{"id":316461,"date":"2025-11-30T13:20:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-30T13:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/316461\/"},"modified":"2025-11-30T13:20:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-30T13:20:10","slug":"five-burning-questions-for-the-ottawa-redblacks-in-the-2026-cfl-offseason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/316461\/","title":{"rendered":"Five burning questions for the Ottawa Redblacks in the 2026 CFL offseason"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Photo courtesy: Ottawa Redblacks<\/p>\n

If another disappointing four-win season that resulted in head coach Bob Dyce being fired was rock bottom, R-Nation has to be hoping the Ottawa Redblacks are on the way up.<\/p>\n

That faith will be fuelled by the franchise\u2019s aggressive pursuit and addition of former Argonaut head coach Ryan Dinwiddie. Dinwiddie arrives in the nation\u2019s capital with a winning pedigree and a history of offensive production, becoming the fourth head coach \u2014 and third general manager \u2014 in team history.<\/p>\n

While the 45-year-old\u2019s hiring resolves a number of issues, plenty of questions continue to swirl around the franchise. Here are five things I\u2019ll be paying close attention to this offseason.<\/p>\n

Is Dru Brown Dinwiddie\u2019s guy?<\/p>\n

On the surface, the question of whether quarterback Dru Brown will return as the Redblacks\u2019 starter in 2026 seems straightforward. He\u2019s signed through next season on a deal that, per our own Justin Dunk, pays $462,500 in hard money, with a maximum value of $471,500.<\/a> That\u2019s absolutely not the kind of cash a team would pay someone to hold a clipboard.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, although he missed half the season with an assortment of injuries, when healthy, Brown completed 71.5 percent of his passes for 2,389 yards, 14 touchdowns and 10 interceptions. In his nine starts, he had four games with 300+ passing yards. At times when he\u2019s been on the field, Browns has looked like part of the upper echelon of CFL quarterbacks.<\/p>\n

And yet, the question isn\u2019t straightforward. To begin with, the team will need to decide if Brown\u2019s frequent absences can simply be chalked up to bad luck or if he\u2019s perhaps injury-prone. There\u2019s also the issue of Brown\u2019s tendency to throw off his back foot and seemingly float passes into high danger areas that result in turnovers. Moreover, there was a distinct lack of willingness to stretch the field on Brown\u2019s part, as he rarely took deep shots in 2025, although he may have been constrained by the system he was forced to operate within.<\/p>\n

During his time in Toronto, Dinwiddie did a masterful job of squeezing production out of anyone he put under centre. Hell, he won a Grey Cup with Nick Arbuckle and had him looking like an MOP for much of last season. Given that he\u2019ll be calling plays next season, what Brown\u2019s future boils down to is, does Dinwiddie believe he can help the 28-year-old Brown take his game to the next level?<\/a> Would he prefer to work with someone he\u2019s more familiar with \u2014 aka someone from his time in Toronto? Or is there a pending free agent passer he\u2019s eyeing?<\/p>\n

It stands to reason that if the Redblacks choose to move on from Brown, they\u2019d do so before the start of free agency in order to maximize the return.<\/p>\n

How will Dinwiddie fill out his staff?<\/p>\n

Tommy Condell is out as offensive coordinator, and Will Fields is set to return as defensive coordinator. Although some in R-Nation might not be overly keen to see more of Fields, given how mediocre his unit was in 2025, he won two Grey Cups while part of Dinwiddie\u2019s staff in Toronto, so it makes sense that he would return.<\/p>\n

What I really want to know is, how many more familiar faces from Toronto will follow Dinwiddie up the 401 to Ottawa?<\/p>\n

Names like Pete Costanza, Kevin Eiben and Mike Miller are all potential candidates for the Argos\u2019 now-vacant head coach position, but if none ultimately get the job, could we see one \u2014 or all three \u2014 trading their double blue for red and black?<\/p>\n

Costanza is an elite offensive mind and has six Grey Cups to his name. In addition to his 11 years of playing experience, Eiben has spent eight years with the Argos, occupying roles from special teams coordinator to defensive coordinator to linebacker coach. As for Miller, he\u2019s been Toronto\u2019s quarterback coach since 2022.<\/p>\n

An extra benefit for the Redblacks would be that the more Dinwiddie strengthens his staff by luring former Argos to Ottawa, the more he weakens a division rival.<\/p>\n

Which pending FAs are worth bringing back?<\/p>\n

Last offseason, fresh off the team\u2019s first postseason appearance since 2018, the theme for general manager Shawn Burke seemed to be \u2018run it back and bolster\u2019. Faced with 31 pending free agents, Burke moved quickly to prioritize those he felt could still make meaningful contributions, eventually bringing back 22 players, while shoring up positions of weakness by adding impact players like three-time All-CFL receiver Eugene Lewis, two-time All-CFL running back William Stanback, Canadian centre Peter Godber, and totally overhauling the secondary.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the 2025 season was what it was. For the fifth time in six seasons, the Redblacks finished with four (or fewer) wins. That could mean that this offseason, faced with 36 potential free agents, Ottawa opts for full-scale change.<\/a><\/p>\n

Dinwiddie is the new general manager but will continue to work with Burke following his shift to vice president of football operations. Dinwiddie will no doubt want to put his stamp on the team, and even if ushering in a culture change is in the cards, there are still a number of impact players the Redblacks should look to retain.<\/p>\n

Topping that list is strong-side linebacker Adarius Pickett. Not only is he one of the league\u2019s best at the position, but he\u2019s also a valuable special teamer. Despite tearing his Achilles mid-season in 2024, the 29-year-old was ready to go at the start of the 2025 campaign and started all 18 games as Ottawa\u2019s biggest contributor on defence. Pickett finished with 84 defensive tackles (a team-high), 14 special teams tackles, two sacks, a forced fumble, four pass knockdowns, and two fumble recoveries.<\/p>\n

Another name that should garner strong consideration is Justin Hardy. Even if he\u2019ll be 34 years old at the start of next season, the Washington, N.C., native has shown no signs of slowing down. Not only did he score a career-high eight touchdowns last season, but he also became the first Redblacks receiver since The Buds to post three consecutive 1,000-yard seasons. Hardy made more catches than anyone else in Ottawa\u2019s receiving corps, and he had the most 100+ yard games with four and the most yards after catch.<\/p>\n

Quarterback Dustin Crum, running back Daniel Adeboboye, offensive lineman Jacob Ruby, defensive linemen Aidan Johnm and linebackers Lucas Cormier and Frankie Griffin are others who could be worth bringing back.<\/p>\n

Will the crowds come back?<\/p>\n

As ugly as the results were on the field in 2025, things weren\u2019t much better for the Redblacks franchise off of it. As the season progressed and losses piled up, it became clear that R-Nation was showing its frustration by staying away. Instead of building off of 2024\u2019s return to the playoffs, quite the opposite happened with attendance decreasing 4.2 percent.<\/p>\n

In fact, the Redblacks\u2019 average of 18,136 fans per game only finished ahead of the Argos\u2019 15,054. For an organization that regularly sold out its 24,000 seats and frequently another 1,000 standing room tickets as recently as 2019, it\u2019s been quite the fall from grace.<\/p>\n

Not only did the team record its smallest home crowd ever in 2025 \u2014 just 15,054 against the Ticats in July \u2014 but only two of nine home games crossed the 20,000 mark. Going 2-7 at Lansdowne surely didn\u2019t help, but the issue is deeper than just losses. As the franchise\u2019s early success of playoff wins, Grey Cup trips, and a championship fades a little more from memory each year, the norm has become the team being an annual cellar-dweller. To make things worse, for much of those underwhelming seasons, Ottawa played a boring and uninspiring brand of football.<\/p>\n

Just three seasons with an above .500 record in 11 years have tested R-Nation\u2019s patience, especially when you consider that track record is stacked upon decades of futility from the Rough Rider and Renegade eras.<\/p>\n

The good thing is that OSEG has clearly realized that their fan base needs a shot in the arm, which the hiring of Dinwiddie is. But to truly get the franchise back where it needs to be, much remains to be done. The two instances of on-site tailgating in 2025 were a solid initiative, and if tailgating on the Great Lawn at Lansdowne becomes a permanent game-day feature \u2014 something that members of R-Nation, such as the Southsiders fan group, have been clamouring for for years \u2014 a new Ottawa tradition could be born. All that said, the Lansdowne 2.0 construction, which is already underway<\/a>, could limit or even make it impossible to tailgate onsite.<\/p>\n

Continued aggressive marketing will also help, but you can\u2019t blame those who are in a wait-and-see mode. The talent Ottawa adds this offseason will go a long way towards generating hype and belief heading into the 2026 season opener.<\/p>\n

Does Dinwiddie have too much on his plate?<\/p>\n

On one hand, Dinwiddie\u2019s addition to the franchise checks a lot of boxes. On the other hand, there are only so many hours in a day, and given that he\u2019ll be filling three different roles \u2014 general manager, head coach and offensive coordinator \u2014 it\u2019s fair to wonder how he\u2019ll manage to simultaneously be effective at three extremely demanding jobs. Other times we\u2019ve seen a coach attempt to pull off the GM\/HC\/coordinator trifecta, it didn\u2019t take long for things to go off the rails (see Chris Jones in Edmonton).<\/p>\n

What will help is that although Burke\u2019s title is different, he\u2019ll still be an ever-present and experienced voice in Dinwiddie\u2019s ear. As the duo made clear in an interview with TSN1200 earlier this month, Dinwiddie will have final say on roster decisions, but that doesn\u2019t mean it won\u2019t be a collaborative process.<\/p>\n

Something else that could ensure Dinwiddie succeeds where Chris Jones failed is a strong coaching staff. Even if he\u2019s the one calling plays on game day, if Dinwiddie has someone he trusts implicitly as his right-hand man to be QB coach or pass game coordinator, he won\u2019t have to spend as much of his time directly installing weekly game plans.<\/p>\n

Since the implementation of the CFL operations cap, it\u2019s been commonplace for front office staff to hold multiple roles, and Dinwiddie has stated that a large part of the reason he came to the Redblacks was that he wanted the challenge of building the roster he\u2019d be coaching. Still, three jobs for one person is ambitious by any standard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo courtesy: Ottawa Redblacks If another disappointing four-win season that resulted in head coach Bob Dyce being fired…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316462,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-316461","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cfl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-canadian-football-league","11":"tag-canadianfootballleague","12":"tag-cfl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}