Commissioner announces Toronto plan for Bills

[Wolf]

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- The NFL map will include Canada now that the Buffalo Bills will play an annual regular-season game in Toronto starting this year.

Citing the "tremendous amount of interest" the Bills generate across neighboring southern Ontario, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced Friday that the team will play a regular-season game in Toronto in each of the next five seasons.

The plan also includes three Bills preseason games -- one every other year starting this season -- in Toronto during that stretch.

The NFL has played games outside the United States, most recently when Miami faced the New York Giants in London in October. But the Bills will be the league's first team to do it annually.

http://www.nfl.com/news/story?id=090...o&confirm=true

I wonder how the CFL feels about that

[ATX]

Didn't the CFL have plans to include a few American cities in the league or possibly already had a few some time back?

[bigfan77801]

I seem to recall talk abut Houston going after Baltimore's CFL team after Butt Adams left

[Marcus]

I wonder how the Bills' season ticket holders feel about being able to go to only 7 home games for the next five years instead of 8 games. With no reduction is price, no doubt.

[Hervoyel]

Originally Posted by Marcus

I wonder how the Bills' season ticket holders feel about being able to go to only 7 home games for the next five years instead of 8 games. With no reduction is price, no doubt.

Exactly my thoughts. The NFL is the "National" football league. The "nation" in question is the United States. When is it going to be enough for these jack asses who own teams? Why do we have to generate interest in Europe, Canada, and Mexico? How long before this guy decides that one Texans home game a year should be played in Mexico City because of the "strong interest in the NFL in that country"? You know it won't be Cowboys season ticket holders who get dicked over when that happens. It will be Texans fans who will lose a game.

In my opinion the NFL is making a huge mistake by trying to spread it's product to thin. I'm sure I'm just being a xenophobic isolationist but right about now I think Buffalo season ticket holders would probably agree with me.

[Giant Tiger]

Originally Posted by Wolf

http://www.nfl.com/news/story?id=090...o&confirm=true

I wonder how the CFL feels about that

Sports radio stations have been speculating since around October that some sort of agreement like this was bound to happen. I don't know about New York state tax laws, but the Ottawa sports radio station was saying Ralph Wilson would eventually sell the team due to state tax laws on inheritance; that he doesn't want his family to be stuck with a large tax bill.

They also said it would be a good fit to sell the team to a Toronto group but they would like to have a few games to test the market first. So it sounds like it's the first step.

I have a couple of problems with this:

1-Up here, the bills think they own NFL fans-like we owe them our allegiance. I know some people find Cowboy fans arrogant, but trust me- up here buffalo fans are much worse. The Ottawa station said the bills consider Ontario to be their territory. It's not even a Toronto station that said that. It's starting already.

2-An NFL team in Toronto (with the huge media) means they'll expect to be "Canada's Team". How sickening is that? Toronto this, Toronto that, Toronto the other. We're stuck with that now with the Blue Jays (no I don't cheer for them). A lose lose situation.

As for buffalo fans losing a home game, with the NFL playing international games; it eliminates buffalo's unfair advantage. They would have wanted their international "home game" to be in Toronto anyway, so that would have given them an extra home game compared to teams that have to play in Europe. I wonder if the "visiting team" has any say where they play their international game. I can't picture any team agreeing to it- especially if their "home game" was where the fan support was 50-50 or so.

So there you go. I'm Canadian but my favorite (notice how I spell favorite with no "u") team will always be the Houston Texans. I've been a fan since Day 1.