Rank your city's sports teams by popularity

[JManc]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

I would have expected the Aggies and Longhorns to have a bigger following than UH?

They are but not local teams. Texas A&M is about 80 or miles from Houston and Austin is about 150.

[L41A]

For Atlanta, I would rank the sports teams in popularity as follows

1. Braves
2. Falcons
3. Hawks
4. United
5. UGA Football (I hate it though - Go Jackets!)
6. Georgia Tech Football
7. Georgia State Football
8. Dream
9. AUC (Morehouse, Clark Atlanta)

Of course, popularity wanes based on winning, stars, etc. And although football in general is the most popular sport in Atlanta and Georgia. I would say that the Braves' popularity has been consistently bigger than the Falcons when viewed in broader contextual sense. It's not that one's popularity is so much greater than the other but if I had to choose one, I would say the Braves. Plus I think football fans get some of their fix on all the nearby prominent college football teams (Auburn, Clemson, Alabama, FSU, etc) and even high school football.

Also, of course, popularity shifts based on location in metro area. Georgia Tech football is probably still just as popular in city of Atlanta as UGA football. GT's football popularity is seemingly taking a nosedive though. In the 1980-90s (certainly prior), GT popularity in city of Atlanta was probably greater than UGA.

[3rd&Brown]

Originally Posted by thoughtcriminal

My Philly sports team ranking: this changes slightly year to year, depending on how the teams are performing, but in general:
1) E-A-G-L-E-S Eagles
2) Phillies
3) Flyers
4) Sixers
5) Combined Big 5 / City 6 Basketball, with Villanova probably topping the list
6) Philadelphia Union soccer

This is the ranking for a white Philadelphia sports fan. If you were black Sixers would be #2 and Flyers wouldn’t even be on the list.

Temple and Villanova basketball would rank higher.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

I would have expected the Aggies and Longhorns to have a bigger following than UH?

I thought the Cowboys would be in there too. Cowboys seem to have fandom everywhere in TX.

[thoughtcriminal]

Originally Posted by Greavsie

For London's Football Teams imho:
1.Tottenham Hotspur
2.Arsenal
3.Chelsea
4.West Ham United
5.Crystal Palace
6.Queens Park Rangers
7.Fulham
8.Brentford
9.Millwall
10.Leyton Orient

Sp*rs at the top? I don't think even the most hardcore totn'm fan would agree with that.
Fun fact: they saved a lot of money on building their new stadium because they didn't need to have any space for their trophy displays.

#londonisred #arsenal #gooners

[thoughtcriminal]

Originally Posted by 3rd&Brown

This is the ranking for a white Philadelphia sports fan. If you were black Sixers would be #2 and Flyers wouldn’t even be on the list.

Temple and Villanova basketball would rank higher.

and if the queen had balls, she'd be the king. what is your point?
why do you have to bring race into a fun, stupid discussion topic?
just because it is from the perspective of a white person, does that make it invalid?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by 3rd&Brown

This is the ranking for a white Philadelphia sports fan. If you were black Sixers would be #2 and Flyers wouldn’t even be on the list.

Temple and Villanova basketball would rank higher.

Yeah, I feel some of these perspectives are strictly white male perspectives, which granted, makes up a good portion of the sports-following public, but may skew our observations.

Like NHL. Nowhere in the U.S. is the NHL dominant, like football (or like NHL in Canada). Even in places like Michigan or Minnesota. Nonwhite Americans, who are now the majority in most of the biggest metros, have almost no NHL following. Go to a Red Wings game and try and find a nonwhite fan (OK, you'll see the random Asian/Hispanic/AA girlfriend accompanied by white boyfriend).

[Steely Dan]

Here's another data point for chicago's teams.


2021 Forbes team valuation:

Bears - $4.1B
Cubs - $3.4B
Bulls - $3.3B
White Sox - $1.7B
Blackhawks - $1.4B
Fire - $0.5B


Now, total team valuation in no way directly correlates to local "popularity" because some teams own their own stadiums outright (like the Cubs, Bulls & Blackhawks) while others play in stadiums with some level of public ownerships where the teams are technically just tenants (Bears, Sox & Fire), but it is another thing to look at. Some teams also have large national followings, like the Cubs, that increase their brand's value, while teams like the White Sox have virtually no national following, but still have a significant fanbase within Chicagoland itself.

I probably had the Blackhawks ranked a bit too high on my original list. Their 3 recent-ish championships last decade were the first to truly galvanize the entire city since the Jordan-era bulls because the Sox championship in '05 and the cubs championship in '16 were really only celebrated by one half of the city at a time, respectively. So I think my judgement was a little clouded by that. Even in cold-winter northern cities with an "original 6" team like Chicago, hockey is still somewhat "niche" in the US. It's just not at the same level as football/baseball/basketball.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Quixote

As an outside observer, the sense I get is that New Yorkers really care about the Knicks and Mets, although the fandom is more closeted. You’ll find a lot of people who say they are fans of those teams, but don’t really follow them too closely. Or at least that’s the case with the Mets, who have lots of fans by virtue of family and nostalgia. The Knicks easily have pound-for-pound the most passionate fan base when considering the lack of success vis-a-vis loyalty and media coverage.

Yeah, baseball allegiances are territorial in NYC. Manhattan and the Bronx are solid Yankees country, while Queens is Mets country. Brooklyn is a mixed bag, but leans Yankees.

On the other hand, the Knicks are still New York's basketball team, despite the Nets having moved into the city a decade ago. There's no real rivalry between the Knicks and Nets (unlike Yankees and Mets), so basketball fans will generally root for both teams.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by 3rd&Brown

This is the ranking for a white Philadelphia sports fan. If you were black Sixers would be #2 and Flyers wouldn’t even be on the list.

Temple and Villanova basketball would rank higher.

Originally Posted by thoughtcriminal

and if the queen had balls, she'd be the king. what is your point?
why do you have to bring race into a fun, stupid discussion topic?
just because it is from the perspective of a white person, does that make it invalid?

I'm usually very far from being a fan of the "immediately inject race into everything" people, but in this case, he brought up a very interesting point IMO.

Also, he didn't call your ranking invalid, he just pointed out one could easily tell you were a white Philadelphian from it. That's interesting. Just as interesting as if (coming up with a random example) you learned that just by the contents of my fridge at snapshot time, one can immediately tell I'm a Québécois, not an Anglo-Canadian.

[Boisebro]

i'll give Wisconsin a shot:

1 - Packers
2 - Badgers football
3 - Badgers hockey/basketball -- the hockey team was the BMOC for decades when they were winning national championships, whereas the basketball teams were historically awful for a long time, but the tide has turned in recent years
4 - Milwaukee Bucks/Brewers - I would've normally eked the Brew Crew ahead of the Bucks, but last year's NBA title gave the Bucks a boost
5 - Marquette basketball
6 - UW Milwaukee basketball
7 - UW Green Bay basketball

[thoughtcriminal]

Originally Posted by lio45

I'm usually very far from being a fan of the "immediately inject race into everything" people, but in this case, he brought up a very interesting point IMO.

Also, he didn't call your ranking invalid, he just pointed out one could easily tell you were a white Philadelphian from it. That's interesting. Just as interesting as if (coming up with a random example) you learned that just by the contents of my fridge at snapshot time, one can immediately tell I'm a Québécois, not an Anglo-Canadian.

I'll disagree. If he had put out his ranking as he mentioned, and I pointed out that it was the ranking of a black Philadelphia sports fan, I suspect I would have been called a racist and might even have received some disciplinary action from the mods. calling my ranking as that of a white person came across as dismissive. the subsequent post said that large cities are mostly populated by nonwhite people now, so the perspective of the white people posting in this thread was misleading: "Yeah, I feel some of these perspectives are strictly white male perspectives, which granted, makes up a good portion of the sports-following public, but may skew our observations"

[3rd&Brown]

Originally Posted by thoughtcriminal

and if the queen had balls, she'd be the king. what is your point?
why do you have to bring race into a fun, stupid discussion topic?
just because it is from the perspective of a white person, does that make it invalid?

Good lord. Relax. Literally nothing I said was intended to raise any one’s ire. The fact that it irks you says more about you than it does about me.

[thoughtcriminal]

Originally Posted by 3rd&Brown

Good lord. Relax. Literally nothing I said was intended to raise any one’s ire. The fact that it irks you says more about you than it does about me.

right. inject race into an otherwise banal conversation, and you weren't trying to raise anyone's ire. got it.

[Manitopiaaa]

Washington DC

1. Nationals (bottom half of MLB teams, but the Nats have a good reputation and no one really dislikes them)
2. Capitals (not a lot of support, but it has a good reputation and supporters are loyal)
3. Wizards (bottom half of NBA teams, but they don't have a bad reputation. They mostly just suck at winning.
4. DC United (usually in the top half of MLS teams, but #4 on the list because MLS isn't really a thing here yet. The somewhat-new Audi Field will hopefully cause it to rise in awareness)
5. Commanders (actively hated by the local population. Dan Snyder is hated, FedEx Field is third-world, the team isn't very good, now they want a new taxpayer-funded stadium in Virginia. Suffice it to say, Commanders are dead-last by a country mile).

Conclusion: Most of our teams are meh, so our sports obsession is meh. NFL team is actively hated.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by L41A

For Atlanta, I would rank the sports teams in popularity as follows

1. Braves
2. Falcons
3. Hawks
4. United
5. UGA Football (I hate it though - Go Jackets!)
6. Georgia Tech Football
7. Georgia State Football
8. Dream
9. AUC (Morehouse, Clark Atlanta)

From an outsider perspective, I would've expected the Hawks to edge out the Falcons. Granted, the Hawks probably haven't been much to talk about since the 90s when Dominique Wilkins played for them.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by thoughtcriminal

right. inject race into an otherwise banal conversation, and you weren't trying to raise anyone's ire. got it.

There are banal conversations in which injecting race is appropriate. "How often do you use ketchup?" for example, if the answer happens to highly correlate with ethnicity, then it's interesting and on-topic. (Not sure whether it does, just a random example.)

[38 Geary]

Originally Posted by Manitopiaaa

Washington DC

1. Nationals (bottom half of MLB teams, but the Nats have a good reputation and no one really dislikes them)
2. Capitals (not a lot of support, but it has a good reputation and supporters are loyal)
3. Wizards (bottom half of NBA teams, but they don't have a bad reputation. They mostly just suck at winning.
4. DC United (usually in the top half of MLS teams, but #4 on the list because MLS isn't really a thing here yet. The somewhat-new Audi Field will hopefully cause it to rise in awareness)
5. Commanders (actively hated by the local population. Dan Snyder is hated, FedEx Field is third-world, the team isn't very good, now they want a new taxpayer-funded stadium in Virginia. Suffice it to say, Commanders are dead-last by a country mile).

Conclusion: Most of our teams are meh, so our sports obsession is meh. NFL team is actively hated.

Come to think of it, out of all the cities/metros with all four of the major American sports (NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL), DC has got to be the lowest ranked and not really known for anything. NYC is known for the Yankees and Knicks. Chicago has the Bulls and the Cubs. LA has the Lakers and Dodgers. SF has the 49ers, Giants, and Warriors. Boston has the Patriots, Celtics and Red Sox. All these teams have had varying degrees of success, many with dynasties. Philly, while they haven't had a ton of sustained success, are at least known for having the most "passionate" fans.

As you stated, most of the DC area teams are meh, and the Commanders basically provide negative value.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Come to think of it, out of all the cities/metros with all four of the major American sports (NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL), DC has got to be the lowest ranked and not really known for anything. NYC is known for the Yankees and Knicks. Chicago has the Bulls and the Cubs. LA has the Lakers and Dodgers. SF has the 49ers, Giants, and Warriors. Boston has the Patriots, Celtics and Red Sox. All these teams have had varying degrees of success, many with dynasties. Philly, while they haven't had a ton of sustained success, are at least known for having the most "passionate" fans.

As you stated, most of the DC area teams are meh, and the Commanders basically provide negative value.

D.C.'s team is the Redskin Washington Football Team Commanders.

[SAN Man]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

D.C.'s team is the Redskin Washington Football Team Commanders.

It's not the Washington Bullets?! I've never liked the Washington Wizards name or logo. They should probably consider renaming themselves again.