Buffalo Resident Buys Last 7000+ Tix For Pats Game

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harrisonhits

harrisonhits

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Classy and expensive move by this guy.

Buffalo resident ensures sellout by buying more than 7,000 tickets

Posted by Mike Florio on December 24, 2010, 10:40 PM EST

Russell J. Salvatore, a Buffalo restaurateur (there really is no “n” in there), has saved the Bills from a Week 16 blackout by purchasing the unsold seats for the team’s December 26 home game against the Patriots.

According to Lou Michel of the Buffalo News, Salvatore bought somewhere between 7,000 and 8,000 non-premium tickets.

“The timing couldn’t be better,” Salvatore, 77, said. “It’s Christmas. It’s the last game of the season. What a way to go.”

The tickets will be given to members of the military and charitable organizations involved with young people.

We hope that Salvatore was permitted to pay 34 cents on the dollar for the tickets. That’s the amount the home team may pay for each unsold non-premium ticket in order to lift a blackout.

A couple of weeks ago, Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco said that he planned to do the same thing. We’ve got a feeling that, once he learned how much it would cost, he decided not to go through with it.
 
harrisonhits said:
Classy and expensive move by this guy.

Buffalo resident ensures sellout by buying more than 7,000 tickets

Posted by Mike Florio on December 24, 2010, 10:40 PM EST

Russell J. Salvatore, a Buffalo restaurateur (there really is no “n” in there), has saved the Bills from a Week 16 blackout by purchasing the unsold seats for the team’s December 26 home game against the Patriots.

According to Lou Michel of the Buffalo News, Salvatore bought somewhere between 7,000 and 8,000 non-premium tickets.

“The timing couldn’t be better,” Salvatore, 77, said. “It’s Christmas. It’s the last game of the season. What a way to go.”

The tickets will be given to members of the military and charitable organizations involved with young people.

We hope that Salvatore was permitted to pay 34 cents on the dollar for the tickets. That’s the amount the home team may pay for each unsold non-premium ticket in order to lift a blackout.

A couple of weeks ago, Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco said that he planned to do the same thing. We’ve got a feeling that, once he learned how much it would cost, he decided not to go through with it.
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That's really cool. I hope someone like him does that for the Los Angeles Bills when the games aren't sold out.:coffee:>)
 
That is a very classy and unselfish move. I wonder if he can write it as a Tax write off since he giving the tickets to charity.
 
harrisonhits said:
We hope that Salvatore was permitted to pay 34 cents on the dollar for the tickets. That’s the amount the home team may pay for each unsold non-premium ticket in order to lift a blackout.
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king of kings said:
That is a very classy and unselfish move. I wonder if he can write it as a Tax write off since he giving the tickets to charity.
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I am sure Salvatore can write off the donated tickets if he gave them to registered (501c?) non-profit organizations.

I have a follow-up question that combines both of these points, though. I wonder if the current tax code allows Salvatore to write off the ticket donations at full face value, even if he only paid 34 cents on the dollar for the tickets. That may sound hokey, but hear me out: if I bought a picture frame at a yard sale for ten bucks, found out later that the picture inside was a long-lost original Monet worth a million, and donated the picture to a non-profit local museum, I'd be able to write off the million dollars and not just ten bucks, right?

If that is the case, depending on how Salvatore's restaurant business is set up tax-wise, he might be able to recover 35% of the face value when he writes off the donations from his business tax return ... which means he could actually be making a small profit from this move.
 
PatrietteAz said:
That's really cool. I hope someone like him does that for the Los Angeles Bills when the games aren't sold out.:coffee:>)
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Wait, I thought the Vikings were moving to LA......
 
It would have been more valuable to have dumped that money in Enron. It's like paying a million dollars to have someone stick a red hot poker up your ass.
 
sprocketboy said:
I am sure Salvatore can write off the donated tickets if he gave them to registered (501c?) non-profit organizations.

I have a follow-up question that combines both of these points, though. I wonder if the current tax code allows Salvatore to write off the ticket donations at full face value, even if he only paid 34 cents on the dollar for the tickets. That may sound hokey, but hear me out: if I bought a picture frame at a yard sale for ten bucks, found out later that the picture inside was a long-lost original Monet worth a million, and donated the picture to a non-profit local museum, I'd be able to write off the million dollars and not just ten bucks, right?

If that is the case, depending on how Salvatore's restaurant business is set up tax-wise, he might be able to recover 35% of the face value when he writes off the donations from his business tax return ... which means he could actually be making a small profit from this move.
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Capital Gains tax...?
 
CleatMarks said:
It would have been more valuable to have dumped that money in Enron. It's like paying a million dollars to have someone stick a red hot poker up your ass.
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Holy Mother of Elvis ... is this going to turn into another Rex Ryan thread?
 
<<
On what, the difference between 34 cents on the dollar and full face value?

Hadn't thought of that ... would it happen?
>>

Don't think that applies because he didn't sell them for more than he paid, he just gave them away. No gains to tax. It should be a straight charitable contribution no matter what he paid or what they are worth.

<<
It's like paying a million dollars to have someone stick a red hot poker up your ass.
>>

If the Pats play this week like they have most of the time lately, you're wrong. Its like paying a million dollars to have red hot pokers shoved up the ass of the 7000 people you got into the stadium ROFL
 
Good for him. Although if he really wanted to give a gift to the city of Buffalo he would have let it be a blackout so they didnt have to watch them. :)
 
He should have given them out with a dinner purchase from his restaurant. He would have drummed up huge business.
 
I love when someone redeems society as a whole. What a wonderful thing to do.wuv
 
EasyBigFella* said:
Good for him. Although if he really wanted to give a gift to the city of Buffalo he would have let it be a blackout so they didnt have to watch them. :)
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Oddly enough, Salvatore's Italian Garden is one of the sponsors of the Bills' radio broadcast. I heard an ad for that restaurant during today's XM feed of the game, which is almost always a re-broadcast of the home team's call.

So, Salvatore's act of buying the tickets lifted the television blackout ... which likely decreased the number of people who heard his radio ad.

Hmmm ... :spock:
 
This is definitely a case of the guy's heart being in the right place but the gesture ending up an epic fail.
 
harrisonhits said:
<<
On what, the difference between 34 cents on the dollar and full face value?

Hadn't thought of that ... would it happen?
>>

Don't think that applies because he didn't sell them for more than he paid, he just gave them away. No gains to tax. It should be a straight charitable contribution no matter what he paid or what they are worth.
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He's not going to have his cake and eat it too.

Either the donation is at the lower "cash he paid out" value or there is some other tax on the "gain" in realizable value.

The government is stupid, just not this stupid.
 
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