The Buffalo Bills opened their new stadium in style, with over 50,000 fans attending the annual “Return of the Red and Blue” practice. That’s right, over 50k for a practice. Among those attending were my sister that I frequently mooch off of, our football friend (of Mando helm fame), my two daughters, and myself. I also needed to know if it passed the muster of one other entity, so I snuck in a guest. If you promise not to tell anyone, I’ll show what the stadium looks like through his eyes.
Entering the stadium
I did
a write up on the Highmark Trail, noting how much fun stuff is outside the fence line of the stadium and that remains true. The family circle (the area surrounding the bison statues) was fully open and packed as expected. At the old stadium, getting through the fence was both security and ticketing. Now it’s just security, with many fan activities set up inside the fence line, but not quite in the building yet. But enough for now, let’s take a peek through the eyes or my special guest.
Meet ‘Lil Krow! I’ll talk more about his origin story in a minute, but first, here’s a shot of the approach to the stadium, his attempt to ride the bison, and his first time on a football field. As mentioned, the bisons are open to the public at all times and are the signature feature of the Highmark Trail and Family circle.
The little field is inside the fence. Along with that were giveaways from various sponsors (like Wegmans) and foundations (like Doug Flutie’s autism foundation). There was a place for caricatures, mini golf on the mini field, a person-sized bobblehead of Josh Allen, places for food and Bills shopping. Here’s the important note I believe for fans. This required you go through security but you did NOT need a ticket yet. In other words, fan can participate in a lot of the pregame stuff even if they’re not going to the game.
In that final picture, that sign is on the glass looking into the stadium itself. We had still not yet shown anyone a ticket. Now for a little detour.
‘Lil Krow’s Origin Story
Not that long ago I went to a jersey singing put on by Thurman Thomas and his wife, The Ghost. It was part of their marketing campaign for their venture into near field tech. They gave us some samples of their work. I made one of the chips they game me into a mini avatar of myself. If you see me at a Bills game this year, come say “hi” to me, Regular Krow; and ask to tap your phone to ‘Lil Krow to see the near field tech in person and get a sneak peak at all things Skarekrow. Right now, anyone lucky enough to tap ‘Lil Krow can get a spoiler on what dangerous thing I’m building for my Mando armor. Anyway, ‘Lik Krow had to make a special stop…
Thank you to Thurman Thomas, The Ghost, and VeriLink for making ‘Lil Krow possible. Let’s continue his quest.
Watching the game
While there are many things to discuss with the new stadium, arguably the most important thing is seeing the game. The ticketing is right at the building now. I can’t vouch for every entrance, but for the one we entered into, as soon as your ticket is scanned, here’s your view.
You can see much of the bowl and the scoreboard. And maybe another 30 feet and you’re looking at the field. There are access stairs, escalators, and elevators all over. Getting between levels was easy with enough access points where we took stairs that felt like we were alone. Again, there were 50,000 people and everyone was walking around.
I know there’s views from all over, so for context the pictures in the seat were from the very back of the 300 level. I absolutely loved the view. I was able to see the entire field easily. The verticality of the seats made for great sightlines. Despite the steepness of it all, the walkway and seat design made it easy to stand up and let other fans by as they meandered to and fro.
We got to test the new partial roof too as a pop up storm dumped a ton of rain in short time. A lot of people in the 100s took shelter in the concourses, and there’s a pic in there showing the view from there if you needed to pull back. Where I was we got a tiny sprinkle blow in when the wind shifted just right. Speaking of wind, compared to how it used to be the air is very still in the stadium. That’ll be great in winter, but if you’re going to a summertime game, don’t count on a cool breeze to help you out.
I know Chris covered a lot of it, but I’ll give my two cents on some things too. The seats were comfortable, the sound system seems like an upgrade, the scoreboards and visuals are fantastic, and did you notice the closed captioning by the scoreboard? Watching a practice was pretty sick and watching a game here is going to be insane. Luckily, thanks to mooching off my sister, I won’t have to wait long.
The extras
I noted on social media that part of the human condition is to experience change as loss. I’ll miss the old stadium, but was simple awestruck at how many cool things the new stadium features. I come from a little town that’s packed with artwork, and my favorite aspect of the new Highmark is how there’s something on display everywhere you look. Please note; we walked around for about an hour and still missed a ton. Here’s some of what we caught.
There’s so much detail in everything, if you get a chance to go, stop and take it all in.
I only tried an order of wings for food, and the quality was quite good. The chicken was cooked very well and the sauce (mumbo) was flavorful. I could get 20 wings locally for the amount I spent on just five, but I don’t know if the prices are much worse than the old joint sadly. Speaking of details, check out the paper in the box.
Despite being a giant enclosed building, walking around in many areas feels open. Shockingly so at time. It was a bit hazy in the one direction, but check out what you can scope in the distance.
There’s one thing that I struggled to decide on whether to put it here or in the game section. I landed on putting it here. There was live music playing as we entered the stadium. There’s a place called the “Charge Bar” which dominates one end zone. It looks like this…
In addiction to the slick looking charge stripe you might notice that’s where the band is. When we went to Cleveland to watch the game last year, I was a bit jealous that they had areas to highlight various things like live music. Old Highmark had former players lead the charge from a corner of the field, and that was fine, but something about the Cleveland experience felt more dynamic.
I don’t think I need to feel jealous any more.
Until next time…
I’ll be back very soon, as my sister gifted me her tickets to the Panthers preseason game. Maybe I’ll do a follow up and let you know how things look from the charge bar area, where her seats are. Until then though, it’s farewell from Regular and ‘Lil Krow…
Epilogue
There were some naysayers about various things and I decided to poke fun at that. I noticed a small amount of exposed steel cable behind the seats and posted it on Twitter as a joke like a sarcastic “The Bills can’t do anything right.” For the record, what I’m about to show you is completely normal. This is the equivalent of a tiny bit of a plastic tag stuck in new clothes. It’ll come out when you wash it if you don’t notice it and fix it first.
I did not intend for this to be the post of the night. Why the heck did this blow up? Anyway, I’ll let this stand as a reminder that there are many imperfections I’m sure. That said, a lot of people are missing the great things while they fixate on what might be the sewing needle fingers of the Other Mother as she creeps out to give you button eyes.
