Sacramento Kings moving franchise to the OC, CA.

You are saying the NBA has 30 healthy markets and could support upwards of 40 teams? You said it is no problem filling 18 to 20000 seats, have you checked attendance around the league? Like I said you are clueless.

 

So you're saying that a city such as St. Louis doesn't have enough corporate potential? St. Louis is possible, but already has three pro franchises.

Birmingham? Not a snowball's chance in hell.

San Diego? Nope. Can't even get the Clippers to come back.

Las Vegas? Not unless you change laws to allow gamblers to bet on them.

Kansas City? Been there, done that. Oklahoma City took that prize, instead.

Nashville? If the Predators struggle to keep their heads above water, does the market need another pro sports team?

Cincinnati? Not likely.

Hell idiot. Oklahoma City was never considered a potential NBA city until a few years ago.

I am curious to see what happens in OKC when the team goes 24-58 in a few years.

 

It's interesting how many NBA teams are in one-team markets...... Sacramento, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Salt Lake City, Portland. Of those, only Oklahoma City and Salt Lake City even have BCS-level universities to compete with for sponsorship and ticket dollars.

Even in the cases of Indianapolis and Phoenix, the NBA was there before any other Big 4 pro leagues moved in.

Interesting dynamic. It's far more one-team markets than any other Big 4 league.

 

Most of those teams have done pretty well. The Kings have struggled the last few years, but they did incredibly well for 20+ years, which is especially impressive considering how bad the franchise was for the bulk of that stretch. When the owners gut the team and keep prices where they were when the team was a title contender, that's never going to work.

 

Have you seen OKC play and how young they are? I don't think they are a few years from the lottery. They're gonna be around for a while.

This coming from someone who hates that team more than any other team in sports history.

 

But it is far easier to support an NFL or MLB team and larger payrolls. Right. You of all people....

 

San Antonio is doing quite well and always has. Portland too.

Some of these "failures" are due to bad management.

Two years old though it is, I guess this guy and his numbers are idiotic.

http://www.bizjournals.com/bizjournals/on-numbers/scott-thomas/2011/08/22-markets-have-nba-potential.html?page=all

 

Portland is a great example of a small-market team. I worked five hours south of Portland and whenever I'd go out to cover a game, people wanted to talk about the Blazers, they are very popular in the state. They always draw well.

 

His numbers bespoke "adequate" support for the NBA. Does that mean night after night of 18,000-seat arena sellouts at NBA prices? Let's put it this way -- if some owner uses this as a pretext to moving a team to the "sufficient" markets of Albany or Tulsa, good luck, because you're going to need it.

Also how much does San Antonio draw from the nearby "sufficient" market of Austin? Does anyone really think two NBA teams that close with that population will really draw night after night at top dollar?

Actually, in many ways, it's easier for a city to support an NFL team. For one thing, the TV money is enormous. The other, you only play eight regular-season home games per year, most all of them on the weekend. For that, people will travel greater distances more frequently than they will for a team playing 41 nights per year, many on weekdays (and during the winter, too).

 

Two big injuries and they're in the lottery. Four or five seasons into his career, Shawn Kemp looked like a dead-solid-lock Hall of Famer.

 

Agreed, but you could have said the same thing about Jordan's Bulls teams...

Kemp was never on Durant's level, meaning, he was never one of the league's top 3 players.

 

For this conversation, the point is -- does OKC sell out every game after Durant and Westbrook go? That'll give you an idea of how solid a market that will be. I would except a dropoff, but maybe a generation of Oklahomans will be so into the Thunder that they'll keep going anyway.