zonabb

You can tell the knowledge a writer has not by his ability to see the obvious issues but his inability to see the good, in particular the small nuanced things players do that are positive. This Road Hack guy is by far he worst guy covering camp. I'm not saying what he's posting isn't legit, but he rarely posts anything positive which I wonder if he's able to see. It's either master of the obvious by reporting details... Like Chris Williams hasn't been seen at RG in a week or entirely negative because he can't offer any knowledgable, intelligent, Xs and Os insight. I've seen his tweets posted throughout camp but I read his recap for the first time today and it's sadly a waste of ESPNs money because it's not worth ever going back to.

It's opportunity cost, plain and simple. And these guys are way smarter financially than any of us here. My point is simply that the cost of the bid for a cash-only buyer can be higher because of the lack of debt service because a buyer using financing is considering the cost of the debt service into the ROI. That cost evens out the bids in total costs BUT from the perspective of the seller, the cash buyer is the preferred buyer due to the higher cost they receive. And you're discounting the ego here that may actually trump (no pun intended!) sound financial principles because being a member of this exclusive club might carry more "ROI" than the profit! And one other thing that never gets mentioned... the actual asset. Most are thinking ROI in a traditional sense, that is the annual ROI on the investment. But the increased value of the asset (team) continues to grow and offset the potentially lower ROI on annual net profit. Any way you slice it, each bidder is going to know where they stand and how to outbid the other. Pegula knows that his cash bid has to be higher than JBJ's cash+loan+debt total. Still stayin any way you slice it.

Again, another ignorant local media story that makes statements about the value of the team based on geography. It misses the point about the value in a cash vs. financing deal. If a bidder is borrowing money, they actually pay MORE than the final bid because of interest, just like any of us buying a house. So hypothetically, a $1B bid with interest financing might be the same as a bid of $1.3B with no financing. So in Tiny Tim's mind, TG would be overpaying when in reality, with interest, the actual prices are the same. That's what happens when sports scribes with no finance skills report on big business. But as I stated in a post above, the trust gets more cash in Pegula's bid whereas the bank gets money in the borrower's bid. Stayin.

This is a very well-orchestrated move by RW, the Trust and Morgan Stanley. The reality is, the trust seems to be acting in a manner that suggests the team is somehow restricted to be sold to a local buyer intent on keeping the team here. That's probably RW's wish and when reading the NDA closely, its very restrictive to a certain type of bidder... one with cash, which does two things... removes those who need financing and points toward a team keeping it local. Why? A local bid flsuh with case is the only one that can make it work due to the absence of debt service. No debt service means RWS works in the short term while working toward a a stadium resolution. The extra wiggle for a cash buyer also increase the actual bid price, which gets paid to the Trust whereas a lower bid requiring financing pays a lender the difference. Knowing that, MS and the Trust have then to develop a way to maximize the sale price with these restrictions and the only way is to drive up the bid price from outside bidder to get the local bid higher, returning the most money. These suggestions by the media that somehow Morgan Stanley has failed to drum up bidders (mostly in the media) is totally misplaced and ignorant. They don't need a large number of bidders, the need one out of towner to scare the local bidder and drive the final sale price up. To suggest that MS is inept is laughable when coming from the media. You can bet that Pegula will always get the chance to match a higher bid because it does the two things most important to the trust 1) ensures the team stays and 2) maximizes the final price. That what a bid and negotiation is because the "binding final bid" or whatever they are calling it, is a minimum, not a maximum. They can go back to T-money and ask him to increase his bid. Stayin.

The lack of bidders is definitely a potential sign that other bidders may have realized (or heard) that Pegula was going to make a strong bid, that he'd been doing his homework with league owners, and that he had the financial wherewithal to outbid anyone, thereby scaring others away from wasting their time with what is likely a foregone conclusion, that come October he;s the new owner. I posted back in June on another thread that some well-placed people I know heard it was his. That included that he had been flying around meeting with other owners. This info came from a conversation between someone I know with someone from an NFL club and someone high up with a very wealthy and powerful local family. They said he was bidding $1.2 but maybe he felt like he needed to go all-in and end this now!

From what I understand, ~16 is the number of "groups", comprised of approximately ~40 individual investors, who request the initial packet and signed the NDA. It's Pegula's team in 3 months.

The rule around here is... if you are the media, you're right. You write so you're right. You get the benefit, like a cop, of the assumption of clarity of conscious and moral high ground, despite their being a high incentive to write regardless of whether you're right. So now, they write to not report news but to draw attention to their "reports" so as to sell ads by driving up views. So rehashing old news, like the current tweet about the JBJ group looking at Toronto statium sites, which was old news 18 months ago and there is no indication this is actually recent but it's a tweet, it got out there, drew attention to the "reporter," pushes the meter. I'm a news junkie and hold in high regard very good journalists, but most sports "informationists" I don't. They cover a sport for a living first of all so what they say is really meaningless in the scheme of what matters. so I don't watse my time on op ed pieces, I have my own brain and can think for myself. Really why do people care what a sports honk says, it's not like you can debate them on the merits of their opinion. They turn self-righteous at the drop of a hat when anyone criticizes them, taking to twitter and forums and radio shows to stand up for themselves, which I find hilarious and hypocritical when you spent you life being critical of someone playing a game while wondering why someone questions your credibility when you get to hide behind anonymous sources. So stop reading into what they say. Let it go. Let this settle on its own instead of thinking anything being said, spun, and regurgitated is of any value.

60% of the time, it works every time. I like the inference.... you know, minus the inferential statistics!!!!

+2. They owe you nothing, ever. If you pay for tickets or a TV package, that doesn't afford you access to anything you want, no more than owning an iPhone should have given you access to Steve Jobs' medicals.

I'll vote for "who cares." If you care what is outside the venue that draft is taking place, you've officially ingested too much NFL Kool-Aid.

Wanted to add to my comment from this morning what I was told by a local high-level manager re: Pegula buying the Bills which I think is important and also would add to the comments/reports of his impending ownership. The person I spoke with stated that Pegula has/is meeting with other owners and in addition to his much publicized sale of OGM leases, he's liquidated other financial assets/instruments, although I don't think he'd need to given the sale price of the OGM leases.

I was told by a high level person from a local company that was thought to be a early interested bidder that Pegula is buying the team and the bid price is in the area of $1.2B. This company is currently discussing a business deal with Pegula/Sabres for the HarborCenter so take it for what it's worth but given what's being said and reported in the last 48 hours, this info from last week matches that.

Having worked in development, planning, and politics, I have a pretty good grasp on major projects like this form how they are financed, how they are planned and constructed, and how the role of the political system. Although it has been suggest that much of the public funding would be soft money and not a check for $200M, that's probably the scenario everyone wishes would happen. However, that's not how it will actually work because that doesn't provide immediate cash to cover construction costs.A so-called "jock tax" or "bed tax" is future money, meaning the state would go bond out whatever money it dedicates from these new taxes for the stadium and pay it back over probably 20 years. That bond, with interest, would cover costs and in all likelihood the stadium owner would use the principal and the state would pay the interest. But the biggest one that'll you'll see if politicians selling off-site improvements to support the stadium as actual necessary improvements for the community.... for example new sewer and water lines, new storm sewers to alleviate some phantom flooding issue; new road lanes to alleviate traffic... all sold as necessary for the general public but without question supporting a new stadium. And because these will be for general public use, the local govts will bond that out, make these improvements and the taxpayers will pay. The cost of a stadium isn't just the stadium, a huge costs is infrastructure upgrades and the off-site improvements will be govt funded. In fact, the owner will say "that's your infrastructure" and "you need to fix it to make this project work." Think of Abbott Road.... no need for a four lane highway in front of the stadium for 355 days of the year. I'm cure that a great deal of any public support will be soft money and include exemption from endless fees and taxes. But the sheer cost will require some hard money from taxpayers. And as for Dr. O'Rourke, the reason why he's probably never quoted is that his background and expertise in in team management and team finances, not the development and construction of a stadium or how to finance that. Suggesting he should be a reference or expert source really is only an attempt to link him to your degree and thereby create credibility for you. I can't find a single publication from the prof in Google scholar and his faculty page doesn't list any either. Andrew Zimbalist, who is quoted constantly, has endless publications. So minus any publications, in particular highly cited ones (the first paper listed by Zimbalist titled "The Economics of Sports Facilities and Their Communities" was cited in 359 other papers/works. That's being a credible expert. O'Rourke is an administrator first, instructor second, researcher and expert third, it at all.

Listen, I was born raised and educated here and my profession and interests focus on urbanization and public policy. I want nothing more than this city and region to rebound but I am so annoyed with the incessant false public discourses suggesting resurgence and that we’ve finally turned the corner. The single variable, likely because it’s the most prominent and visible, that this entire conversation has focused on and this idea being constructed around (pun intended) is construction. Everyone is suggesting that bricks and mortar is proof positive we’ve finally broke away from the shackle of deindustrialization and economic contraction. It’s a very convenient conversation since politicians dated back to the 1950s have suggested growing and building your way out of decline. So politicians have long used their voice to suggest to the populace that growth is good and further that new growth taking the shape of new buildings and investment is our indicator. And that may be true if that growth was not induced by massive influxes of public subsidy to create a market where none actually exists. Canalside…. Massive govt subsidies. Everything Rocco Termini and most other developers touch… massive subsidies. New federal building… all govt money. Any waterfront projects… massive subsidies. Uniland’s new Delaware and Chippewa Building… subsidies they cried about needing to make the project work. The 500 IBM jobs taking over Delaware North’s office when they move three blocks away.. millions in subsidies. Making brownfields shovel ready on Riverbend….. hundreds of millions in govt subsidies. These are the big ones, there are hundreds of small ones that all of the projects, like the magic silver bullet projects from the prior decades (Metro Rail, Main Place Mall, Bison’s stadium….) are nothing without fundamental systemic shifts in public policy at the local and state level. The reason these types of projects never deliver anything but millions to the owners (socialized debt for privatized profit) is because the cost of the subsidies far outweighs the return in the form of jobs. Jobs matter but when many jobs created at places like Canalside and new hotels and other commercial uses are minimum-wage paying services jobs, that have minimal positive impacts. The systemic problems keep these from actually helping because for every new job they create, others are leaving or the hyper-acquisition mentality of large global corporations result in more lost jobs, think HSBC. And guess who will get saddled with millions in subsidies to fix the foreclosed and vacant former HSBC tower because the Urban Land Institute , a pay for membership group of real estate pros, has told the city it needs to help their brethren make this building suitable by throwing millions at it usable. So the govt subsidized Uniland’s project to move Delaware North three blocks and backfilled the vacant spaced with millions more in subsidies and now the govt will eventually subsidize the former HSBC building so that someone can move into it and vacant more space…. And the chain of government subsidized vacancy continues absent any actual economic growth. If anything, the only positive we’ve truly seen is a geographic one. We’ve seen major investment in the city and less in the suburbs, so all we’ve really done is changed the location, which to be sure is good for the city proper. But… we are a region and that as a cohesive agglomeration of cities, towns, and villages has to be measured as one entity in this global economy and it certainly has to be measured as one when considering how this supposed change will be viewed by potential new owners. What these subsidies have done is commodified the city, and Americans love a hot commodity and to talk about it and brag about it and Facebook about it. The city has become that, which wealthy empty nesters who pushed urban sprawl in the 80s, 90,s and 00s, forever impacting this region, now buying city properties with cash. But let’s be clear, again with another misconception, that more of the city remains a weak housing market than not. The entirety of the east side is among America’s most impoverished, segregated, and abandoned neighborhoods in the entire country. Riverside and Black Rock remain areas of minimal interest and investment and continual decline and disinvestment, aside from a few potential corridors. South Buffalo is a neighborhood in transition, with areas of insipient decline and some areas of maintenance but little improvement. Regionally, the older inner ring suburbs and many rural towns and villages continue to experience population loss and aging. Additionally there are major increases in vacant and abandoned properties, cost local govts and the county millions per in lost assessed value and taxes. So all the positives locally (just for Bflo) across a few square miles of the 40+ square miles may come at the cost of the suburbs, just as suburban growth came at the cost of the city. And by the way, the data matters to, which no one every discusses because that takes work, knowledge and may actually debunk the public misconception of what’s actually happening. Just so we’re clear, from 2010 (last complete census) to 2012, the city lost another 0.7% of its population (-1,926) The county has seen a minor jump in population….from 919,040 to 919,086 (+46) (these are estimates so they could be over it under-estimated). Which means even with population decline Buffalo it’s still increasing slightly in the suburbs… but everyone is moving into the city I thought? If it weren’t from the massive influx of refugees into Bflo for its cheaper, low quality housing in many areas, the loss would be worse. All we’re doing right now is throwing massive money at systemic problems… bad business climate, poor investment in human capital, bad infrastructure, high energy costs, etc… rather than just fixing the problems so that moving forward the incentives to move here are because we have a good business climate, an educated work force, great infrastructure to create a business and lower energy costs that Vegas and Phoenix (yes, with NF right here, we pay more for electricity than desert cities). Why? Politicians love to cut ribbons and tout “accomplishments” on the campaign trail and people vote for it, devoid of any understanding of the reality. My money is on continual economic stagnation coupled with massive public investment and more gentrification in the city and decline in the suburbs, recreating the urban decline in the suburbs and switching the massive costs of that decline geographically. Then, because the voting power remains in the suburbs (about 70/30), politicians will reverse course to get votes from the suburbs and throw massive money their way again. I’m not a pessimist, I know the challenged and the reality and don’t have the luxury of blind loyally and the religious fervency displayed by those who just want to believe so bad and don’t want to have an honest conversation based in reality.

Change your name to jw and speculate away, even as you wag your finger at others for doing the same thing.

Response should come with a caveat.... where are you sitting? I would argue, having been on the seating fringes as a season ticket holder, it's is steady devolving into a joke. I've had seats everywhere from my first ones the end zones when I was a senior in high school during the super bowl years, to the Rockpile to the upper deck. And I've sat 10 rows behind the bench for a MNF game, club seats, and on the visitors side half way up last year. My most recent seasons were in 2012 but I went to nearly all games last year, mostly sitting in the upper deck, visitors side. Without question, the idiots who come to a few games or in large group populate the upper reaches of the upper deck and lower bowl and it's gone way down hill. Had a kid passed on in front of us who pizzed his pants and had to be carried out. Fights and arguments are common. I had a guy turn around and tell me to shut up one year because a group of us were complaining about Jason Peters. I told him to settle, he spit in my face and then called security and had me thrown out! Turns out, security was his brother. And yes, the constant, idiot, arrogant, power hungry, rent-a-cops make it unfriendly and unenjoyable. I mentioned it here a few weeks ago... clean it up and charge more and you'll get better fan behavior. I used the Sabres analogy.... if they can sell out every game and meaningless ones in November mid-week for higher prices, the Bills game too. There is this culture in WNY where we're supposed to just accept this scene. If you can't take a kid to a game because of fear of all hell breaking loose, that tells you all you need to know about this circus. It's no longer fun (I'm no longer that young!) and I bailed on seasons last year because of the crowd problems and am unlikely to return this year for the same reason. I would if I get get acceptable, better seats away from the upper deck but I didn't find what I wanted.

Gotta love listening to our favorite media rep on WGR55 complain about speculation and slap people's wrists for conjecture and rumoring and then stating he knows an interested bidder who won't bid due to costs.... also know as fueling more speculation an rumor mongering. Maybe the media needs to recognize that their need to produce copy and feed the 24 hour news cycle. Now he's slapping the County Executive's wrist and telling him to stop the speculation. Uh.... you just pushed more speculation about bidders backing out. Jesus, hypocrisy doesn't own a mirror. I guess the media plays by its own rules where anonymous sources and speculation is OK for it but for anyone else, it's unacceptable.

right, wrong or indifferent, this is the reality. Cuomo isn't spending $300k to conduct a stadium location feasibility analysis for any other purposes than 1) to know what sites would cost, 2) to present a proposed stadium with potential costs (I have it from a good source he will show a potential stadium design at some point), and 3) and to put it out there to potential bidders that the state appears to be interested in funding with the sole purpose of having interested buyers engage with government prior to bidding, which I am sure has already happened. If the state's position, as well as county's, was that under no circumstances would the govts support a new stadium financially, they would waste their time with this expensive endeavor.

Geography.... site and situation. You can improve the site of a stadium location, that is improve infrastructure. You can't move it's situation, that is how it fits into its network or surroundings and in this case, the bi-national population market. So placing the stadium in NF, from a pure situational standpoint puts it as close to Toronto and southern Ontario as possible without leaving NY. All the so-called site factors that people suggest are problematic are correctable but you can't build a stadium in Orchard Park again and move millions of people closer to it! Not advocating NF but it does make the most sense IF getting more people from that market is a goal AND the decision makers feel that reducing travel time will help support that goal.

In a story he was asked, I think the recently Poloncarz story but I can't recall and can't go looking (1:30 mtng), if he could confirm the the existence of a "must sell to the highest bidder" requirement and he chose to basically say "no comment."

And dropping.... which you didn't mention... probably as a result of an aging population. As I just wrote in another thread.... these are meaningless rankings because they measure the percentage of viewers. So Buffalo as a high percentage, lets arbitrarily say 50% of the 2.5M or 1.25M. That number is obviously used as a proxy for fans but the NFL sees it as a proxy for income. What if in LA, which every says isn't an NFL market, they weekly pulled on 15% of the population. That's 15% of 17M people, or 2.55M people, or equivalent to everyone on the Bills market watching! Yeah this doesn't include the southern Ontario market and the numbers would be higher but the point is, simple math folks. From a business standpoint, you can't argue that big cities mean big money and big profits.

The key point is market size as a proxy for potential. People are more interested to things locally so having a team in LA with a metro population of 17M+ represents many more new potential fans, corporate sponsors, ad sale prices no TV, etc. The opposite of true here, our local market has a fixed size with people who are fans or aren't, making it have very limited potential. I've heard people argue that "well we have a higher percentage of fans in the population". Maybe. but 50% of 2.5M (the market size when considering the 75 mile market buffer) is 1.25 million. Only 10% of the LA market means 1.7M and that is more money, more ads, more corporate sponsorships.... The bottomline is, the NFL isn't stupid, they know that large markets matter. The question is how much do they matter is they're talking about a global product now? If they, as many owners seem to speak about, are inclined to get into the largest markets absent a single utterance of expansion, the small market teams, unfortunately, are doomed without a local benefactor. And even with a local benefactor, if the NFL is willing to support the relocation of historic franchises like Buffalo, then no out of town interest is going to be outbid by a local person looking to lose money.

Brandon's silence on the "fiduciary duty" question speaks volumes. He doesn't want to publicly state that this is the obvious requirement and potentially quell bidding. I would argue this spells out the reality. Now, the bigger question is what role does the NFL play in this, or can they? Do they want it where every time a team needs/demands a new stadium in a smaller market (there are lot of small market on the context of the CHI/LA/NYC markets BTW) that relocation is an open option so that they can basically chase the top 32 markets all the time. If that's the case, they've turned unmistakably from an entertainment entity to a money machine not unlike GM or any corpoation seeking maximum profits over all else.

I've said it countless times... RW cried poverty on behalf of all of WNY, creating an image of fans needing a hand out via low prices to afford games. The reality is, he was never a good "brand" creator and never tried to make attendance more of a "luxury" good than a blue collar good. The best example of why this attitude falls short and has limited this team from exploiting the wealth in the region can be seen at the FNC where premium tickets in the lower bowl are way higher than at the Ralph. So how is it that the Sabres can sell out meaningless games in December and the Bills struggle to sell out meaningful games on a beautiful October fall day? Perception (and of course winning which until recently the Sabres were actually god at). Sabres games are luxury goods... look around at a game... lots of people decked out in their best clothes, husbands and wives galore, lots of kids, even at higher prices. Now, the NFL makes money hand over fist. A new owner here knows he can make profit without or without a new stadium. In our uber-greedy American culture, the question is how much is enough. That's basically what this entire discussion boils down too.... how much profit is enough profit. Here's what a new stadium with a dome/retractable roof would do... create the luxury the wealthy class wants and suddenly they'lll buy it. It'll price a lot of people out but it'll do exactly what an owner wants, bring in higher earning, ie spending, fans. More women will go (I know plenty of women who wouldn't step foot into a Bills game because of the number of morons there) and as I've heard a few times on the radio in the last few months, women not only make up, I think it was more than 50% of the fans, they also control I think about 80% of the disposable income (as in they tell their significant other what it can be used for!!!). So a more fan friendly, comfortable stadium that'll attract more women and possibly families is where the NFL and a new owner want to attract. The same goes with the suites... I think all the FNC suites are sold out. You don't have to have a Fortune 500 company or 10. It'd be nice, but we have plenty of wealthy corporations in this region. It'd be nice if all the leaches that have taken handouts would invest in some suites huh, sort of as a thank you for the public footing the bill for their project. Of course they'll get to write it off, corporations always win. Esmonde is nothing if not a hypocrite. He's favored handouts in the last that did the same thing... created greater profit for owners... when it was something he liked and at a smaller scale. Any handout to a corporation in the city to rehab a building is justified in his mind but this isn't? He's a wart on our collective face. And a quick comment on this: "And with more downtown residential living units coming on line every month, the urban population is headed in the right direction." The Buffalo population has declined every single year since 1950. Despite the false narrative of the city renewing, it's not happening. Don't equate bricks and mortar, most with heavy govt subsidy or investment... Canalside, new Philips Lytle bldg, Delaware and Chippewa, everything Paladino the Conservative hypocrite touches, just about everything Sinatra, Termini, Ciminelli, TM Montante, Uniland and on and on... This is the private market with zero demand getting help to create, not meet, but create demand. It has not resulted in any substantial new economy jobs (knowledge-based) but usually low income service jobs. Keep dreaming about the renewal, it's not happening, it's being constructed in both senses of the word! So for every new unit brough onto the market downtown, one unit in the region becomes perpetually vacant. More units with less people even as household size has declined, means more vacancy and abandonment.

Polian is misguided and frankly wrong if he thinks the county executive who oversaw the current lease, whose government owns the stadium, and whose taxpayers (who elected him mind you) are footing the bill for the improvements and have for decades should stand down. So he should shut his mouth and quietly walk away after all the county and its taxpayers have given this team and helped secure Wilson's massive return on investment off the backs of the public? I want my elected official who is spending my tax dollars on a publically owned stadium to do what he can to make sure this team stays in Buffalo/Erie County. I like Polian as a football man but his opinion is worth a squirt of piss in this discussion. He should shut his mouth.