Why the Toronto Argonauts, Buffalo Bills partnership could work for all parties

The Toronto Argonauts and Buffalo Bills unveiled a partnership on Tuesday that the organizations touted as the “first-of-its-kind,” which it very well could be.

The 30-minute press conference held at BMO Field was big on spectacle — CFL legends Doug Flutie and Mike ‘Pinball’ Clemons were both in attendance, as were Bills limited partners Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady, and Jozy Altidore — but low on details.

Cutting through the marketing lingo, the partnership currently amounts to the sale of joint merchandise, the franchises cohosting youth football camps, Bills watch parties being held at a downtown Toronto sports bar owned by MLSE — the same corporate entity that owns the Argonauts, Maple Leafs, Raptors, and Toronto FC — and Bills prizes being given away at games played by some of these other teams.

The Argonauts will also host a Bills-themed game against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats on October 4. Flutie, who spent three seasons with Buffalo following his eight-year stint in the CFL, will attend the game, as will longtime Bills quarterback Jim Kelly, who is also the uncle of Argonauts franchise quarterback Chad Kelly.

Let’s be frank: the concept of a CFL game being themed to an NFL team is weird. To local diehards, it’s probably also insulting (more on that in a moment). With that said, the Argonauts shouldn’t leave any stones unturned in their mission to fill BMO Field.

Toronto has finished last in the CFL in attendance every year since 2015, a trend that’s set to continue in 2025. An average of 14,591 fans have attended the team’s first six home games, a 3.5 percent decrease from last year despite the Argonauts coming off a surprise Grey Cup victory. The team will also play only six home games next year as they lose access to their home turf during the World Cup.

The upside for the Argonauts seems obvious. Research shows that a growing number of Canadians — particularly young men — follow the NFL more closely than the CFL. By leveraging their brand, the Bills might be able to eliminate some of the perception that the Boatmen are a second-rate franchise. Critics can’t argue that nobody cares about the Argonauts if the Bills care about the Argonauts.

“As soon as people hear there’s an affiliation with the Buffalo Bills or the NFL in any way, it brings credibility to it and people get excited,” said Flutie. “It brings more attention to it, gets more kids out on the playing field, and the translation is more football fans.”

It seems unlikely that Western New York football fans will start buying Argonauts season tickets, but the Bills might be able to help grow the Double Blue’s fan base within Southern Ontario. This seems counterintuitive — a foreign team helping grow local support for a domestic team is a bizarre concept — but there might be something to it.

“I think we do it well in the National Football League,” said Bills chief operating officer Pete Guelli. “It’s a great domestic product for us and we want to come up here and share all of our best practices and the brand equity that we’ve built with our friends here in Toronto. If we can do anything to help the Argos grow the sport of football in Toronto, we’re all for it.”

If the media turnout for the press conference was any indication of what’s to come, this arrangement could actually bear some fruit. Argonauts practices receive little to no coverage and regular-season games draw a small group of reporters. On Tuesday, those on-site estimated that between 40 and 50 members of the media made the trip to BMO Field, which will surely result in the most publicity the Boatmen have received all year.

Most football fans in the United States have two favourite teams: an NFL team and a college team. This new partnership seems focused on mimicking that within Canada, only with the Bills and Argonauts. If successful, Toronto football fans might buy Argonauts tickets in the summer, support both teams in the fall, then be all-in on the Bills by mid-November. There have certainly been worse ideas.

For the Bills, this partnership seems designed to safeguard assets. Buffalo is set to open New Highmark Stadium next year, a venue that will reportedly cost $2.2 billion USD upon completion. Taxpayers have covered around half of the construction costs and are also on the hook for all future repairs and maintenance. For the NFL’s second-smallest market, that’s an awfully tall task.

Canada and the United States are currently engaged in a trade war, resulting in cross-border traffic plummeting over the past nine months. Guelli indicated that 10 to 15 percent of Buffalo’s season ticket holders live in Canada, a revenue stream the team surely wants to maintain and grow over the long-term.

“Having a world-class city and one of North America’s largest less than 100 miles from Buffalo, it’s significant not only for the Bills but the entire National Football League. The support from Bills Mafia from throughout Canada over the years has been incredibly important to our franchise,” said Guelli.

“Canada, Ontario, and specifically the GTA will continue to play an even more significant role as we look to grow the Bills international fanbase starting right here in our backyard.”

It also seems fair to speculate that Buffalo never wants an NFL team in Toronto, something that seems far less likely now than it did a decade ago. The league has had an office in the city since 2006, back when the Bills’ future in Buffalo was far from certain, and has done a tremendous amount of market research on Canada. If the NFL really wanted a team in Toronto, there would already be one.

By working to brand themselves as Toronto’s de facto NFL team, the Bills are arguably lowering the chances of the city getting its own team even more. Why would locals cheer for the Toronto Huskies if they’ve been members of the Bills Mafia for decades?

Then there’s CFL fans to consider. Many diehard supporters agree that the league needs to grow and change — so long as it stays exactly the same.

It’s only natural to be skeptical of the bloated, all-consuming juggernaut that is the NFL. Laura Pegula, a daughter of Bills owner Terry Pegula, attended Tuesday’s press conference donning a white Argonauts hat. What may very well have been a good-faith gesture could be perceived by fervent three-down supporters as a wolf wearing sheep’s clothing.

“I don’t think there’s anything for CFL fans to be fearful of with this partnership,” said MLSE president and CEO Keith Pelley. “This is a partnership they should embrace. This is about growing the game they love — this is about growing football — and to have the opportunity with the power of the National Football League and the Buffalo Bills to work side-by-side by the Canadian Football League and the Argos, they should be delighted.”

“The Argos have been here for over 100 years,” said Flutie. “They’re not going anywhere.”

It’s also not entirely unprecedented for CFL and NFL teams to work together. Though it remains a more informal partnership, the B.C. Lions and Seattle Seahawks have collaborated on several projects in recent years. According to a Lions spokesperson, these initiatives include partnering for youth football clinics, collaborating for a special high school game in Coquitlam, holding viewing parties, and pushing ticket pre-sales.

The bottom line is that fans don’t need to pick between the CFL and NFL. It’s perfectly appropriate to be a fan of both leagues and, in this case, two teams separated by a mere two-hour drive. The chances of this partnership bolstering both franchises in Toronto seems much higher than the possibility of some kind of hostile takeover.

“This is not competitive, this is a partnership,” said Guelli. “We think you can be a Bills fan and an Argo fan and we think, actually, that people should be fans of both.”

“I don’t think there’s anything to be fearful for, I think everyone should embrace this,” said Pelley. “I think they will. I’d be surprised if they didn’t.”

They say a rising tide lifts all boats. In this case, it might also lift the Boatmen.

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