When Ackles said "no Grey Cup", he meant no real national championship as the western div. teams will be all that's left of Canadian football if an NFL franchise comes to Toronto. But the east div. is a complete joke anyways, and has been for about 25 years, with all the teams going bancrupt and being managed like a fly-by-night flea markets. They don't even have full-time scouts like the western teams, and instead rely on other teams castoffs and NFL rejects to fill out their rosters.
But I guess the Argos and Cats have had their moment in the sun. They gave away their subscriber lists to the Bills marketing dept in return for hope of being "mentioned" in Goodell's news conference (being carried Live on the nothing less than the NFL network!)...with all of Toronto preening at being mentioned in the big leagues!!
Anybody who thinks that only Rogers and Tannenbaum want an NFL team are naive. People seem to assume that no one in Buffalo is gonna step up and buy the Bills. What about that small town called Los Angeles? Who’s to say that someone (anyone of 300 million people), with no affiliation to Buffalo buys the Bills?
PS Toronto is not the only city vying for NFL games, Montreal wants an exhibition and didn’t Edmonton want to also host a game?
Well I guess The CFL is doomed! Montreal, Edmonton and Toronto are getting NFL teams.
The media in Toronto need to make their collective egos bigger. Stephen Brunt pretty much said that Toronto should be picked before LA.
But who's to say more games are going to be played in Toronto? We're talking about 8 games in what, 4 or 5 years? It could very well turn out that Canadians don't care about the Bills and attendance numbers will start to sag and the whole project may just get scrapped.
I think people are getting a little too worked up about this issue right now. A lot of things can happen in the next few years.
More important than finding billionaire bidders for NFL franchises, is the concessions forthcoming from the civic and state governments.
U.S. cities have bent over backwards to lure NFL franchises to their cities, to the tune of hundreds of millions in stadiums, concessions, financing and tax incentives.
I just don't see Mayor Miller of Toronto or the Ont. gov't getting into a subsidy war against LA, San Antonio or any other U.S. city...Especially with homeless people freezing in their streets, a broken-down healthcare system and the introduction of apartheid in Ontario.
How could they justify giving hundreds of millions to Godrey, Rogers and Peddie to support an NFL team which will decimate a popular 150-year old tradition in Toronto? This is the biggest stumbling block which NFL boosters like Brunt conveniently avoid in their NFL wet dreams.
Not to mention paying $250 a seat per game. He also stated the NFL has no intnet in moving into Canada or Mexico expansion is not on the radar. The games in December his his way of helping the cFL. Apparently those fans that have seasons tickets for the Tiger cats and ARgos have first dibs on the games. Good idea to help both teams market their cfl clubs.
I doubt that TSN backs out of one of their highest rated programs being CFL football, or reduces funding because of 1 game a year in Toronto.
We've seen it over various years that the CFL always produces higher numbers on TSN than their NFL broadcasts so why would they make a move to upset one of their largest audiences?
I'm sorry but I don't buy the world is ending story from Bobby Ackles or anyone else for that matter.
it is going to have no affect, the bills suck, the cfl is doing great, better than it ever has. Roger Goodell is a good man, and is friends of Mark Cohon's, he will be a man of his word and will not allow the NFL to expand here, at least not for another two decades.
Chief, no matter how much common sense you try to apply here, no matter how much reasoning you attempt to debate. We’re all doomed! I might as well learn how to tie a hang man’s noose and find a small stool! :roll: :roll: :roll:
And once the novelty wears off, the PROFESIONALS that the NFL hires to scope out areas, will find that Toronto really only has 35,000 REAL football fans, and filling Skydome will be difficult after the honey moon is over!
Bobby Ackles sees the NFL in Toronto
as a problem for southern Ontario
Toronto, Hamilton and,
imo, Ottawa and Montreal.
Kill those markets and the CFL loses
it’s biggest source of income,
National TV networks money.
Then it will be time to fold up the tent.
I don’t believe that the TV contract or national sponsorships are the biggest source of income for CFL teams. They get at least 85% of their revenue from ticket sales and local sponsorships…which should not be directly affected by the loss of Ontario CFL franchises. Although losing the Argos and Cats would cast a pall over the entire league and could lead to a drop in stature and fan support across Canada.
While most of the CFL teams are privately owned and do not disclose financial details, the three community-owned teams do. The Riders reported $15.3M in revenue last year (and were only one season ticket loss away from losing money, according to the Toronto media) and this year they project revenues of $20M...which accorinding to the numbers you read, means the Riders, (in the smallest city in the CFL), will turn a $6 million dollar profit! You heard it here first, football fans!!
…yup…fold our tent and slip slowly away into the night…nfl in Canada as a permanent fixture …‘ain’t gonna happen’…oh! and what year was that Cup win gonna be Chief… :lol: :lol:
We have too many Chicken Littles in this forum, who are nothing but doom and gloom about the CFL. This league has survived, it is one of the most resilient professional sports leagues on this continent. The Blue Jays were supposed to kill the CFL. The Jays have been around for 30 years the CFL is still here! The guys who are negative have to look at this league's history to know that it is not going to die in the forseeable future!
if that were true the CFL would not exist. Most break the normal, even if it’s by a few thousand dollars, but they do. Even if a team does fall short it’s not by how much you say. Man the CFL must have really rich owners if they are willing to piss away millions of dollars each year. bullspit.
I'm not so quick to write off Ackles' comments as lunacy, especially when he starts talking TV contracts. Time will tell but I'm betting in the long run he's probably right.