TEAMWORK: For Redblacks interim GM Jeremy Snyder, the rest of 2021 is about building a future

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It’s not the easiest thing to get into, it’s not the way he wanted to get a promotion, but Jeremy Snyder found himself with the Ottawa Redblacks interim general manager title on Monday after Marcel Desjardins was fired in his ninth year at the job.

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Snyder, 42, grew up in a family that made a living felling trees in Titusville, a small industrial town in northwestern Pennsylvania. With what could be the opportunity of a lifetime, he’s taking a team approach to hopefully get the team back on the winning track. With the rest of the Redblacks soccer operations team, a group that includes interim assistant GM Jean-Marc Edme, he hopes to help build a successful Ottawa team in 2022. It’s too late to worry about qualifying at In 2021, the team is 2-9 and has been eliminated from the CFL playoff contest with three games remaining. But, for Snyder, these next three games (the first is a home match against Calgary on Friday night) are important as the team looks to the future. And maybe, if things go well, they will take away the interim title at the end of the year.

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“It’s not just me,” Snyder said. “Yes, I was selected to sit on a chair. But there is a group of guys around me who have been with us for a long time. We’re going to come together and do the best job we can to finish this year, then at that point we’ll see where things go. Do I have experience, have I been close to good organizations? Yes, I have, including this one. I have learned many good things from the people I have been with and that I can apply to this opportunity. But at the end of the day, it’s about us, it’s not about me.

“When you have an interim tag at the top of your post, it means that expectations were not met. (Has the season been) frustrating? Safely. But we still have today and tomorrow to keep moving forward and moving towards bigger and better things. And that is what we are doing right now. It is not about looking back; The past is the past. If we stay in the past, we will stay there and people will leave us behind. We are looking forward to 2022 and we hope to get good results in these last three games of the season ”.

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A family man, Snyder and his wife Melissa have three children: Owen, Hazel, and Harris.

“I have a very supportive family that has moved from country to country to be here for me to take advantage of this opportunity,” Snyder said. “It has turned out to be a great adventure for us and you know that we hope you continue here because we have made our home in Ottawa. I am grateful for everything I have worked for. I don’t take anything for granted. I’m going to be very direct and very direct to the point, and what you see is what you get from me. Most of my family are manual laborers who work long hours in the forest, they have done it most of their lives. So yeah, I’m the weirdo in my family in that sense, but I never forget the hard-working group that I come from. “

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Snyder played soccer at Titusville High School, then Allegheny College. When he finished playing, he helped as a coach at school. He obtained an internship in the Chicago Bears video department and then worked as a football operations assistant for four years. From there, the Philadelphia Eagles worked in the scouting department. He was hired by the Montreal Alouettes in 2010. Desjardins hired him to be part of the Ottawa expansion team in 2014.

While it gives him a new opportunity, Snyder said it was difficult to see Desjardins pay the price for the team’s lack of on-field success in the past two seasons.

“You just have to keep going,” he said. Find positivity and move on. You learn a lot over the years from your mentors, now you have the opportunity to apply them. We hate to see a teammate go that way. We respect Marcel for what he has done, not just for the City of Ottawa, for the Redblacks, the organization and the group of owners, but for us individually. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for him. That’s the situation we find ourselves in, we have to do the best we can. “

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Regarding the job as the general manager of the Redblacks, he said: (Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group President and CEO) Mark (Goudie) asked me, ‘Do you want to move on to bigger and better things?’ I said, ‘We’re in this job, we want to be the guys at the top.’ We want to build a team around a group of people who can move forward together and achieve higher goals than we currently meet. I hope that everyone who works in professional sports wants to be the best at some point in their career. We want to improve this team and provide hope for 2022. “

THE END AROUND: The Redblacks looked good to quarterback Duck Hodges in last week’s 32-3 beating at the hands of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. Hodges, who started six games for the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2019, completed 8 of 16 passes for 49 yards, with an interception after replacing starter Caleb Evans (12 of 15 for 138 yards with two interceptions). Hodges also rushed five times for 13 yards. It will be interesting to see how the Redblacks split their playing time as a quarterback on Friday night. When asked after practice Wednesday who would start the game, Redblacks head coach Paul LaPolice said, “Will it be … Caleb … or will it be Duck.” When asked if it would be a good opportunity to see more of Hodges, who has been on the roster for just over a month, LaPolice said: “I just want to win the game. It doesn’t mean we can’t start Caleb and get Duck replays. I’m just worried about beating Calgary. “… The Redblacks decided not to make any moves before the CFL trade deadline on Wednesday at 5 p.m. In fact, it was quiet throughout the league… Veteran safety Antoine Pruneau (hand ) did not practice again on Wednesday.