Its official now-the Bills will indeed be playing a regular season game a season in Toronto for five years

I’m not sure how much of an impact it will have on luxury-suite sales-the raison d’etre of NFL franchises nowadays. Sure, it could easily create new fans in Toronto since we already see an estimate of 10,000 Canadians a game at Ralph Wilson Stadium but I don’t imagine many wealthy executives considering a 1.5 hour drive + a wait at the border to Orchard Park to enjoy a few hours in a mildly-expensive toy.

Merchandise sales will go up, perhaps Torontonians will become curious about their old neighbor and pay a visit to non-Bills related things, and maybe a couple extra suites will get sold but I’m not sure if these efforts will help the Bills cope with the rising salary cap as revenues go up across the league and as other teams’ cities grow tax bases and help give their NFL franchises new shiny stadiums that provide 1st class facilities and the potential to host Super Bowls.

But maybe it will work. In fact-if the day ever came where the US and Canada entered some sort of Schengen-Zone agreement you would see not only the Tor-Buf-Chester Bills do quite well for themselves but you’d see the regions of Buf and Chester do quite well for themselves too.

Toronto Globe and Mail coverage

Kenny Mayne is always good for some high quality ironic humor on ESPN. Here’s one I apparently missed earlier this year with Marshawn Lynch as he proves Willis McGahee’s thoughts on Buffalo to be wrong.

This summer I wrote about the Bills having a downtown stadium and in what circumstances it should follow. A lot of people don’t believe in it but I insist.

The best and I would say only good (aka potentially profitable) location would be in the Cobblestone Parking District.

It would have to have a convention center attatched.

It would have to have a dome.

With an ample sized convention center attatched in the DOMED stadium project, Buffalo now becomes qualified to host a Super Bowl assuming that there is enough hotel space (new development trends suggest that is quite possible).

With an ample sized convention center the HSBC Arena can FINALLY host an NHL All-Star game and maybe even a Final Four.

If located in the Cobblestone area it feeds off the Inner Harbor, Arena, Casino, modest office/residential development around it, light rail, and CBD parking ramps without becoming a monolith in the heart of the CBD (see: current convention center). This location puts the stadium in a postion to be a truly unique urban football stadium and actually feed off and help add life to its surroundings unlike most urban stadiums and unlike what a stadium on the Outer Harbor would do.

The stadium could be European in a sense. Not too much immediate surface lot space for tailgating. Park in CBD parking ramps (downtown already has parking infrastructure for 60-70,000 people), get drinks at the bars/restaurants and hop on the light rail for free if you’re a bit too far away from the stadium.

Its’ expensive as hell ($800 mil) but if you go half-ass on it you won’t see a good return in the lesser investment (no ability to make the huge money off hosting a Super Bowl, NHL All-Star game, or NCAA Final 4)

And then (while we’re still in La La Land) we can tear down the old convention center and restore Genesee Street to the condition in which it should be.

Okay. Back to reality…

Why stop talking about the Bills just yet?

Two things of note:
1. If we kept Travis Henry instead of Willis McGahee, not only would we have had a better running back but we might have turned around those depressing population trends…He can’t play now because of a so that would do the Bills no good. But that just gives him more time to bring Buffalo back to its 1990 census figures.

2. Willis McGahee might sound incoherent and mildly retarted, but when he is translated, he has some good lines like in this Washington Post interview.

On Wednesday, McGahee — who also criticized the quality of Buffalo’s restaurants, nightlife and women — was asked if he wished he could take back some of the comments he made, particularly the one about the team moving. His reply: “Oh my goodness, who said that? I don’t know what you’re talking about.

As you are aware, the Bills are looking to and seemingly will play one preseason and one regular season game a year in Toronto. Its a good deal. The Bills don’t have to fly to Munich or London for a game to meet their Internation requirement. The Bills get to attempt at getting people in the Greater Toronto Area interested in the team and maybe make the 1.5 hour (on a good day) journey to watch a game in Orchard Park.

Maybe this is a secret plot to move the team to Toronto permanently. Thats fine too. I’d still watch them/care about them. A move to Vegas or LA would make me never want to watch football in general ever again.

The GTA is about 5 million people and constantly growing, the Canadian economy is strong. Not just for the Bills but for business in general in the Buffalo area, Canada and the GTA in general is our future. If the local powers that be are smart and agressive, Buffalo’s Canadian influence can go beyond Labatt and Hockey Night in Canada. Have great train service to Toronto, have quick and efficient border inspections, and promote Buffalo as a cheap way of having back-office or head-american offices while having quick and easy access to Toronto at all times.

Willis McGahee is smarter than you think

Here’s what the Canadians are saying:
National Post
Toronto Globe and Mail

After picking up empty heroine bags along Niagara Street, Saturday morning, it was picture time with some local celebrities…

The mayor…

JP Losman…

Peerless Price…

Coy Wire…

Josh Stamer…

Alex Van Pelt drove around in a golf cart handing out “Round Up” for all the weeds growing out of the sidewalks, and Brian Moorman could be seen spotted brushing up stuff around the new courthouse site.

Later on in the day when the event was long over my friends and I saw JP with a couple people still doing landscaping…I don’t think I can ever have a negative opinion of Losman anymore after I’ve witnessed how much he genuinely cares about Buffalo.

Ralph Wilson always says that a downtown stadium would never work because Buffalonians would never pay the $65 it would cost to go see the Bills.

Lies.

*Cleveland only has tickets for the 2007 season in the upper deck ‘family zone’ for $32. Everything else is sold out. Their downtown stadium opened in 1999.

*Pittsburgh tickets vary from $59 to $212. Heinz Field opened in 2001.

*Detroit has tickets avalible from $40-$70. Pretty affordable for a new domed stadium.

*Cincinatti tickets vary from $60 to $78. As long as their winning, Paul Brown stadium is packed with a passionate fan base.

All these cities have similar economies and other than Detroit-similar populations. Drive around Williamsville or Orchard Park or Waterfront Village or see the list of new high-end retailers coming to the Galleria Mall and tell me there is no money to go around in this area. Then see how obsessed people are here with the Bills and tell me they wouldn’t spend the money on tickets to see their obsession in person in a beautiful downtown stadium.

A great site for a new stadium could/should be built over Perry Street in the cobblestone district, absorbing the surface lots behind the HSBC atrium and the HSBC arena. Google Map it for better visualization. Incorporate a new convnetion center and you have a potential date with a Super Bowl. Too expensive to have a retractable roof? They are closing in on getting one in Cleveland. Its right next to the Light Rail, Thruway, Amtrak, waterfront, and central business district (parking garages/surface lots included).

After seeing the rest of the rust belt build brand new NFL stadiums and then sell most if not all of their “expensive” tickets consistently afterwards, I’d like to know the real reason why Ralph doesn’t want the Bills to have a new downtown stadium.

Like with any big public project- its almost always feasible as long as the public wants it badly enough to make it happen.

Checking out the sale items at UrbanOutfitters.com since anything else they have is out my price range and I came across this!

Bills fans aren’t known for being on the cutting edge of fashion (although I have a lot of respect for people who rock Zubaz pants) but now they can look chique…kinda.

Miami certainly has a very different lifestyle than Buffalo, but apparently Willis only drove around Clarence and OP when he was looking for things to do..

Coming from Miami, I was used to partying, going out, just having something to do every night. Restaurants, whatever. Going to Buffalo, it was like hitting a brick wall. Like, ‘Damn!’ Can’t go out, can’t do nothing. There’s an Applebee’s, a TGI Friday’s, and they just got a Dave & Busters. They got that, and I’m like, ‘What the?’ And, you know, the women …

Buffalo gets a bad rap for having nothing to do but jesus that’s the stupidest story I’ve heard form someone telling me that there’s nothing in Buffalo.

Here’s the rest of the interview in the Baltimore Sun

Hahaha. But the thing about “the women” did make me chuckle a bit. Then again, I think he’s impregnated enough women, no need to be looking for new ones.

William C. Rhoden has a book out about the stuggles of African American quaterbacks and this link is an exceprt of chapter 5 which is about former Buffalo Bills quaterback, James Harris who goes through the ordinary stresses of being on a preseason roster, and then some.

Rhoden usually pushes his agenda and I try to ignore everthing that comes out of his mouth ever since he declared that black athletes who make millions in the NBA and NFL are today’s slaves. But in this book excerpt, his interviews do the talking instead of him, and thats good.