Season Tickets

Well today the Sabres released their Season Ticket renewal rates. And its at 97% which is pretty good since, A) the team is awful and doesn't care about their fans(sarcasm) and B) the local economy is a piece of crap and can't waste their precious extra income on a casino(heavy sarcasm). So why is the renewal so high and why are the Bills season ticket rates higher then they have ever been? If the economy sucks and gas prices are the same as baseball cards (which use to be cheap as well) why are people spending all this extra income on sports entertainment? Is it because people have more money then studies show, since people who live in city proper are poorer then say Clarence, but don't count when calculating average income. I'm out there and theres lots of people in the eastern Northtowns. They are expanding Transit because of the traffic. The real reason, Canadians. Their economy is exploding and the local Southern Ontarians come down, spend their extra cash on our local sports teams and in our local stores.

Their is a reason why the Bills are playing a game in Toronto, sure Bills fans might not like it, but it shows the braintrust at 1 Bills drive is intelligent and actually decent at Business. Russ Brandon might not last with the Bills long, since other teams will see what he can do for a small market and can only imagine what he could do in say Houston or LA. These numbers show, that the Buffalo sports fan and Business leader should embrace our Canadian brothers and form stronger bonds. It will only improve the local area, by tapping into extra cash.

Say what you want about the Sabres and not retaining players, I would understand not resigning Miller to a long deal, but they know business. They know how to operate a franchise. There is a waiting list for season tickets! You couldn't give them away for free years ago. Know people are paying to wait in line to possibly spend thousands of dollars. Who are these people and where did they come from? Sometimes you have to pull yourself back from the irrational parts of sports into the rational side. What would you want, a team thats financially sound and will stay or a team that wins but is in the red and threatening to move all the time? I'll take the the financially sound one. Sure the Bills are the ones operating in the black and threaten. But if it means playing 1 or 2 games in Toronto a year, the cold weather games I assume, isn't that better then losing the team outright? You pay less for season tickets, you get to have the good weather games, and you still have a team 30 minutes or less away.

Sports is a business, and business goes where the money is. It also means operating within your means. Thats what good businesses do. I want my sports teams to operate like a good business.