Latest Golisano story

PITTSBURGH -- Fact 1: Tom Golisano has admittedly been listening to offers for his team for quite sometime.

Fact 2: Larry Quinn, Sabres minority owner, says they will never entertain offers that would move the team out of Buffalo.

Fact 3: Golisano has said he likely isn't in this for the long term, even though he has fun.

Fact 4 (OK, it's actually Opinion 1): People should relax. It's not a huge story that he's listening to offers. He has been and will continue to do so.

---John Vogl

Comments

[RW]

Buffalo, for the most part, supports their local teams(Bills and Sabres), but it is primarily with lots of relatively cheap tickets and very little, if any, major corporate support. Looking, realistically, at what is happening in leagues like the NFL, MLB, NBA(large stadiums, seat licensing, higher private box revenue, higher caps etc. etc.), it would seem that the gap between the large and small markets is growing so wide that teams in Buffalo, over the long haul, can't really survive, let alone be competitive. We may not like it and it is probably not fair, but it is reality.

[Mike K.]

TJ- Yeah I understand how a business is run but to own a winning sports team the owner has to actually have a clue about the sport and what it takes to win a championship. Championships bring money and hence a profit. The winners sacrafice here and there to win. Golisano is too busy counting his pennies and venturing into politics rather than allowing management to build a winning team (not a team just good enough to keep most people happy).

[Matt]

Said before, said again: Buffalo and Western New York cannot support an NFL team in an economic sense, but can certainly handle an NHL franchise. If anyone tries to move out the Sabres, and any such move will be risky to begin with especially given the tanking economy, they will face robust opposition. The opposition will have more going for it than the Bills' opposition to their eventual move will: A newer, slicker venue than the Bills, and, again, a fan base that has proven time and again it will back their team by buying tickets and merch. The Bills have that too but in their case, it's not enough $ coming in. Only the die-hards are on the bandwagon these days -- the team has, lets face it, been mediocre or worse for years. And in today's NFL, to try and approach the revenue levels of your rivals, you really need to charge higher ticket prices than the disgruntled Bills fan base is willing to pay. (Or able, seeing as how the recession in Buffalo has been going on for 50 years now.) Keeping up with the Joneses is less expensive in the NHL and any prospective owner, even if an out-of-towner, will see that it can be (and is being, nice win tonight) done in Buffalo.

[Mumbo Jumbo]

The Sabres should go and take the Boobs (Bills) with them!

Who cares?

[Buffalo Excuses]

Team doesn't leave Buffalo, regardless of who owns it. But it is SCARY to talk about isn't?

Now go back to dutifully doling your dough over to Darcy and the Donutboys.

[Lloyd Marshall, Jr.]

"Be thankful you have a team, etc."

Filed under... "intellectual flatulence."

[Chad]

It's not going to happen. They're not going to take a team from Buffalo when there are about 15 better candidates to lose a team in the NHL. Bettman, for all his faults, knows better. I'm not concerned.

[Bob Chalk]

I was born a Sabres fan and I will die a Sabres fan. Let's not let them take away our team. We need to let the NHL know that we will not stand for this.

Los Angeles never thought that the 2nd largest city in the US would lose NFL football but they have. We need to keep a watchful eye on this matter.

[tim]

are we going to do this every 6 months until it actually happens (if it even does) so the whiners and conspiracy theorists can finally say "I told you so".

If you have enough crazy people say enough different crazy things there is bound to be one of them that is right and that crazy man will be called a genius or Nostradamus even.

Relax and watch hockey games.

[Macks]

Where do I sign up if I want to buy the team? I was thinking that if I got enough pop cans together and returned them for the 5 cents, then I would have enough eventually.. With revenue sharing I would not need much more than that.

[Beavis]

Two things:

First, Salt Lake City (the NBA's Jazz), Oklahoma City (the NBA's Thunder, previously the Seattle Sonics), and Milwaukee (MLB's Brewers) all have professional sports teams.

Second, cities a lot bigger than Buffalo have lost their teams for reasons much more basic than a dwindling economy. Point is, we should always be worried that the Sabres could leave town. That's why people's comments about boycotting the team in order to facilitate trades, etc. is a bunk argument.

We stop buying merchandise and tickets and watch how fast they leave. Hell, we all shell out this money year after year and the talk about Hamilton still won't die.

[Johnny K]

Comment directed at Big T: Correct your post about OK City, Milwaukee and Salt Lake City...all three have NBA franchises. Relax.

[Don H]

If Canadian interests are seeking teams for Hamilton and Toronto (second team), there are teams in Florida that have trouble drawing fans. Nashville and Carolina are not exactly setting attendance records. They are more likely to be purchased and moved than the Sabres. Also, Galisano is a very astute businessman who didn't get that reputation by not listening to business proposals.

[Stryker]

Tell Balsillie he can have the Sabres as long as he takes the Bills too. Enough of these underachieving, overpaid and overrated "professionals".

[cMoore]

Gee when the Sabres and Bills move from Buffalo what will you folks have to whine about. Be thankful you have a team while it lasts. You must believe in Santa and the Easter Bunny if you think these two teams won't be gone sooner than later.

[SabresFan in DC]

I don't believe anything Quinn or Golisano say. If the money's right, the team will move. I hope it doesn't happen, but it's a business and the bottom line is profit.

[Chad]

Guys, c'mon, the Sabres are not on the top 10 list of NHL franchises that should be moved. From a purely business standpoint, those in the industry think they're one of the best business models going, evidenced by the fact that they were up for that very award given by the SBJ. They're not hemorrhaging money like Phoenix, Atlanta or Nashville. They're always the best American TV market. The list goes on. The Sabres aren't leaving. They may be sold, but they're not leaving.

[BigT]

I am a die hard Saber fan and I cannot image Buffalo without them.

Let's not forget what happened with the Harftord Whalers. The NHL said that they would not allow them to move and now they are in North Carolina.

[Mike C]

Fact: the Buffalo-area is only a few years away from dropping out of the top 50 metropolitan areas in the nation by population. We are now 46th and dropping rapidly. Birmingham and Salt Lake City should pass us soon - neither has a sports franchise. We may drop below Rochester within 10 years.

Fact: Cities ahead of us in population without a pro sports franchise include: Virginia Beach, Providence, Austin, Milwaukee, Louisville, Richmond, Oklahoma city, Hartford. They are all growing; we are shrinking.

Fact: In the top 80 US metro areas (by population) only Hurricane-ravaged New Orleans has lost a greater percentage of population than the Buffalo area over the last 7 years.

(source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_metropolitan_statistical_areas_by_population)

Fact: Professional sports is going corporate. Dallas and New York will soon have new stadiums dedicated to drawing big corporate money, and will even target regular fans with "personal seat licences" - huge sums fans will be forced to pay just for the *right* to *BUY* season tickets. We can barely even survive in today's climate, how will we survive when those new cash cow stadiums come online?

Fact: player salaries may be capped, but other things are not: facilities, coach salaries, scouting, etc, are all areas where wealthy franchises can take advantage. Gregg Williams left a head coaching job in Buffalo and got a raise to be a Redskins assistant. That disparity will continue to grow. That's why we get second-tier coaches like Jauron.

Fact: Buffalo professional sports is on life support. In 10 years we will not have any pro sports.

OK, the last one is not fact, it's conjecture, but really, isn't the writing on the wall?

[TJ]

Mike K.-
No, there is most certainly no such thing as 'free speech' in the private sector, which is where you are when you choose to comment on a privately owned and operated blog.

But I wouldn't expect you to know that, given that you don't even understand the most fundamental principle of business ownership.

[Tom]

Fact: Tom Golisano recently went under $1 billion in net worth as his holdings in Paychex were cut in half from the value they held 2 years ago.

Fact: Golisano's net worth is based on a service company that has no real assets and that makes it's money three ways; by holding client cash and making a profit off of the float, by processing payroll for firms...many which are small businesses that could do it in house if needed, and by numbers of transactions in direct relation to the numbers of employees at their clients' businesses. All three aspects of his business are down and will continue to go down in the near future.

Fact: When Obama takes office, his new tax plan would cost Golisano at least $20-40 million on the sale of the team.

Fact: There are anywhere from 5-10 NHL teams that are currently having or will have direct economic hardships to the point of possibly blowing up the franchise. Credit is nowhere to be found. Corporations are cutting costs left and right which include advertising and ticket support. Some teams are having problem making payroll and many owners are handcuffed due to losses in other investments along with their NHL team. There is a real possibility the league itself may not survive past the next few years under the worst case scenario, which is now looking more than possible.

Fact: New York State is going to lose almost half of their revenue from downstate by next year and the Erie County government will suffer. With an auto manufacturer debacle and government jobs and handouts tightening, Buffalo has some more near term pain on the horizon.

Fact: Balsilie has the liquid means to take over the team and Bettman will be begging him to do so at some point over the next 12 months if he hasn't already gotten him involved at a serious level.

Fact: It is just about the point in Larry Quinn's Buffalo Economic Lifecycle where he cashes out and disappears for a few years before he comes back into town and finds another way to sell his wares.

This is big news. This should always be a concern. The way this franchise has been managed the past 3 years has been pointing to a sale all along.

[Mike K.]

Why was my post removed? I gave my opinion of Golisano. Do we not have free speech? I guess the truth hurts. I hope a real hockey person buys the Sabres because they are a sinking ship. The current owner seems to only care about his bottom line, a true owner needs to actually want to win not just make a profit. We were only a player or two from winning the Stanley Cup just a few short years ago. Please Mr. Golisano do us a favor...

[Mike K.]

The sooner Golisano sells the Sabres the better. He is as useless to the Sabres as Wilson is to the Bills. We need a true hockey person and someone who is actually dedicated to the team rather than the bottom line. Golisano is a moron and only cares about his profit margin, this team needs a life raft from the Titanic. They will sink under Golisano...and to think we were only a player or two from bringing Lord Stanley to Buffalo just a few years ago.

[Melissa]

While there may have been "offers" made, Quinn said (according to WGR550) that the team is NOT up for sale, and as you said, they won't entertain offers to move out of Buffalo.

I admit, I always panic when I hear these stories... but as someone in a Sabres community I'm in said, these things come up nearly EVERY year, and they always turn out to be false alarms.

[Caps]

Thanks. But John, you can obviously understand the apprehension - coming as it does after yesterday's trainwreck. When TSN starts publishing stories about half the Sabres' home games headed to Hamilton, folks have every right to be freaked out.