Quarterback Nathan Rourke has returned to the CFL, where he’s now the highest-paid player in league history.
And while the re-debut of 2022’s Most Outstanding Canadian didn’t go well statistically (he completed eight of 25 passes for 126 yards and two interceptions in a 20-11 loss to Winnipeg), Rourke’s return, with the B.C. Lions, generated more than 750,000 viewers on TSN.
Via 3DownNation.com, it was the CFL’s biggest TV audience of 2024.
The game also gave the CFL its biggest weekly rating of the season, with nearly 600,000 on average watching the games.
Those small (relative to the NFL) numbers help explain why it takes only $600,000 (American) to set the record for the highest-paid player in CFL history.
Rourke, a native of Canada who played college football at Ohio University, spent only two seasons in the CFL before shooting his shot in the NFL. He didn’t stick, however, with the Jaguars, Patriots, Giants, or Falcons.