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Yesterday, the Buffalo Bills announced a couple changes to the gameday experience at the Ralph. Unfortunately, none of those changes involved actually winning games on gameday, but maybe that’s coming in a future press release.

So what did they actually change?

For starters, the Ralph is going full non-smoking. No more designated smoking area with a re-entry gate. They’re not the first team to institute such a policy; a quick check shows that plenty of other NFL teams, and lots of college teams, have the same policy. Of course, this brought out the Rampaging Indignant Smoker’s Alliance folks who vowed to cancel their season tickets and never attend a Bills game gain. I’d guess that most of these folks also promised never to patronize bars or restaurants again after New York State passed the current smoking bans, but I’m sure they still do.

Listen, I’m not a smoker, so I’m not really affected. I get that it’s an addiction, and it’s something you HAVE to do. (Unless you nut up and decide to quit.) However, your complaints are silly. You’ve watched the last 10 years of Buffalo Bulls football and THIS is going to get you to cancel your seats? I think your priorities are a little out of whack.

The second major change has the tailgating crowd raging like there is no tomorrow. Instead of opening at 8am, the team run lots will delay opening until……

9 am.

OH THE HUMANITY!!!

I’m sorry, but nothing can convince me that this will be the ‘end to tailgating’ like some are suggesting. It’s a freaking HOUR. This is not a big deal. If you can’t get to your spot, set up, cook, eat/drink, tear down, and get to your seats in 4 hours, you’re doing it wrong. Four hours is a TON of time. Before you start in the comments, I was a season ticket holder for 5 years. Gave them up because the team sucked. I’ve still been to at least one game every year for 15 years running. I know the tailgating scene pretty well, and nothing you say can convince me that the extra hour is going to ruin your gameday experience.

Jeremy White from WGR was railing about how badly it’s going to cause traffic snarls. Really? Traffic down there sucks already. It’s not going to get appreciably worse. The people who are married to starting at 8am are still going to start at 8am. They’ll just move to one of the private ‘lots’ in the area. Of course, White ignores the last part of the release, where the Bills say that they’s working with law enforcement to improve traffic patterns down there anyways. That does kinda blow a large hole in White’s argument that he conveniently ignores.

The four hours of tailgating is plenty of time for anyone, if you’re hosting your own, or attending someone else’s. The amount of rage this is generating is quite comical.

Look at the upside. At least you can still smoke out there.