It’s here.

The dreaded CFL off-season is officially coming to an end, and preparations for the 2024 campaign get underway tomorrow as rookie camps open across the country.

And for the 111th time, teams across the league begin their quest to hoist the coveted sterling silver cup come November.

But before we jump right into camp, it’s important to appreciate what the off-season has to offer:

Free Agency.

The CFL Draft.

And time to reflect on the good, bad, and the ugly from the season before.

“Yeah, it was a good detox that’s for sure,” said quarterback Jake Maier about the off-season following his first full season as a starter in the CFL.

“I think right when the season ends, you have so much to reflect on. The CFL season is so long and there’s so many moments where you feel like it’s going well and then obviously there’s moments where we feel like it’s not.

“I’d say the last four or five months have been solely focused on building relationships with the guys, the work that we obviously all have to put in.

“I feel like my off-season was the best I’ve ever had in my entire career simply because I had tons of resources and I was able to move into our house that was finally done being built, and I was really able to just live peacefully with (wife) Amanda and (daughter) Everly, and every day was pretty consistent.

“I was able to train multiple times a day, I was able to be a dad, be a husband, I was able to reach out to teammates and I had them come out for a week at the beginning of April.”

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Simply put, the 2023 Stampeders season was frustrating.

It was a season full of adversity.

The injury bug hit the Red and White hard across all position groups with players such as running backs Ka’Deem Carey and Peyton Logan missing extended periods of time, to receiver Malik Henry and defensive lineman James Vaughters suffering season-ending ailments. At one point in the season, there were 16 players on the six-game injured list.

Younger players were forced to fill veteran holes, there was little time to build new chemistry, and the challenges caused slow starts and miscues on the gridiron.

But the group never gave up.

Despite finishing the regular at 6-12, the Stamps were able to string together a playoff appearance for the 18th straight season.

And as we enter the 2024 campaign, there’s plenty to build upon.

“When I reflect on it,” explained Maier, “I just think when you’re in it and you’re in that situation, it’s hard to have perspective about the whole situation but then once you get removed from it, you look at it as, OK, there’s a lot of things that maybe didn’t go our way. There’s a lot of football that I was proud of and a lot of football that I wasn’t proud of.

“But everything I’ve done in the last five months is to prepare not only myself, but the guys that we have coming into this year, and it’s really exciting because we are an under-the-radar team, but we’re a super-talented team.

“We just haven’t played a lot of football together yet, because of circumstance and injuries, and whatever that may be. That’s just part of the game and (we) just so happened to experience that last year as a team.

“If we have our full group out there, and obviously we’re going to be able to build this through training camp and then throughout the season, then I love our chances. I think it’s going to be a significantly more enjoyable year because of it.

“And then obviously, with the addition of (quarterbacks) Coach (Beau) Baldwin and having those conversations over the last couple months or so, have been nothing but positive and I really do believe that this is going to be a far more enjoyable year for all of us and we have an opportunity to do something that maybe nobody really expects us to do. But that makes it really fun.”

The 27-year-old Californian has also been able to use the winter as time to spend with his six-month-old Everly, who has sparked higher motivation for the young pivot.

“I’ve learned first and foremost how to organize my time and make my family and my job the top of my priority list,” he said.

“When you’re trying to raise a six-month old, there’s a lot of patience that comes with that, too, but she’s such a good baby and Amanda’s such a good mom that I would say my life as a dad is pretty easy.

“It’s been super rewarding, too, because now when I go train, I think about them maybe a lot more than I did when she wasn’t here yet. You have a purpose now as a parent to provide for not only your family but your baby.

“It’s been a very humbling experience, but it’s also been a refresher because you don’t lack any motivation when you have a six-month old that you’re coming home to after you’re done training or after you’re studying film or whatever you’re doing.

“When you have that motivation constantly, you wake up every day super energized and when you’re done doing that stuff you get to hang out in the pool with your daughter and your wife or you get to go to the mini-golf course, those times just become so sacred and that much more enjoyable.

“It’s been really refreshing and really fun. And, like I said, my motivation has never been higher because of it.”