The following is my latest review in my search of finding the best bar/restaurant to watch Buckeye games. I call the series “Buckeye Hotspots”, and I grade different locations based on four aspects; Quality of food, beer variety and prices, game visibility, and general atmosphere.
For Saturday’s Wisconsin game, The BBC went to Buffalo Wild Wings in the Belden Village area. I had been told that the place was great for Buckeye games and it would be the perfect place.
That assessment was wrong.
Let’s start off with the good news about the place.
Quality of food – Buffalo Wild Wings is renowned for their wings. Hell, it’s in their name. I believe that the best wings come from BW-3 (I know that’s not their name anymore, but it’s shorter to write and you still know where I’m referring to, OK?). We grabbed a few wings before the game, and later went for some cheeseburger sliders. The sliders were good, but a little overcooked. That’s no big deal, maybe it was just this one time. I’ve had them before and they were worth it. We were planning to order more food at halftime, but a little incident nixed that plan. Details shortly.
Quality of food – Yes, I would recommend BW-3
Drink variety/prices – We each ordered a tall beer. The house special was a large Bass Ale on tap for something like 3 bucks. Perfect! I’d never had Bass on tap, and I wasn’t disappointed. I went for a second one later. They’ve got over 20 brews on draft, and we tried a few different ones. Good selection, and some of them were inexpensive. Our server Cammie directed us towards the special and we’re glad she did. The Jack Daniels shots were a bit overpriced, but that’s to be expected. Good thing it was a low-scoring game…doing a shot after each score could have been costly!
Drink variety/prices – Yes, I would recommend BW-3
Game visibility – If you’ve ever been to a BW-3, then you already know that the place is set up for nights like this. Several large-screen projection TVs all over the place , surrounded by multiple high-def plasma screens. Many different events can be shown on all those screens, and they have a nice opportunity to accommodate many people.
We got a table in the bar area, surrounded by people in scarlet and gray. Our table was directly in front of one of the large-screen projection TVs. We positioned our chairs to face that set and we were ready. Only thing is, they only had one screen showing the game at 8pm. Several screens had UNC-Connecticut, and some baseball was showing on others. Also, the sound was still focused on XM Radio Flight 26. By 8:10pm, still no sign of movement. Shortly before kickoff, they turned the house sound to ABC, and slowly the TVs began to change. All the big screens were showing the Buckeyes, and the smaller screens had the less-popular events playing.
With two minutes left before halftime, half of the large screens in-house changed in the middle of an Ohio State possession. They began broadcasting Ultimate Fighting, including on the screen directly in front of us. The tables immediately around us had the same puzzled look on their faces as we did. Men and women in Ohio State clothing started speaking up to servers and other BW-3 workers. The servers were left to tell us that management changed the TVs and we should speak to them. After about 5 minutes, a few of us approached the bar to inquire.
A manager was behind the bar changing the screens. We spoke up. I asked him to change it back and he said “no”. I stated that it wasn’t a positive sign for us ever returning to BW-3, and his response was (and I quote) “Go ahead and fucking leave. I don’t care.”
After a few minutes, two of us found the GM and she more calmly explained that the change was “to accomodate everyone”. That excuse I can somewhat buy, but BW-3 had already been playing the Buckeyes on all those screens. Many of us chose our seats based on where the game was located, and now that the place was full, we couldn’t switch to a better seat. My friends and I were now stuck in a corner showing nothing but UFC and baseball. Nobody was watching UFC except at halftime. Many fans were visibly upset.
Once you put that game on the screens, it’s gotta stay there. Management knew they would be changing it to UFC at 930, but told nobody. You want to reserve those screens for UFC, then have them broadcasting a random game from elsewhere that will upset nobody when you change it away. Putting us in those seats and changing the visibility on us shortly afterwards was not the right way to go about it. And that’s beside the point, especially after management decided to use vulgarities towards customers.
We left at halftime, and two tables near us joined us as we went across the street to Fox and Hound.
Game visibility – No, I would not recommend BW-3. Other events were clearly more important to BW-3 than the Ohio State game, despite having 95% of their patrons dressed in scarlet and gray.
Atmosphere – A big “hell, no” here. No sign of music outside of piped-in XM radio, no real concern for the start of the game on any TVs except one, all they did was change the channel to ABC (late, I remind you), and they even screwed that up before halftime.
Basically, BW-3 was not concerned with Ohio State football on this night, outside of how much money they could make off of fans. No servers in OSU jerseys, no Hang On Sloopy, not an ounce of genuine support for Ohio State or their fans.
It was disheartening to say the least.
Atmosphere – No, I would not recommend BW-3. Not at all.
Overall grade – I’ll never set foot in the building again. It was bad enough to watch those TVs change channels DURING the game, but to be mistreated by management is beyond the pale. Before we left, I informed a few tables nearby about this upcoming review, and handed out my web address. I even waited 24 hours before writing the review so I wouldn’t be too harsh. But I already got an e-mail from one of my fellow Buckeye fans over the shoddy management Saturday night, so now is the time to write.
If you were in the room for this, drop me a comment. If you’ve ever seen this type of behavior before from there, let me know. And if you know who ownership of the Belden Village-area Buffalo Wild Wings is, give him/her this weblog address so they know what kind of management they have running their establishment.
Buckeye fans, on the night of a huge game like this, deserved better than they got. Never again.
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