In some ways, Tre Ford’s preparation for the 2025 season is just getting started. In one way, though, it’s been on-going, with a two-year-old daughter he’s been trying to keep up with.
“It’s a lot of work chasing her around,” says Ford with a laugh.
At least he now has a sense of what it’s like to be on that side of things. Defenders all across the CFL could weigh in on the challenges of chasing little Anaïs Ford’s daddy around on the field.
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Tre Ford with a trick up his sleeve for No. 7! 🃏
📺 Watch the Top Plays from the 2024 #CFL season on CFL’s YouTube Channel via the link in bio! pic.twitter.com/ZFqbqnasTi
— CFL (@CFL) December 29, 2024
With the afterglow of the exciting news of the 26-year-old quarterback signing a three-year contract extension with the Edmonton Elks now fading a month after it was announced, it’s time for Tre Ford to get seriously down to the business of cementing himself as the team’s starting quarterback.
Holiday’s over, taxing as it may have been with all that running. Training camp is only four months away.
“I just recently got the playbook, so I’m gonna be studying that,” says Ford, who’d just returned to Edmonton after making merry back east in his hometown of Niagara Falls, Ont. “I want to learn the playbook inside and out and be ready to go.”
That playbook he speaks of is most certainly a post-Christmas gift from Jordan Maksymic, formerly the offensive coordinator with the BC Lions. The Elks haven’t formally announced coaching staff appointments just yet, but new head coach Mark Kilam let the cat out of the bag during the media conference to announce Ford’s extension, saying “If you look at the quarterbacks that Jordan’s worked with, they’re outstanding. I can’t wait to see what he does with Tre.”
What lies ahead for Ford as he attempts to convert the best chance he’s so far had to be Edmonton’s QB1 is a busy winter and spring chock full of a great deal of early mornings at the Elks’ training facility at Commonwealth Stadium.
“I’ll do my running, throwing, timing with receivers, that kind of stuff, in the morning,” explains Ford of a routine that will see him at work anywhere from five to seven days a week, “and then I’ll get my treatment, therapy, hot tub, cold tub. Take care of the body after that.”
Coming off what Ford tells me is his first serious workout of the new year, the young quarterback is optimistic about the possibilities ahead for not only him, but for the team that new general manager Ed Hervey is piecing together in concert with new head coach Kilam and the team’s newly-appointed president, Chris Morris. To name the three chief architects.
“I’m excited with free agency around the corner,” says Ford, “to see who we’re bringing in, who we’re going to extend and keep, and trying to figure out all of those things.”
“I think we’re taking a step in the right direction. I think we’re going to be a better football team.”
The club’s braintrust is banking on Ford being a big part of that improvement. A three-year contract extension signals that they believe in him, and that the promise he has shown over his first three seasons in green and gold is about to be fully realized.
“Today marks the beginning of Tre Ford’s opportunity to take the reins as the starting quarterback of this franchise,” Hervey said a month ago.
So the part of the leading man is Ford’s, if he can grab it. Hitting the weight room, and sharpening his impressive, game-breaking talents in on-field workouts will be part of it all.
And so will that playbook, which Ford needs to master. A new OC means a new way of doing things.
“There’s similarities, but there’s definitely a lot of differences,” he says of the new collection of Xs and Os under which the Edmonton offence will operate this season.
“I feel like it’s a mix of offences kind of coming together and different languages (terminologies). I feel like a lot of the concepts are going to be similar, but, you know, one guy going this way instead of that way, right?”
“It’s gonna be a little bit challenging.”
Ford will have help in his attempt to meet the challenge of locking in as a CFL starting quarterback from some people he feels very good about.
Asked about his impressions of Kilam – the longtime Calgary Stampeder assistant who was named Edmonton’s head coach just days prior to Ford signing his extension – Ford says “I love talking to him. I’m happy he’s our head coach, and I’m gonna have the next three years with him.”
“I think he’s just a kind, genuine guy. I think he actually cares about the people that are going to be in his locker room. And taking care of them. Not just in football, (but) outside of football, right?”
Then there is Cody Fajardo, the 2023 Grey Cup Champion quarterback who is now an Elk after Edmonton completed a trade with the Montreal Alouettes a little over a week after Ford signed his extension.
“The interactions I’ve had with him,” says Ford, “obviously they’ve been limited because we haven’t played together or anything like that, he’s a pretty good dude, and I’ve heard a lot of good things about him.”
Theoretically, Fajardo arrives in Edmonton to both back-up and to mentor Ford.
That’s if it all goes as planned. The way Hervey thinks it can, the way Kilam hopes it will.
And the way Tre Ford is working to make a reality.