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You would think that Adrian Montgomery would have the toughest job in Toronto — selling the Buffalo Bills to a market that has already surpassed its quota for losing teams.
That’s what you might think.
The Bills, after all, are a garbage team, in need of a coach firing, in need of a quarterback who can throw downfield, in need of providing something resembling entertainment. Spend a minute or more listening to Buffalo sports radio and you will understand the angst and the despair that surrounds this squad and that city.
But the weird thing is, Toronto is happily buying in. Maybe we just can’t resist terrible. Maybe we are attracted to despair.
Whatever the reason, the marketing research numbers produced by Montgomery indicate that for the first time ever — with ever being since they started measuring such things — the Bills are the most popular National Football League team in the Greater Toronto area.
They were not that a year ago when the Bills played the first NFL game in Canada against the equally popular Miami Dolphins.
Fans revolt
They were not that when the Bills In Toronto series was first introduced with the late Ted Rogers and the ancient Ralph Wilson and the very alive Phil Lind, miscalculating how badly they could gorge the paying public for their NFL lust in a city that really should have its own franchise.
They were not that when the Bills were 4-1 last October but they are when the Bills are 1-4 this October.
“I credit the Buffalo Bills for this,” said Montgomery, the general manager of the Bills In Toronto series. “They have really, wholeheartedly emersed themselves in the community. You see the Bills rookies up here for their rookie day. You see Trent Edwards here for various charity events.
"You see the Bills linking to the schools. They’ve really jumped into this community with both feet.”
These may be the only examples where the Bills haven’t tripped over themselves this football season.
This column, to be honest, wasn’t supposed to be about how the Bills have become popular in this market. It was intended to ask this question: How does Montgomery sell this team to this city this season?
How do you market crap?
Montgomery laughs the uncomfortable laugh when first asked the question and then he goes into his marketing spin. About how this game is a dvisional matchup when the Bills play the New York Jets on December 3rd. And how many great stories surround the game. And about how the Bills have Terrell Owens, in his words, “one of the most controversial and high profile players in football.”
And about how the Jets have one of the “most exciting rookies in years” in quarterback Mark Sanchez.
And by the way, did you know that Jets coach Rex Ryan spent some of his youth living in the townhouses at York Mills and Bayview and this is a Thursday night game which means Toronto will get all kinds of face time on television in the U.S?
The tenor of this entire Bills In Toronto experiment has changed since it first opened for business. Then, it was all about the NFL coming to Canada and the possibility of the Bills moving here permanently. Then, it was a serious threat to both the Canadian Football League and to the very existence of the Argonauts.
But the evidence from both marketers and television people is clear: Toronto, and to a greater extent the rest of Canada, is football country — CFL country and NFL country.
The Monday Night game with Brett Favre playing the Green Bay Packers did more than a million viewers on TSN as have a number of CFL games this season.
Which explains that we love our football. But doesn’t explain, because there isn’t much to explain, why we care about the Buffalo Bills.