So maybe it's not quite classic, but Labour Day it is.
For years upon years they have played a football game here, on a holiday that reflects this city's proud working heritage, which for generations of local kids also represented the last blessed bit of freedom before the return to academic captivity.
Most often, but not always, the hated Toronto Argonauts were the dance partners, and that rivalry still stirs up a healthy hate in this part of Golden Horseshoe, even as the lines of demarcation between the big shiny metropolis and the gritty former Steel City have become rather blurred.
But it was only after the CFL's failed foray into the United States (the Baltimore Stallions were the Tiger-Cats' foes one year – on the Saturday, no less – in what was clearly a death-to-tradition phase) that the game's custodians decided history and heritage and continuity and Canadian-ness were the core strengths of the brand. So they wrapped the Labour Day game up in a bow, gave it a name, printed some T-shirts, and formally enshrined Toronto as the natural visiting team.
It has certainly served a purpose. Even in the bleakest years, even when both franchises were headed for or in the midst of bankruptcy, even when one or the other – or both – were awful on the field, there was pull of ritual, the reassurance of the familiar, an occasion when non-contenders for the Grey Cup could still play a game with something on the line, when underdogs tended to rise to the occasion.
That was enough to pretty much always fill the benches at homely/beautiful Ivor Wynne Stadium.
Monday, though, marks the beginning of at least a short period of turbulence, when all will not be the same-old same-old.
The Montreal Alouettes are the opponent this year because the Argos don't control their own stadium, and their friendly landlord doesn't seem overly inclined to give them a break. So instead of making the short trip down the Queen Elizabeth Way, they were forced to stay home Friday night and play host to the Braley Bowl, a god-awful, inept and lifeless affair that was everything the Labour Day classic isn't – and which one hopes was the nadir of this CFL season.
Football-wise, the Als represent an excellent matchup, in a rare year when it seems three of the best four teams in the game are playing in the east. Though Winnipeg has been this season's shooting star (its stumble in Saskatchewan on Sunday notwithstanding), the Montreal organization remains the CFL's gold standard. If Marcel Bellefeuille's Ticats are ever going to get past their stuttering, frustrating, one step forward-two steps back phase, at some point they're going to have to beat the Alouettes in games like this.
And then, whither the classic?
Next year, Rogers willing, the Argos will presumably be back for what will be the last Labour Day game in the old east end neighbourhood ballpark, a sentimental occasion for sure. Ivor Wynne is set to be levelled after the 2012 season, leaving the Ticats to wander from one temporary home to another during the construction of a replacement, which will also house the soccer competition at the 2015 Pan American Games.
Bet on the Labour Day game being played in Toronto in 2013 – for gate purposes, as a Ticats' "home" game – which, if the Hamilton fans are willing to make the pilgrimage en masse, might at least inject a little life into the energy-sucking dome.
And then back to the hallowed ground, if not to the funky old stands, when they'll have to shoehorn the faithful into even cozier confines (as of now, only 22,500 seats are planned), when everyone will have to get used to the place and its new stadium smell and decide whether the ghosts have come along.
From then, surely the string will be unbroken, to become once again the signal here of summer's end.