Champions Sports Bar and Restaurant

If I could rate it lower, trust me, I would...  

After being seated at our table on a night when it was just slightly busy, it took the server 25 minutes to take our drink order. My family of 4 (2 adults, 2 kids over 16) looked over the menu and nothing jumped out at us. You know that feeling when even the menu makes you think the food is bland and uninspiring? Not impressed, we managed to make a choice on what to order and settled on an appetizer. The waitress returns and takes our order and we still have yet to receive our drinks. 20 minutes after getting our table she drops off our drinks in a "are you happy now?" kind of way. Sipping on my coke I noticed something floating in my sons drink. After further inspection there is also a grease fingerprint smudge on the inside of his glass. Luckily I stopped him before he took a drink. I flagged down a different waitress, ours was gone, and asked if it could be replaced. She was not happy about having to do this and said that she would have our waitress bring another in a minute.
Our waitress returns with out appetizer and my sons replacement beverage. 15 minutes later. When my gf looks at the plate and notices that it was potato skins put on a dirty plate. There was clearly some left over "red" residue on the plate. My patience has just worn out as I glance at my glass and noticed a paper sleeve from a straw floating in the drink that I have been sipping on for the last 20 minutes. Disgusted, we stand up to leave and suddenly our waitress cares and says that she will get the manager. As customers are now stacked up waiting to be seated I see her speaking to a manager who refuses to come to the front  to stop us from walking out.
If this sounds like the kind of experience you would like to have... feel free to try them out. Just know that a rip off impersonation of Champps is what you are going to get.

It's is your standard sports bar. Benefit is its attached to the hotel. If it was for this simple fact this place would be in trouble.

 I sat at the bar and the staff was friendly and sociable which is more common in the Fly Over States!  Lauren tried her hardest to keep the patrons at the bar here, but to no avail. The bar is the rally point for the lawyer, insurance agents, GE Medical Imagining and pharmaceutical sales people staying at the hotel.

The main reason is the menu! It's all greasy pub food with a very limited higher end food. The steak in elevator looked really nice but that was the only place that I saw any pictures of food for this place. A few in the menu would entice the palette. A picture is worth a thousand words.

 This being said I opened the vertical folding menu and ordered the New England Clam Chowder and the Sweet Thai Chili wings. The crock of chowder came out with 2 packets of oyster crackers! The Chowda was actually really good but Molten Lava hot. My wings actually came out before I could even get to eating the soup because of the burns to my mouth. They wings were smothered with the Sweet Thai Chili Sauce but it ha not heat to them. It was more of a sweet jam taste. The wings are a good size with lots of meat on them but the meat tasted watery. I don't know if they were frozen and thrown into the fryer but they were very bland tasting once the chili sauce was gone.

Most of the pictures of the food were staged because my wings came out in in a flat wire rack with paper underneath and looked nothing like the presentations in the bucket.

So if your looking to watch the game or per game before the local sports venue then stop in here cause the prices are good an the staff is friendly.

I'm going to buck the trend here and give this place a 4 out of 5. Ok, so if you're an out of town guest, believe me Fort Wayne offers better in the downtown area. But if you are looking for a sports bar in downtown, this place is your best bet. It's safe food, by that I mean everyone should be able to find something to order on the menu. Nothing will knock your socks off, but why would you expect it to at a chain sports bar? I mean, do you go to Applebee's expecting a life altering meal? I don't think so. The servers are always nice, bartenders are even better. Personally, I'm not a big fan of the signature drink menu...weak sauce. At least give me a well balanced drink if you're gonna charge me premium prices instead of a watered down alcoholic beverage. If you want people to pay a higher price for a mixed drink, it should be worth it. Am I right? For that reason, I now only order a beer here. Speaking of beer, my biggest complaint is that I get served beer in a plastic cup. I'm an adult, give me a glass. Oh and you don't need to pay for parking, just get your parking ticket validated at the front desk. And why did someone give this place 2 stars but then check-in 5 times. lol.