Now comes the real fun for Ryan Dinwiddie.<\/p>\n
With CFL free agency essentially over, Ryan Dinwiddie has switched from general manager to head coach\/offensive co-ordinator with the Ottawa Redblacks. He\u2019s started the process of putting together the club\u2019s new-look offence and scheming the possibilities.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow for me it\u2019s putting in the install,\u201d Dinwiddie said in a wide-ranging interview Tuesday. \u201cWe\u2019re going to evaluate the players and how we\u2019re going to evolve the offence around which players and all of those things.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow is the fun part of designing it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie joined Ottawa in November after five years as Toronto\u2019s head coach. Dinwiddie compiled a 51-35 regular-season record, won two Grey Cups (2022, 2024) with the Argonauts and was the CFL\u2019s coach of the year in 2023.<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie and Shawn Burke, Ottawa\u2019s vice-president of football operations, were active in free agency. Among the Redblacks\u2019 off-season acquisitions were veteran quarterback Jake Maier, running back Greg Bell, receiver Ayden Eberhardt, defensive lineman Dylan Wynn, linebackers A.J. Allen, of Burlington, Ont., and C.J. Reavis and defensive back Demerio Houston.<\/p>\n
Ottawa\u2019s activity wasn\u2019t surprising given it re-signed just 12-of-35 pending free agents before the market opened Feb. 10. The Redblacks (league-worst 4-14 record) missed the CFL playoffs last season after finishing last in the East Division for the fifth time in six seasons.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou always have to turn over your roster if you win the Grey Cup or aren\u2019t in the playoffs, that\u2019s just what you have to do as far as the salary-cap world we live in,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cWe knew the players we wanted to keep that were hard workers and understood what it takes to win, it just hasn\u2019t worked out for them in this building.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen we wanted to bring in guys who have a winning pedigree and we felt like we did that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie entered free agency expecting to be busy but was pleasantly surprised to land both Eberhardt and Reavis. Eberhardt had 45 catches for 863 yards and four TDs with B.C. last season, his 19.2-yard average per catch being second-best in the CFL.<\/p>\n
Eberhardt joins a receiving corps that includes veteran Americans Justin Hardy (78 catches, 1,019 yards, eight TDs) and Eugene Lewis (75 catches, 1,012 yards, six touchdowns).<\/p>\n
Reavis had 61 tackles, two sacks, an interception and two forced fumbles in 17 regular-season games last season with Grey Cup-champion Saskatchewan. Ottawa also acquired American linebacker Nyles Morgan from Edmonton in December.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just look at the yards per catch and versatility (Eberhardt) has, I didn\u2019t think he\u2019d be a guy that would be available,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cYou look at C.J. Reavis \u2026 I thought he was a really good player.<\/p>\n
\u201cWas Sam (strongside linebacker) a priority for us? It wasn\u2019t, but we felt like he was someone we had to bring into the building.\u201d<\/p>\n
Certainly players have a role in the molding of a team but so do coaches. The challenge in Ottawa, though, is with so many new faces — both in pads and on the coaching staff — an acclimation process must also happen.<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie got a head start on that in January when he gathered his coaches together for two weeks.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew it was going to be busy in free agency and didn\u2019t want to waste the coaches\u2019 time,\u201d he said. \u201cThe beauty of it when you come into a new organization is you\u2019re not stepping into a familiar situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously it starts with the coaching staff to know we\u2019re all on the same page. It\u2019s going to be the same thing for me as far as these players, everything is kind of new but we have to rally around each other and build a bond in that locker room.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ottawa didn\u2019t add any offensive linemen early in free agency but signed American Martez Ivey and Canadian Gregor MacKellar last week. Both were with Edmonton last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe feel McKellar can compete for a starting guard job and Ivey can be one of our tackles,\u201d Dinwiddie said. \u201cWe brought (American Dino Boyd) back so we\u2019ll probably have two American tackles, three (Canadian) interior guys.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll see how that all plays out \u2026 but we feel like Martez is hungry and ready to show he\u2019s one of the league\u2019s best tackles.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dinwiddie can\u2019t put his GM\u2019s hat away just yet. Ottawa has the first pick of the \u201926 CFL draft April 28 and that evaluation has begun but Dinwiddie said the Redblacks will keep an open mind regarding the No. 1 selection.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve got to be creative, you always want to keep your phone lines open,\u201d he said. \u201cIf something is a good deal for our organization that\u2019s going to make us better for this year and the future, then we\u2019ll obviously look into those things.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 24, 2026.<\/p>\n
Dan Ralph, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Now comes the real fun for Ryan Dinwiddie. With CFL free agency essentially over, Ryan Dinwiddie has switched…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":497189,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-497188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-football-league","tag-canadianfootballleague","tag-cfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497188","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=497188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/497189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=497188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=497188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=497188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}