Swap Raptors for Bills?

[buffalobillsfootball]

Swap Raptors for Bills? TheStar.com - Sports - Swap Raptors for Bills?

Swap of home dates could be ideal deal

 

February 22, 2007

Dave Perkins

 

Rumours are flying around the Internet, sparked or at least exacerbated by comments made by running back Willie McGahee about moving the Buffalo Bills to Toronto.

 

McGahee told Penthouse it should happen. This was merely his personal preference, yet a relatively simple comment to a one-hand magazine has morphed into something more serious.

 

A Buffalo-area political website (www.PoliticsNY.net) takes it much further: It purports to quote Tom Golisano, who owns the Sabres, as saying the Bills are going to move to Toronto and assume another name. Buffalo would retain the name Bills (the way Cleveland kept the name Browns) and, upon construction of a downtown domed stadium, the Queen City, i.e. Golisano, would then be gifted with an expansion team and, sooner or later, a Super Bowl.

 

Well. That's a lot to digest and since it has been the position here, for 30 years, that there won't be an NFL team in Toronto in this lifetime, at least, I'm buying none of this.

 

But what's to stop a little intra-city cooperation between Buffalo and Toronto? Why couldn't Larry Tanenbaum "give" Buffalo a couple of Raptors games – say two of the 41 for a couple of years – and in return, Toronto could get that 2008 regular season non-U.S. NFL game for which Toronto is a frontrunner?

 

Think about it. Tanenbaum, who rides the fastest horse in the gang known as Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, is on record with Ted Rogers, who owns the Blue Jays and the stadium formerly known as SkyDome, as wanting an NFL team for Toronto if and when possible.

 

So show some good faith here. Larry could let the Raps play a couple of games in Buffalo, maybe against the Knicks, who would doubtless sell out in New York state, and the Celtics or Detroit or somebody else. There are plenty of midweek crowds of 13,000 at the Air Canada Centre over the course of a long season. If anybody here missed a couple of games, they could be made optional for season-ticket holders.

 

The Raps could develop a large potential U.S. market, one they don't actively harvest at all – and yes, I know, it's nuts to suggest MLSE ever leaves a dollar on any table anywhere. Buffalo has a good sports history, remember, and a handful of colleges, which suggests a basketball audience of some size, even though the Braves lasted only eight seasons in the NBA in the 1970s before becoming the Clippers. (By the way, the TorBuff Braves, as we called them, played 16 "home'' games in Toronto from 1971 to '75. So there's precedent.) Sure, the Raps would have costs they wouldn't have at the ACC, but market the games right in a nice 19,000-seat building and they shouldn't take too much of a hit.

 

The Bills, meanwhile, also have a couple of games every December with rotten weather and 15,000 empty seats at Ralph Wilson Stadium. So pull one of those out of Buffalo in 2008 and move it the 100 miles to Rogers' stadium. Larry and Ted could sell the popcorn and get their foot in the NFL door. Plus, each city gets a little something, rather than the biggest bankroll doing all the talking.

 

Goofy idea? Maybe. But it makes a lot more sense than that other one.

 

WILL THE WORD BE GOOD? The word on the best words in baseball broadcasting comes today when the hall of fame announces its recipient of the 2007 Ford C. Frick Award.

 

Blue Jays' Day One guy Tom Cheek, for the second year in succession since his passing in the fall of 2005, is on the 10-man short list for the honour.

 

Cheek's many fans are well aware of his ample qualifications to have won the award by now, but that doesn't mean he's a slam dunk to nose out the likes of Tony Kubek, Dizzy Dean, Ken Harrelson, Bill King and five other worthies when the call is made in Cooperstown, N.Y.

 

If it's not today, we'll look to next year for Cheek. Better late than never and it's already late.

[colin]

one game wouldn't hurt