Bills-Steelers Game in Toronto Annoys Argonaut Fans

The American version of football hasn’t really caught on in the rest of the world the way basketball and baseball have. Still, the National Football League keeps trying with games in Japan and at Wembley Stadium in London. Last night, the Buffalo Bills hosted the Pittsburgh Steelers but not in Buffalo. The game was in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where the local team is the Argonauts of the Canadian Football League, and the local fans were very annoyed.

The CFL and NFL versions of the game aren’t dissimilar. The Canadian field is a bit longer, there are only 3 downs to make 10 yards rather than the NFL’s 4, and there are 12 players on the field per team in the CFL, 11 in the NFL. However, the differences are minimal – much like the differences between Rugby League and Rugby Union, though perhaps greater than between American League Baseball and the National League's variety.

And that’s the problem for CFL fans. Canadian Senator Larry Campbell, a fan of the Argonauts, fears an NFL franchise in Canada. Given that the Buffalo Bills play in a town one-tenth the size of Toronto and one that Forbes magazine says is one of Americas fastest dying cities, the Bills are a team that could conceivably move 100 miles north. “Should the Bills or any NFL team come to Toronto, it would virtually spell the demise of the CFL,” the senator said, a man who is trying to get a law passed to ban the NFL from Canada.

Of course, there was a period in the CFL when expansion south was the way forward. In the 1990s, the CFL had at one time or another the Sacramento Gold Miners, Las Vegas Posse, Baltimore Stallions, Shreveport Pirates, Birmingham Barracudas, Memphis Mad Dogs and San Antonio Texans. The Baltimore Stallions even won the Grey Cup in 1995. But there was never a threat to the NFL from this.

Senator Campbell’s concerns to one side, it seems that the CFL has price going for it. The Argos (or “AARRRGGOOOS” as the locals shout it) tickets range is more affordable: C$79 for the best to C$33 for the more economy minded (and there’s something called the FabulousSavings.com Zone that goes for C$20 a seat). The Bills-Steelers game cost anywhere from C$70 to C$575 a seat. The CFL is still a family event; the NFL is as well but only if the family’s named Rockefeller or DuPont.

But above all, there’s fan loyalty. Trevor Boyer, a 27-year-old Argos season-ticket holder from Kitchener, Ontario, told Bloomberg, “I hate the NFL.” Mr. Boyer, a self-described laborer who has held season tickets since he was 15, said, “The CFL’s the game in Canada. The NFL can stay in Buffalo.” Now, if the NHL could just stay in Canada instead of moving more teams into the American Sunbelt . . . .

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