I’d like other Doper input on the likelyhood these teams would move. In each case, I see it as a bad facility/poor fan support situation.
NFL: Jacksonville
NHL: Phoenix
MLB: Tampa Bay
NBA: Memphis
I have no sense where they’d move, you can offer WAGs if you want.
I love the way the sports leagues blame the fans and citizens when a team moves. Taking the Jacksonville Jaguars as an example, the NFL approved the renovations to the old Gator Bowl Stadium, decided to move into a market too small to support an NFL team, and now that the honeymoon is over and the economy’s in the tank, it is the Jacksonville people’s fault rather than the team or league’s that the team may move.
If Phoenix somehow gets rescued from the NHL scrap heap, I’ll take a flyer on the Atlanta Thrashers. Right now, their ownership group can’t even agree on what to have for lunch. Even Gary Bettman, all three-foot-six of him, has called out the owners.
But if the citizens had just paid for more luxury boxes when the stadium was built, everything would okay.
I think Jacksonville may be stuck. Assuming the NFL wants to keep Los Angeles open as a threat, about the only NFL-worthy city I can think of that wouldn’t be encroaching on another franchise’s turf might be San Antonio.
In baseball, both Tampa Bay and Miami have serious, chronic attendence problems, but I can’t see MLB abandoning Florida. However, San Antonio (again), Nashville and perhaps Charlotte and Buffalo could probably be viable.
The NBA and NHL have always been more - shall we say - dynamic. But a lot of the likely suspects for an NBA team are cities that teams have already left (e.g., Cincinatti, Kansas City, St. Louis, San Diego.) It looks like Pittsburgh has never had an NBA franhise, but the financial difficulties of the Penguins and Pirates don’t make the city’s prospects exactly bright.
And the NHL seems permanently incapable of keeping a franchise in any city where there isn’t snow on the ground for at least two months.
I agree with the other posters about Jacksonville – it doesn’t look to be an issue of weak fan support, so much as a small fan base. Whereas Green Bay is an even smaller market, the Packers can count the entire state of Wisconsin (including the far larger Milwaukee market) as “theirs”, while Jacksonville really only has the Jacksonville area – the NFL placed a team in a market surrounded (more or less) by three existing teams (Atlanta, Miami, and Tampa Bay), all of which had 20-to-30 year head starts on building fan bases.
Jacksonville is also in serious competition with UF and FSU college football as well. It really wasn’t a good choice for a franchise. I figure somehow Minnesota will find a way to get a new stadium and keep the Vikings there.
The Marlins aren’t going anywhere soon. They’ve got a new stadium opening. They’ve been a decent team most years, but they just can’t seem to draw at the ballpark. They only get fans who are there to cheer for the opposing team. I think the Rays will either get a new stadium worked out or they’ll be likely to relocate.
Not to mention sticking the other expansion franchise just up the road in Charlotte. If not for the Panthers, Jacksonville might have laid claim to a goodly portion of the Carolinas.
I think Portland, OR is a likely destination for a MLB team, I think the Marlins absolutely need to relocate. What an embarrassment of a sports town, especially in the summertime.
I wish the NHL would take the Panthers, Lightning, Thrashers and Coyotes and take them up north. Contract 2 of them and find Canadian homes for the other two. Take the Hurricanes and give them back to Hartford and wash their hands of the Deep South. I wonder if Portland or Seattle would support an NHL team.
I also wonder if Salt Lake City would suuport an NHL team, after the great 2002 Olympics.
It’ll probably never happen but the NBA should say the hell with it and put the Grizzles in Vegas. Maybe Memphis, if they had a decent team and better management, could be a great niche location like OKC appears to be absent any other pro sports and another team deserves to move more but that they are in the West already makes it easy. The issues with attendance at Hawks games probably means they should get shipped to Vegas and their player history really fits nice with the Vegas vibe. Not sure what other NBA teams are on the move, maybe Sacramento or New Orleans but Sacktown fits that OKC mold and New Orleans feels like it needs 2 Pro teams.
Incidentally, how hilarious would it be if the Bobcats ended up in Vegas?
There should be a league rule that when a team moves to another city, they must change their names and allow the city that is being left the opportunity to rename a new team with the same colors and identity. The owner would lose the name upon moving.
For example, when the Colts left Baltimore, the owners (Ersay) should of given the team a new name (like Stallions) and allowed Baltimore the opportunity to give the new club the Colts name.
When the Oilers moved from Houston to Nashville, thankfully they changed their name, because the Oilers had the ugliest uniforms and those oil derrick helmets. Again, a new NFL owner should have the right to have the name Oilers.
Several teams want to move to Los Angeles. If the Jags go there, change the name. The Viqueens, I mean Vikings have wanted to leave Minnesota and go to L.A. The LA Vikings might sound cool, but the Vikings are a nod to the majority of the people of Minnesota’s ancestery. However, if Oakland comes back, keep them the Raiders, because the Raiders are a part of the California landscape. If I was the owner, I would rename the team the Los Angeles Stars, Galaxy or Generals.
Relocated NBA teams, Los Angeles Lakers, Utah Jazz and my favorite, Memphis Grizzlies. Grizzlies especially is an awful name since the only Grizzly within a 1000 miles of Memphis is in a zoo. However, way back in the early 70’s there was a short lived football league called the World Football League and the Memphis team is the Grizzlies.
If I may ask, why is Miami baseball suffering? The weather seems to be tailored made for it, not to mention a lot of Cubans who have loved the game (even Castro played baseball). Then there are the older folks from big cities up north who would seem to love having a baseball team there.
Not too long ago, Miami only had the Dolphins.
It would be interesting if when a franchise milked a tax break or arena or something from taxpayer funds the state or city wrote a stipulation that transferred the name and history of the team to the city upon any move. That way at least the cities get something for their money and if an owner screws them, a new owner with a expansion team at least gets the Browns treatment and a ready made fan base.
In baseball, Tampa is a fine market, they just desperately need a new, easier to get to stadium. Miami is a bit tougher to tell as actions by owners may have poisoned the fan base.
Have you been to Miami in the summer? It’s unbearable. Sitting outside away from the beach for 4 hours in August is the definition of hell. Plus Miami is loaded with transplants who don’t give a shit about local teams because they prefer their old hometown teams. The Dolphins, Panthers and Heat all can’t draw flies when they aren’t the one of the best teams in the league. It’s not just a baseball issue. Miami isn’t a sports centric city, even the Hurricanes aren’t a sure thing when they aren’t dominant.
The very transient nature of the population. Everyone is from the Northeast, even if they only lived there as an infant. The current stadium. There is nothing around the stadium at all except for a turnpike toll booth. I’d also say the weather. The frequent pop up thunderstorms make going to a game in an open air stadium a risk and who wants to sit through rain delays on a Tuesday night when you’re looking at a long drive back to suburbia. They draw fans for the Mets, Cubs, and the Yankees and Red Sox if they’re on the interleague schedule.
Maybe getting the stadium into Miami itself and out of the mass of suburban sprawl area between Dade and Broward counties will help.
Las Vegas could support a team but the NFL would never do it because they like to pretend no one bets on football.
Currently Hartford can’t sell out their AHL team. And The Canes are drawing more people than Columbus. Move the Blue Jackets to Connecticut so ESPN will stop hating hockey, and let me keep my Hurricanes.
That would be nice.
What would be even better is for cities to stop bending over for multi-millionaire sports team owners altogether.