Originally from Thursday, July 19, 2007
Newark, NJ – For once, I’m actually traveling without my laptop, so I wrote the core ideas of this blog by hand while waiting for my plane that never arrived (a near future blog topic). Being in a different city, I was thinking how popular the Yankees and Mets are to New York, the Red Sox to Boston, the Redskins to Washington, etc. In essence, to kill time, I linked the four professional sports to their respective city. So, based on my quarter century of sports knowledge, reading countless newspaper articles, magazines, and internet pages, I tried to define which sport best captures the city’s heart. For a city to be qualified, it must be home to at least two professional sports teams. I defined a professional sports team as “The Big 4;” baseball, football, basketball, and hockey. Therefore, Salt Lake City, Orlando, San Jose, Memphis, Portland, San Antonio, Sacramento, Raleigh, Montreal, and, Jacksonville were disqualified. Here goes my attempt…
Baseball
Boston
New York
Cincinnati
St. Louis
Phoenix
Seattle
San Francisco
Los Angeles
San Diego
Football
Washington, DC
Charlotte
Atlanta
Tampa
Miami
Cleveland
Nashville
New Orleans
Pittsburgh
Denver
Chicago
Houston
Dallas
Kansas City
Baltimore
Basketball
Philadelphia
East Rutherford, NJ
Hockey
Detroit
Toronto
Buffalo
America’s pastime may be baseball, but my chart above illustrates that football takes precedent. Yes, it’s tough to call Houston a football town, but the Astros and Rockets don’t possess the charisma it takes to win the fans. Houston is more of college football town, but since this blog focuses on professional sports, I placed the city in the “football” category. If the Texans were to build a consistent winner, they will easily take over the city.
Furthermore, it was difficult identifying a suitable home for Atlanta. Atlanta is also a college football town. Sadly, the Braves, even with their impressive 14 straight division title run, don’t attract the crowds to match their dominance.
I believe that a future blog is in order to rank the top sports towns of America. Until then, let the debate begin on the above categories…
3 comments:
San Fran is a baseball town over football? I see 49ers fans all over the place still from their run in the 80s & 90s. Is it just that there are more fans outside of the city, making it seem football crazy? I dont see SF Giants fans anywhere except SF.
I think the reason you have so many more "football cities" is because of the structure of the whole thing. Lots of baseball teams (Kansas City, Milwaukee) were really good, and I think would have put up a better fight against football if teams like Boston and New York weren't allowed to run rampant with their spending. Less competition than football. If this were the 80s, you'd have a much different looking list.
Yes, you are absolutely correct about your 80's theory. The cities listed under the baseball category are all considered to be "big markets." If a team is willing to spend money, a la Boston and New York, it will generate more fan interest. The cities in the north tend to be "baseball" cities, while the southern cities fall into the football category.
Because the Niners were very popular in the 80's and early 90's, it sparked a "fair-weather" fan trend outside of the city (see Jose). More recently, the team has gone through losing seasons, coupled with playing in a dump (Candlestick Park). Since the opening of AT&T Park, the Giants' attendance has flourished. The Giants made a World Series appearance five years ago (and came within 5 outs of winning it), they have made regular playoff appearances in the early 2000's, and San Franciscans have been the bedrock of support for Barry Bonds. These were the key reasons why I deemed San Francisco a "baseball town."
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