Well, lo and behold, I might actually owe the Buffalo News an apology for all the time I’ve spent poking fun at their atrocious coverage of the Bills stadium demands. The day after Terry Pegula won the bidding to purchase the Bills, here’s what the News ran today:
Pegulas’ winning bid makes stadium decision less urgent
ALBANY – The decision about whether the Buffalo Bills will get a new stadium, renovate their existing home or keep things as they are for now has become less urgent, now that Terry and Kim Pegula have been announced as the winning bidders for the team.
Okay, so it’s just recounting what some state leaders say, and is more “We don’t have to build a stadium just yet” than “Do we need to build a stadium at all?” (Sen. Charles Schumer says Pegula’s purchase provides a chance to “take a look at how we can collectively surmount the challenges to a new stadium that would strengthen the franchise for decades to come.”) But still, at least Buffalo residents are getting a break from the constant drumbeat of how a new stadium needs to be discussed immedi — sorry, what’s that, WGRZ-TV?
Pegula Purchase Re-ignites Stadium Talk
Never mind.
Someone forgot to make the daily cash drop over at the Buffalo News, apparently.
The new owner will have to learn that he needs a bagman on staff to handle all the payola you have to dish out to grease a few of the commoners who think they run things, in order to get them to run things the way us ownership class types expect them to be run, if you catch my drift.
I love the smell of public stadium cash in the morning!
Wonder if any politician is going to have the stones to say something like, “Yeah, don’t even bother asking for tax dollars as long as you still have a commissioner who gave Rice two games then probably lied about numerous things regarding the tape of the incident.”
If that’s ever anything close to becoming an issue, I expect Goodell will be thrown under the bus in a matter of seconds.
I believe the same. It’s going to take sponsors bailing or the threat of losing all those hundreds of millions of public money for something to happen. Otherwise people’s outrage will last until about kickoff on Sunday and Goodell will keep his job.
I think Ralph Wilson Stadium is just fine, it’s getting renovations, just continue to renovate it. Western New York is a blue-collar community, they don’t need all the bells and whistles for an NFL game, they just want a good experience and the team to win football games.
I believe some teams in the NFL just need to step-back and look at the stadium situation and realize that it may not be worth it. The only teams that really and quite badly need new stadium are the Chargers & Raiders.
The fans will continue to shower the league with money no matter how many horrific domestic violence examples come up. It’s what mindless sheep do. Let’s not forget that one of the league’s once prominent receivers is still in jail for having the mother of his child murdered. There are other former NFL players in jail for violent crimes as well many famous players who’s celebrity allowed them to avoid incarceration for same.
I’m told fans not only showed up in Baltimore the other night, several “Rice” jerseys were being worn – by women.
For whatever reason, the general public is outraged about baseball players using PEDs, yet finds football players far greater use of them to be a trivial matter. Perhaps domestic violence will be judged more equally across all sports… perhaps not. Who provokes more public anger, Ray Rice, Michael Vick, Ray Lewis or Barry Bonds?
No, I don’t understand it either…
@ John a laden
Yep, they’re just mindless sheep. Just like the people who watch tv and movies after all the sex scandals, drug convictions and murders.
Most of the football fans I know are very conflicted about their fandom after this week, if they weren’t already after all the brain trauma revelations. The problem is they really like football, and are having a tough time reconciling the two with no other option.
I think a more accurate word, John, is “addicts.”
Maybe rugby will take off if the NFL implodes.
It would probably be helpful to start with a reevaluation of what the NFL is–it is an athletic competition, not a “celebration of our city,” an economic development project, or a reflection of ourselves and our merits.
All recognize that times have been tough in Western NY for a while, but if things didn’t get better during all those Super Bowls, I doubt they’ll get better for the occasional AFC East title in a new stadium with suites left open because there are no companies to rent them. So maybe the newspaper would be well advised to look elsewhere for inspiration.
“The fans will continue to shower the league with money no matter how many horrific domestic violence examples come up. It’s what mindless sheep do.”
Sorry, John, but that’s a ridiculous statement. Of course there’s a limit to how many cases of “horrific domestic violence” fans would put up with before giving up on a sport. But there’s no reason to think that limit is going to be reached anytime soon – and it has nothing to do with being “mindless sheep”. There are always some stupid, gullible people who will defend the indefensible. But most fans realize that for every Ray Rice there are 100 players who are solid citizens.
While we’re at it, let’s put a moratorium on the use of phrases like “mindless sheep”. (Special demerits to the next idiot who uses the egregious “sheeple”.) It’s a lazy way of denigrating large groups of people who don’t see an issue as you do. When given all the information required to make an “enlightened” decision, most people will act in a thoughtful way. Uninformed is not mindless.
Keith:
If you buy that the overall arrest rate among NFL players is about 13% and if you want to define ‘solid citizen’ as ‘not having been arrested’, then it’s more like there are 7 players that are solid citizens for every Ray Rice, not 100.