due to a contractual snag<\/a>, and was instead hired by the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. After things fell through with Monson, Dinwiddie offered the job to Fields, but he didn\u2019t take it.<\/p>\n\u201cI think that was the point where we lost a little bit of trust in each other,\u201d said Fields. \u201cI just didn\u2019t feel like it was a fit between me and R.D. because I just didn\u2019t feel the trust.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not knowing where he stood in Toronto, Fields had been interviewing for other jobs and ended up accepting the defensive coordinator position with Ottawa under then-head coach Bob Dyce.<\/p>\n
The following offseason, Dyce was fired and Dinwiddie took over the Redblacks as head coach and general manager.<\/p>\n
Ottawa signed several free agents on the defensive side of the ball in February, including four day-one starters in Habakkuk Baldonado, A.J. Allen, C.J. Reavis, and Demerio Houston.<\/p>\n
Though the injury bug bit the club\u2019s secondary early-on in the season, Fields believes his unit was talented enough to play well. It just needed more time to gel.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought we started off with the talent and\u00a0cohesiveness to get it done, but remember, we lost one of our best players who was the boundary half, Bennett (Williams). We lost him early for the season. We ended up losing (Adrian) Frye at\u00a0corner.\u00a0(Alonzo) Addae\u00a0had went down early, so he missed a couple games early on,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought that\u00a0we had some good, talented\u00a0guys on\u00a0the practice roster that we couldn\u2019t get on (the active roster). They\u00a0are playing now, but\u00a0I think we had enough (talent) to possibly do well. I just knew it would take some time.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe issue\u00a0when\u00a0you\u2019re trying to build is you\u2019re gonna take your lumps and bruises early on, but you\u2019re hoping\u00a0you can steal a few wins while you\u2019re learning, and then things will hit a peak. I think we were going that direction besides that drop in that Montreal game, but I think we were building in the right direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had the same issue in\u00a02024 with\u00a0Toronto when we had lost Chad (Kelly) for nine games, and we knew we were gonna take our bumps and bruises. The point was to try to steal a few wins while we\u2019re trying to figure it out, which we did. I think we ended up 4-5 or 5-4 or something like that by time Chad got back, and we ended up figuring it out, and we started to roll.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe problem in Ottawa was we weren\u2019t stealing those wins. We had a few close losses early on, which we didn\u2019t capitalize on, so that kind of made everything a little worse.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the weeks since he was let go, Fields has kept close tabs on the Redblacks, and he\u2019s hoping to see them win plenty of games before the year is out.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a hand in hiring some of the defensive (coaches), and\u00a0it\u2019s a lot of love,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve\u00a0still got a lot of history in that building. A lot of those guys I coached with in Toronto. The\u00a0defensive staff, and even the players, some of those guys. I\u2019m still rooting for them.\u201d<\/p>\n
His time away from the game is allowing Fields to focus on a much more important battle: his health.<\/p>\n
When he returned to his offseason home in Houston last fall, Fields sought medical treatment for some unusual health symptoms he was experiencing.<\/p>\n
In March, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and had surgery the following month. He lost 65 pounds.<\/p>\n
Two weeks after undergoing surgery, he left for training camp in Ottawa.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m\u00a0still healing now, so this actually was a\u00a0blessing in disguise because I\u2019m able to come home and finally heal,\u201d said Fields. \u201cIt\u2019s been a lot\u00a0going on. I don\u2019t even know if I should have been coaching this year, but I don\u2019t think it had anything to do with how the season was going.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fields informed Ottawa\u2019s coaching staff of his diagnosis after undergoing surgery, and told the players during training camp.<\/p>\n
The 48-year-old did not have to undergo chemotherapy and his prognosis is good. He\u2019ll have to get tested every six months for the next two years, but is expected to make a full recovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went to MD Anderson. It\u2019s\u00a0one of the best cancer hospitals in North America, so it\u2019s good care,\u201d said Fields.<\/p>\n
\u201cI definitely needed more time, so (the firing) actually wasn\u2019t a\u00a0bad thing.\u00a0I don\u2019t think it should have happened because I think we were probably going to trend\u00a0better.\u00a0I don\u2019t know how good we would have been, but I think defensively we would have\u00a0trended upward.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Redblacks fell to 0-10 on Thursday night following a 46-16 loss to the Alouettes. The team has lost 16 consecutive games dating back to 2025, which is the longest streak in the modern history of the CFL.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year, it\u2019s a lot of problems. It was more problems than\u00a0just defensive problems, but I know sometimes people feel like you have to do something, and I don\u2019t know if you always have to do something, but hopefully, the thing that you do works, and you continue to get better,\u201d said Fields.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf they had to do something, I\u2019d rather it had been me than anybody else, so that\u2019s why I didn\u2019t push back on anything when I did get let go. I\u2019m OK with it as long as everybody else is good.\u201d<\/p>\n
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John Hodge is a longtime Canadian football reporter, insider, and podcaster for 3DownNation. Based in Winnipeg, Hodge is also a freelance television and radio broadcaster.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo: Ottawa Redblacks. Photo edit: 3DownNation. William Fields was let go as the defensive coordinator of the Ottawa…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":872331,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[166835,166836,49,48,7028,520,1172,36621,80528,102812,6325,527,20739,70504,168169],"class_list":["post-872330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ottawa","tag-3down","tag-3downnation","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian","tag-cfl","tag-coach","tag-defensive-coordinator","tag-fields","tag-fired","tag-firing","tag-football","tag-ottawa","tag-redblacks","tag-william-fields"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872330","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=872330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/872331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=872330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=872330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=872330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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