Sabres Arena Lease Drama - Relocation imminent or a lot of nothing?

landy

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Mar 20, 2025
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TLDR or something that resumes this whole shit, mostly just talks because lease is complicated and set to expire

"KeyBank Center’s lease is set to expire in September 2026, according to the county. Poloncarz said this is not something where he’s concerned about losing the Sabres, saying Buffalo is a great hockey market.

The team has through this September to give the county notice on whether they want to extend the lease or re-negotiate it, Poloncarz said. He also said the lease is a very complicated formula involving the county, city, state and other agencies."
 
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Bills and NFL teams in general are going for $5 Bill and up based on the Broncos/Commanders sales the past few years. Wash in at $6 billion.

So, it does make sense for Pegula family to sell some of the Bills. As long as they have controlling interest in the football ops, they can sell most of the club, ala Mark Davis and the Raiders. He's down to like under 25% or something after selling to Brady and 2 Private Equity firms.

As for the Sabres, well, that's another matter. Ideally, he'd sell them to someone else. Not too familiar with the Sabres arena. Is the location ideal? If so, is it large enough to make any necessary renovations to accommodate the new revenue streams arenas have these days? I'm more of the mindset that as long as the arena has the space, it's better to renovate if it was built in the 1990's or later. STL, Bos had major 9 figure renovations. PHI too, but now they appear to want to build a new one with the Sixers.
 
Let's see how this cookie crumbles

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The Sabres are relocating....across the parking lot. Let's build a new 19,000 seat version of The Aud. Keybank sucks
 
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The Sabres are relocating....across the parking lot. Let's build a new 19,000 seat version of The Aud. Keybank sucks
Sounds like the exact thing the Yotes were planning on doing and then Utah owners swooped in ebcause of all the delays/drama around the arena.
 

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I dont want buffalo to lose their team. Besides the last 15 years they were a very good team and consistent playoff team.

Have a strong and established market with lot of support. Hockey is very popular in buffalo and even more so considering how horrific last 15 years have been as a fan for them. They dont have a fan issue, they need a new owner and an aggresive management team that builds a team to win rather than keep on accumulating picks and prospects for eternity

Ideally the Sabres keep their team and either Hamilton or Toronto 2 get another team (but thats unlikely to happen due to the leafs/mlse)
 
As long as Kathy Hochul is governor, they'll get public money. She's cartoonishly crony-ish (even for Albany), and she's shameless about getting money to Western NY.

I'm not even being political here, I'm just stating a reality. We already have precedent:

WIVB - "Bills stadium deal ‘one of the worst’ for taxpayers, economist says"
Local NPR - "Tax specialist and journalist calls Bills' stadium deal a loser for taxpayers"
NY Post - "NY Senate leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins says Gov. Hochul blindsided her on Bills stadium"
 
I admit I did not follow the Coyotes arena drama, but it seemed seemingly overnight they were relocated. Could that happen in Buffalo? We know Pegula is selling a piece of the Bills and with Utah/Seattle/Vegas success, im sure the next franchise owner would buy the Sabres if they could move them immidiately to Atlanta, Houston, or wherever.

Sabres aren't going anywhere.

Atlanta has failed twice. They aren't going there again. Houston isn't a hockey market and would create an inbalance between the conferences. Plus, it's too early to tell if Utah and Vegas are a success. Utah is still in its honeymoon phase. Vegas isn't even a decade old and hasn't had one bad season. Let's see Vegas stink for several years before me make an assessment.
 

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