Five things to watch on the field this CFL season

The CFL's new collective bargaining agreement, which was finally ratified Thursday and Friday, has dominated most of the discussion in league circles for the past several months, but now that labour peace has been reached, there are plenty of interesting on-field elements to consider. The preseason is already well underway, with two games played already and three more taking place Saturday, and after another week of preseason action, the regular season is set to start June 26. Here are five intriguing things to watch for this year.

1. Can Troy Smith turn into a star?

Montreal Alouettes' quarterback Troy Smith is one of the biggest American stars to play in the CFL in a long while, as he won the Heisman Trophy at Ohio State and briefly started in the NFL. Lots of big NCAA names have wound up north of the border without finding much success, of course, but Smith already looks different; he adeptly took over as the Alouettes' starter less than two months after signing, thanks to an injury to legendary pivot Anthony Calvillo and less-than-stunning performances from the team's other quarterbacks, and he helped lead the Alouettes into the playoffs, where they came very close to winning in the first round against Hamilton. With Calvillo choosing to retire this offseason, this is Smith's team now. Will he be able to prove last year's success was more than just a fluke?

2. Will Chad Johnson make it to the regular season?

The Alouettes have another one of the league's most fascinating players in Chad "Ochocinco" Johnson, who's trying the CFL after a remarkable 11-year NFL career, but after being out of football for a couple years. Johnson has seemed eager to be in the CFL so far, and he's certainly put up plenty of impressive football performances over the years, but he's 36 and has never played Canadian football, plus he's already battling an ankle injury and won't play Saturday. Will we see him make a CFL impact, or will he prove unable to crack Montreal's deep receiving corps?

3. How will the Roughriders do with a new-look lineup?

The Saskatchewan Roughriders are the defending Grey Cup champions, but they had one of the toughest offseasons across the league, losing stars Kory Sheets and Weston Dressler to the NFL, plus losing plenty of defensive starters to free agency. Retirements have hurt the team's experience level as well, with slotback Geroy Simon and Canadian middle linebacker Mike McCullough both electing to hang up their cleats. The Riders have found some interesting new talents, and they still have several key returning pieces, but we'll see how successful they are at building those players into a cohesive team.

4. Are the Ottawa Redblacks going to contend in their first year?

Entering this league as an expansion team is anything but easy, and while the Redblacks are better off than their predecessors in Ottawa thanks to loosened draft rules that let them pile up more talent, they're still at a disadvantage. Every other team has at least a core of returning guys who have played together; Ottawa's starting completely from scratch. They have talented pieces, including running back Chevon Walker, defensive tackle Keith Shologan and safety Eric Fraser, and they made it clear they plan to compete right out of the gate by signing 39-year-old quarterback Henry Burris, who's had a couple of great recent seasons but doesn't look like a long-term solution. How effectively they'll play this season is still up in the air, but they're certainly giving it a good shot.

5. How will the new head coaches do?

This offseason's seen plenty of coaching turnover, with four different guys taking up new head coaching jobs: Tom Higgins in Montreal, Mike O'Shea in Winnipeg, Chris Jones in Edmonton and Rick Campbell in Ottawa. Higgins has been a successful head coach and GM before, but he was working as the CFL's director of officiating for the last while, and it's going to be interesting to see how he works with general manager Jim Popp (who held both the HC and GM jobs last year after firing Dan Hawkins five games into the season, and reportedly wanted to keep them both). The other coaches are even more interesting, as none of them has been a CFL head coach before. That can be a large adjustment, and it will be interesting to see how they handle it, especially with regards to expanded pass-interference challenge rules that will put even more in-game-decision pressure on coaches.