is for Danny Brannagan to get an invite to an NFL camp and become the team’s starting quarterback, eventually winning the Super Bowl.
It would serve the CFL right.
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