OT: The Buffalo Bills on borrowed time in western NY and the AFC East?

[QuiGon]

As for determining fan support, you cannot use either tickets sold or percentage capacity as a measuring stick without looking at the situation. The Patriots can only sell 68,000 seats a game, but they probably could sell 75,000 or 80,000 tickets pretty easily if they had them. So do the Patriots have a weaker fan support because they sell less tickets to the game than the Bills eventhough the Bills don't sell out? I mean the Bills sell more tickets than the Patriots. So the Bills fans must be more loyal to their team than the Pats based on your estimates.

I am done dealing with upstater's idiocy, but there are still some interesting points I feel can be addressed...

Having these attendance discussions are difficult because there is no single standard employed by every team. For example, the capacity of Gillette is 68,756. By an amazing coincidence, the Patriots reported an attendance of 68,756 people in every single game last year. Seriously... go check out the box scores and you will see that exact attendance figure for all the games. So the actual number of people in attendance is probably over 70,000 once you throw in the SRO's. There's no way that exactly the same amount of people went through the gates for every game. So whatever standard the Pats use seems not to be the same as other teams.

 

[upstater1]

I never lied or mislead anything about the ticket sales. I mistakenly put the wrong word in an arguement that would have easily been corrected if you looked at my previous posts when I clearly stated that Buffalo is dead last in average ticket prices. You are the one who still maintains there are 80,000 seats when I gave you evidence to the otherwise.

I really don't get you. You refuse to admit you are wrong ever and rather accuse people of lying than admit you are wrong.

Funny, if you talked civilly to me I would admit I was wrong when I was, but you are obviously not mature enough to have an adult conversation and continue to go on about these imaginary 15,000 seats under a tarp that doesn't exist.

Maybe you will learn from this experience and gain some maturity. I kinda doubt it though.

Man, you can't read. I wrote you're an obfuscarter because you want to get away from the actual topic at hand, which is Buffalo's pull with its fans in the community. You use bogus and made up facts to get your point across. Now you're saying you made a mistake in one of your posts. Fine. But it doesn't change the fact that you made a lot of other inaccurate boasts, and especially that you still stick by the idea that % capacity is more telling than tickets sold.

Buffalo has been 8th or 9th in tix sold prior to last year. Do you deny this?

First off, I was the first one to mention here that Buffalo's stadium had been renovated, that it had 80,000 capacity. When you provided a link that reaffirmed that it had been renovated and that the seats had been removed, I immediately responded to it not by countering it, but by saying that it's interesting that they removed seats without making more space. in other words, the tarp is still there over a dead area. You would have assumed they did it to make more space. one can only conclude that it was done to allow them to beat the NFL's sellout rule. I wrote this DIRECTLY after your post.

I was the first one that mentioned that ESPN is wrong to use 80,000 seat capacity, and that the actual capacity was significantly less than that. Nevertheless, as the game against Miami showed, Buffalo could fit more than 80,000 people into its stadium in seats if it wanted to. But they don't.

 

[upstater1]

I am done dealing with upstater's idiocy

Thank god, I knew you were pretty busy with your own. I was wondering where you were finding the extra energy.

 

[upstater1]

Yeah, you continue to lie about 15,000 seats that don't exist.

As for the distance, I looked on a map and based on the legend it looked like Rochester was 100 miles away from Buffalo. Sorry it is only 75.

http://www.mapquest.com/directions/...1s=ny&1z=&2pn=&2a=&2c=rochester&2s=ny&2z=&r=f

Ralph Wilson Stadium is about 80 miles away:

http://www.mapquest.com/directions/...Monroe+County&2pn=&2a=&2c=Rochester&2s=NY&2z=

Ok, can you stop bring up these same whiney little arguements like a little baby?

It's less than 75. Just look at the official stats.

I was the first one to bring up Bills stadium's football capacity as being less than ESPN's assumed 74,000, and yet you continued to cite ESPN. The additional 15,000? Huh? What are you talking about? Are we still comparing Bills Stadium to Gillette? My God, we already went through that, and I responded to that by saying my number 15,000 was off. Once shown the facts I quickly admitted I was off on that. Unlike you who can't stand to be shown his error in harping on % capacity as though it were more telling than tickets sold. Ludicrous.

 

[upstater1]

As for determining fan support, you cannot use either tickets sold or percentage capacity as a measuring stick without looking at the situation. The Patriots can only sell 68,000 seats a game, but they probably could sell 75,000 or 80,000 tickets pretty easily if they had them. So do the Patriots have a weaker fan support because they sell less tickets to the game than the Bills eventhough the Bills don't sell out?

I never made that argument. Did someone here make that argument? No.

So admit it then, you think the Bills fans are more passionate than Patriots fans. You can't have it both ways.

This is the sort of illogic and ridiculous speculation and bogus facts that I've come to expect from you.

Ok, so now I answered your silly little questions that you seem to not get past. Can you move on now? Or are you going to waste people's time acting like a whiney little baby?

You haven't answered it at all. You still can't admit that tickets sold is a LOT more relevant than % capacity. You still can't do it because your entire thinking on this subject is based on that, and your thinking is faulty. Your very own link showed that the Bills regularly finished 8th or 9th in the league in tickets sold up until last year when they finished 14th or 15th (I forget which one). Yet you want to spin this idea that their ticket situation is weak. Compared to the other 32 NFL teams, it is NOT weak.

And how do you try to justify your spin? With this bogus stat about % capacity. Never mind that the numbers you used were wrong (as you admitted) but you're sticking to the validity of the stat itself. Why? Because the Bills are at the bottom of the league in it and it suits you. But as I said, PSU with 100,000 fans doesn't fare to well in % capacity either.

 

[Rob0729]

I never made that argument. Did someone here make that argument? No.



This is the sort of illogic and ridiculous speculation and bogus facts that I've come to expect from you.



You haven't answered it at all. You still can't admit that tickets sold is a LOT more relevant than % capacity. You still can't do it because your entire thinking on this subject is based on that, and your thinking is faulty. Your very own link showed that the Bills regularly finished 8th or 9th in the league in tickets sold up until last year when they finished 14th or 15th (I forget which one). Yet you want to spin this idea that their ticket situation is weak. Compared to the other 32 NFL teams, it is NOT weak.

And how do you try to justify your spin? With this bogus stat about % capacity. Never mind that the numbers you used were wrong (as you admitted) but you're sticking to the validity of the stat itself. Why? Because the Bills are at the bottom of the league in it and it suits you. But as I said, PSU with 100,000 fans doesn't fare to well in % capacity either.

I am done on this subject, but if you want to keep arguing with me go right ahead. You seem to argue with me better when you put words in my mouth anyway.

Do you happen to post on any other boards under a different screen name? There is only one other person I have ever seen argue irrationally like this.

 

[DaBruinz]

I never lied or mislead anything about the ticket sales. I mistakenly put the wrong word in an arguement that would have easily been corrected if you looked at my previous posts when I clearly stated that Buffalo is dead last in average ticket prices. You are the one who still maintains there are 80,000 seats when I gave you evidence to the otherwise.

You also claimed that they were near last in capacity. Look at post 78 if you need to have your memory refreshed.

I really don't get you. You refuse to admit you are wrong ever and rather accuse people of lying than admit you are wrong.

Pot/kettle/black

Funny, if you talked civilly to me I would admit I was wrong when I was, but you are obviously not mature enough to have an adult conversation and continue to go on about these imaginary 15,000 seats under a tarp that doesn't exist.

Maybe you will learn from this experience and gain some maturity. I kinda doubt it though.

Could you please submit a link that says these seats don't exist? The link I provided "Ralph Wilson Facts and Figures" does not mention that the seats were removed. I have searched and all I can find is the ambiguous "seating capacity reduced". There are many reasons seating capacity can be reduced including new building codes. The seats can still exist, but they can't be used. I am told this is what happened at Northeastern's Matthews Arena.

 

[Rob0729]

How did the link prove you right? You were the one pointing to the ESPN page and saying that the Bills only had 84.5% capicity, the lowest in the league (you pointed to it twice). Your using those numbers in your initial post and a subsequent post and then trying to claim you were talking about 73967 as sell-out attendance is nothing but you backtracking. I went back and re-read the thread. You changed your tune in back to back posts of yours. Post #78 and Post #84.

You were wrong and now you have backtracked to say that you were correct. You weren't. And this also flies against a statement you made where you claim that you admit when you are wrong.

You also were the one who implied that the Bills wouldn't be able to find 88 sponsors for luxury boxes, yet you ignored my pointing out that they already have 86 "luxury" boxes and 76 "dugout" boxes currently. Could you please show me where you admitted to being wrong about that?

One of the things I have noticed, Rob, is that other people put up things and you later lay claim to the one pointing out the information. A perfect example is the Renovation of Ralph Wilson Stadium. Upstarter mentioned it first in post #28. Yet, later in the thread, you attempt to use that same renovation comment to support your argument.

Rob, your original claim was that Buffalo is a small market team and that the League is probably going to move them. You cited capacity records from ESPN that were proven to be inaccurate.

The only credit I can give you is that you admit that Wilson hasn't done enough to increase his team's revenue.

According to ESPN's site they did have the lowest percentage of attendance and their average attendance according to their site is 6,321 below capacity on their site. I didn't crunch the numbers to see that their calculations were wrong and I admitted it. Sorry you didn't see that. Typically, you would think ESPN would get something like that right.

As for stealing upstarter's point, that is BS. I stated that they reduced the number of capicity in 1998. All he said is that the Bills did renovations without saying what the renovations were and he claims that all they did was throw a tarp over the empty seats. He was completely unware that the seat reduction was due to the Bills putting in bigger seats. I will conceed I used his arguement against him to prove that there aren't 80,000 seats in the stadium like he claims if you like.

I will admit I am wrong about the luxury boxes too. DaBruinz I have seen you posts way back to the ESPN board in the early 2000s and I have never ever remembered seeing you admit you were wrong. So don't get all selfrighteous with me.

Now will get off my back. I don't need to you to follow me around telling me I am ducking questions and trying to bully me like I have seen you do with others for years. I am too old for this crap. If you want to discuss things civilly, then that's fine. Otherwise, just leave me alone.

 

[Rob0729]

You also claimed that they were near last in capacity. Look at post 78 if you need to have your memory refreshed.




Pot/kettle/black



Could you please submit a link that says these seats don't exist? The link I provided "Ralph Wilson Facts and Figures" does not mention that the seats were removed. I have searched and all I can find is the ambiguous "seating capacity reduced". There are many reasons seating capacity can be reduced including new building codes. The seats can still exist, but they can't be used. I am told this is what happened at Northeastern's Matthews Arena.

I think I have said all I need to say to you on this matter.

 

[DaBruinz]

According to ESPN's site they did have the lowest percentage of attendance and their average attendance according to their site is 6,321 below capacity on their site. I didn't crunch the numbers to see that their calculations were wrong and I admitted it. Sorry you didn't see that. Typically, you would think ESPN would get something like that right.

One of the things that I try and do is make sure that the math adds up.

Now, something to think about. ESPN is reporting that the capacity is 80,024. That was the capacity PRIOR to whatever changes were made in 1998. If those seats are still there, but there is an agreement in place with the state not to use them OR state building codes now no longer allow their use, then the official capacity would be the 73967. It doesn't mean those seats don't exist. It just means they can't be used.

As for stealing upstarter's point, that is BS. I stated that they reduced the number of capicity in 1998. All he said is that the Bills did renovations without saying what the renovations were and he claims that all they did was throw a tarp over the empty seats. He was completely unware that the seat reduction was due to the Bills putting in bigger seats. I will conceed I used his arguement against him to prove that there aren't 80,000 seats in the stadium like he claims if you like.

Except that you haven't proven that they physically reduced the number of seats. You also didn't prove that they reduced the number of seats because they couldn't sell out games. It was an assumption by the website link (Wikipedia) that you provided. As I said, I went looking and could find nothing to support your claim that they physically removed seats. In fact, what I found was that in 1999 people were complaining that the new seats in certain sections were SMALLER and weren't to code. If you'd like, I can provide that link for you if you'd like.

Can you provide a link (other than to Wikipedia) specifying what the renovations were? What I have found was that the renovations affected the "CLUB" seats (making 6000 of them heated) , the Luxury boxes and the adding of the "Dugout" boxes. Any more information would be appreciated.

I will admit I am wrong about the luxury boxes too. DaBruinz I have seen you posts way back to the ESPN board in the early 2000s and I have never ever remembered seeing you admit you were wrong. So don't get all selfrighteous with me.

Then your memory is faulty because I admitted to being wrong PLENTY of times there and over here. And that includes my being wrong about Corey Dillon.

Now will get off my back. I don't need to you to follow me around telling me I am ducking questions and trying to bully me like I have seen you do with others for years. I am too old for this crap. If you want to discuss things civilly, then that's fine. Otherwise, just leave me alone.

I was talking civilly to you. And, yes, earlier you did duck things. I didn't mention that here in the post you replied to, so why are you bringing them up? OH, and don't flatter yourself. I am not following you around. I happen to be a participant in this thread and addressed your claims directly without insult. You seem to be the one having an issue with this.

 

[DaBruinz]

I think I have said all I need to say to you on this matter.

A perfect example of you DUCKING a question asked of you. You were asked to provide a link to show where the Bills physically removed the seats to reduce the capacity and, instead of doing so, you throw out a lame statement.

Articles that I have found point to the seats being primarily in the club sections. The other seats were "upgraded" by putting cup holders on the arm-rests of the seats. There was also question as to whether the new seats they put in met building codes because they shrunk the aisles.

BIGGER seats doesn't necessarily mean bigger in WIDTH. They could have been bigger in length and in depth.

 

[jimmyjames]

thought i was going to have to wait for a josh mcdaniels thread to break this out...

 

[Rob0729]

A perfect example of you DUCKING a question asked of you. You were asked to provide a link to show where the Bills physically removed the seats to reduce the capacity.

I'm not ducking you. I provided a link from Answers.com that said it. If you want further proof get it yourself.

Here are where the seats went:

In 1998, as team owner Ralph Wilson Jr. renewed his lease at the stadium, a series of major renovations took place that increased the number of suites fourfold and introduced premium indoor seats.

http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stories/2007/03/12/story3.html?jst=s_cn_hl

Where are they going to get the room for these premium seats without taking away some on the regular seats? Premium seats and boxes are usually in center of the stands for maximum viewing. It is very safe to assume that you cannot increase the number of suites by four times and add indoor seats without losing quite a few regular seats. I don't know if I can give you any more evidence, but I think it is clear enough for any reasonable person to know where those seats went when they renovated.

Are we done yet. I have not ducked any of your questions. If I use poor ESPN data, then write ESPN about it. I don't know what more you want.

Are you done yet?

 

[Rob0729]

thought i was going to have to wait for a josh mcdaniels thread to break this out...

Nope. I guess we are all acting like kids and jackasses long before the season starts. Without NEM here anymore, the Josh McDaniels threads will not have level of stupidity they had last year.

I wonder if the offense explodes though this season will opinions of McDaniels change or will they say the talent will overcome his moronic coaching.

Oops! I now started another 300 posts of idiocy to come.

 

[Rob0729]

DaBruinz, before you post anything else. I am done. I am not doing it to duck your questions. I am doing it because this arguement is useless at this point because we are rehashing the same old arguements and you just want to call me out on every single little point. It isn't productive and it is just another example how you like to beat down people who don't agree with you.

 

[DaBruinz]

I'm not ducking you. I provided a link from Answers.com that said it. If you want further proof get it yourself.

Here are where the seats went:

In 1998, as team owner Ralph Wilson Jr. renewed his lease at the stadium, a series of major renovations took place that increased the number of suites fourfold and introduced premium indoor seats.

http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stories/2007/03/12/story3.html?jst=s_cn_hl

Where are they going to get the room for these premium seats without taking away some on the regular seats? Premium seats and boxes are usually in center of the stands for maximum viewing. It is very safe to assume that you cannot increase the number of suites by four times and add indoor seats without losing quite a few regular seats. I don't know if I can give you any more evidence, but I think it is clear enough for any reasonable person to know where those seats went when they renovated.

Are we done yet. I have not ducked any of your questions. If I use poor ESPN data, then write ESPN about it. I don't know what more you want.

Are you done yet?

You know, you really should look at what you are posting. The link from Answer.com actually comes from WIKIPEDIA. And the Wikipedia page only speculated that the reduction in seats was to meet TV blackout requirements.

Now, I suggest you go back to your own posts and read them because, until now, you didn't say a thing about the seats going into the luxury boxes or the club seating. You just said they were removed for "larger seats". If you are going to claim that you meant the boxes and club seating, I am going to laugh at you.

The fact remains that your original premise that Buffalo is a "small market" team and will be moved by the NFL when Ralph Wilson dies. All that has happened is that its been proven that your premise was flimsy at best. Including you mentioning that it was unlikely that the Bills could sell 86 luxury boxes. The fact is that they have 88 luxury boxes and another 76 "dugout" boxes that they sell.

I think its pretty clear that Wilson hasn't managed things as well as possible and that he could raise the ticket prices $10 across the board and it probably won't negatively impact his bottom line as long as he puts a decent product on the field.

 

[DaBruinz]

DaBruinz, before you post anything else. I am done. I am not doing it to duck your questions. I am doing it because this arguement is useless at this point because we are rehashing the same old arguements and you just want to call me out on every single little point. It isn't productive and it is just another example how you like to beat down people who don't agree with you.

Another faulty premise on your part. All I was doing was addressing points you claimed as settled that really weren't. And I was addressing what appeared to be inconsistencies in your own arguemnt.

If that ruffles your feathers, then you need to get thicker skin. Nothing I have said is an example of beating you down because you don't agree with me. I haven't called you a moron or stupid or an idiot or anything of the sort. I have addressed you civilly and called you on things that you did ignore, intentionally or not.

 

[upstater1]

You know, you really should look at what you are posting. The link from Answer.com actually comes from WIKIPEDIA. And the Wikipedia page only speculated that the reduction in seats was to meet TV blackout requirements.

Now, I suggest you go back to your own posts and read them because, until now, you didn't say a thing about the seats going into the luxury boxes or the club seating. You just said they were removed for "larger seats". If you are going to claim that you meant the boxes and club seating, I am going to laugh at you.

The fact remains that your original premise that Buffalo is a "small market" team and will be moved by the NFL when Ralph Wilson dies. All that has happened is that its been proven that your premise was flimsy at best. Including you mentioning that it was unlikely that the Bills could sell 86 luxury boxes. The fact is that they have 88 luxury boxes and another 76 "dugout" boxes that they sell.

I think its pretty clear that Wilson hasn't managed things as well as possible and that he could raise the ticket prices $10 across the board and it probably won't negatively impact his bottom line as long as he puts a decent product on the field.

I can tell you what was there before and after.

http://www.buffalobills.com/facility/SeatingChart.jsp

Jim Kelly's club boxes were there before, as were the press club boxes. They added luxry boxes in the end zone, Seneca Club, Goal line club, red zone club. Were seats removed from the end zone to make those clubs? It could be, but I seem to recall a short end zone tier with now current new construction there. On the flip side of the end zone, near the scoreboard, those are also new boxes. Now, in the past when I've been to the stadium, I've seen tarps on 338, 339, 328, 329, 316, 317, 306, 307. Not the light blue LL, but the corner tier dark blue, what they call UD-21-38. Now, just for the heck of it, I tried to buy season tickets on the website in those sections, and sure enough, I couldn't buy any tickets in the above named sections, which were the worst seats in the house. I tried to make it more difficult on the purchasing system by requesting 10 seats together in UD. None available, they kicked me over to the red section in the middle. That means there are no 10 seats together in any of the dark blue upper tier. So I tried 8 seats together and found them, but not in the corner sections that are the worst in the house.

You have to wonder, why do the Bills make it very difficult to sit in those corner sections?

We're talking about 4 to 8 sections of 30 seats a row, of 18 rows. That's 4320 seats. Not the 6,000 that gets you down to 74,000, but a good chunk nonetheless that they tarp. They may have pulled another 3k seats from elsewhere in the stadium to build some more, but I know I've seen the blue tarp in those areas during sellouts. And now you can't buy tickets in those sections.

Hmmmm.

I may be wrong, and really, this whole question of whether the seats exist is meaningless. The subject is whether Buffalo purposely cut down capacity in order to meet the nFL's sellout clause. Everyone here agrees on that. No one knows exactly how many seats were pulled in the renovation. So, why is this so controversial?

 

[upstater1]

I am done on this subject, but if you want to keep arguing with me go right ahead. You seem to argue with me better when you put words in my mouth anyway.

Do you happen to post on any other boards under a different screen name? There is only one other person I have ever seen argue irrationally like this.

I'm the irrational one who puts words in your mouth? Dude, look at your previous post. Look what you wrote:

Originally Posted by Rob0729. So do the Patriots have a weaker fan support because they sell less tickets to the game than the Bills eventhough the Bills don't sell out?

So admit it then, you think the Bills fans are more passionate than Patriots fans. You can't have it both ways.
This is the sort of illogic and ridiculous speculation and bogus facts that I've come to expect from you.

LOL, man, you accuse me of putting words in your mouth, and that's what you did in the post preceding yours. Too funny. You're the type of guy that tries to fudge things in an argument, and you accuse the person of using the tactics thart you're employing instead. I think I've met you before. This is getting to be pretty damn pathetic and funny.

 

[AzPatsFan]

We are talking salary cap vs. money paid out. These are two different things. The Pats pay out actual dollars well over the cap virtually every year. Are they violating the cap rules? No. Dollars actual paid are totally different than the actual cap.

For example, Adalius Thomas cost the Patriots $13 million this year, but he only counts $3.4 million vs. the cap. Wes Welker got a $5.5 million bonus, but only counts $1.7 million towards the cap. So those two players are going to get paid $19 million by the Patriots this year between the two, but only count $5.1 million vs. the cap.

The Pats will most likely be under the $113 million adjusted cap, but I wouldn't be surprised that they will actually pay over $140 million in actual money this year. Again, it is real dollars vs. salary cap dollars.

People keep talking about the cap as if it means everything about how much a team can afford to pay in actual dollars for up front bonuses. Signing bonuses can be amortized over the life of the contract that gives higher revenue teams more of an advantage because they can afford to shell out monster signing bonuses and it won't make a huge effect on their profitability or operating revenues.

Again this is simple economics, not salary cap issues. If you have a $100 million cap and a player counts $3.4 million vs. the cap, but you paid him $13 million in real dollars; you most likely have spent far more more money the the actual salary cap for that year.

So who cares what the revenues vs. the cap. The cap is a BS number when it comes to determining how much a team spends in salaries every year. High revenue teams like the Patriots spend well over the cap every single year.

You are half correct. When a player is signed with a big SB the money goes to him that year.

But the rest of his contract the SB is an accounitng amortization cipher. If the guy signed a $100 million dollar 10 year deal and $50 was SB in year one, the club acutually pays him $55 million. Every other year his cap is $10 million but they only pay $5 million out of pocket.

To say the Pats cap is $113 million and they spend all of it, may mean they have half or twice as much out of pocket depending on the signings that year.