By Aidan Joly
I was watching an NHL version of this last night and it got me to thinking, if I was to start a professional basketball league from scratch, where would I put the teams? It doesn’t necessarily have to be the NBA, but just a league. I didn’t look at where teams have done well in the past or history of basketball in the city or anything like that, I just looked at what cities I think would support a professional basketball franchise the best.
32 teams, and I did do repeats of cities, but not a ton. Divided up into 16 teams in each an Eastern and Western Conference, didn’t do divisions. The order the teams are in is a general order of where I would give them the teams. All of them are North American cities. Sorry London.
First up, the Eastern Conference:
- New York: Obvious one, put them in the heart of Manhattan.
2. Boston: Great sports town, would easily support a team, you see it with all of the other sports.
3. Philadelphia: Another great east coast sports city, loads of history not just in sports but history as a whole.
4. Washington, D.C.: The nation’s capital, has supported teams since professional sports leagues began, they get a team.
5. Toronto: Going outside of the United States, you’ll have all of Canada rooting for them.
6. Charlotte: That area of the country is a hotbed for basketball, it’s a college basketball area but I think they would support a pro team.
7. New York (second team): Putting a second team in the area because it’s so big. This team isn’t in Manhattan, put them in either Brooklyn or Queens.
8. Indianapolis: Going outside of the east coast for the first time. Great Midwest sports city that has supported the Colts and is in a basketball-crazed area.
9. Miami: First Florida team. Hot weather, big sports town, they would support a team.
10. Detroit: The city has a major economic problem and has not been doing as well so they go kind of down the list for that, but teams there still get support so they do get a team.
11. Cleveland: They support baseball and football through thick and thin, so basketball shouldn’t be a problem.
12. Milwaukee: Another good Midwest sports city, cold weather, fans would come out to see a basketball game in Wisconsin. You also get a natural rival with Indianapolis there.
13. Atlanta: Going to the Southeast for a second time, pretty simple to put them in.
14. New Jersey: A third team in the New York metropolitan area. It has that level of population and is the biggest basketball hotbed in the country. There’s an arena in Newark, have them play there.
15. Louisville: This one might be surprising but the basketball-crazed state of Kentucky has been pushing for a pro basketball team for a long time. Here, they’ll get one.
16. Baltimore: Maryland is an underrated sports area, they support the Orioles and Ravens even when they are bad and it creates a rival for the Washington, D.C. team.
Just missed the cut: Tampa Bay, Virginia Beach, Montreal, Pittsburgh, Buffalo
Now, the Western Conference:
- Los Angeles: Biggest city on the West Coast, second-largest in the country, easily the first city.
2. Chicago: Sports-crazed town, they get one quickly.
3. Houston: Texas is football-first but putting a team there is easy, they’ll support the team as they have supported all of their teams.
4. Dallas: A second team in Texas, same reasons as Houston, but Dallas is a tick smaller.
5. San Diego: It’s odd that the NBA doesn’t have a team in San Diego, but they would support one in Southern California.
6. Bay Area: Six teams in the West so far, three of them in California. Put this team in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, wherever.
7. Seattle: It’s a crime that there isn’t an NBA team in Seattle. The SuperSonics left for Oklahoma City in 2008 and they’ve been begging for a team back since. The NBA will be back there soon, but they are almost a shoe-in for a franchise in this.
8. San Antonio: A third team in the state of Texas, but far enough away from both Dallas and Houston, giving them their own part of the state to call home.
9. Denver: The biggest city in that area of the country, it’s more of a hockey town but they deserve to have all four major leagues in Denver.
10. Phoenix: A team in the desert, same reasons as Denver for Phoenix, even though hockey isn’t exactly working out there.
11. St. Louis: The city of the arch is down to two teams, the Cardinals and Blues, but it is a great Midwest city that deserves to be back to three teams after the NFL’s Rams left for Los Angeles in 2015.
12. Los Angeles (second team): LA will be the only West city with two teams. It’s big enough to do it, but have them play outside of downtown. Inglewood area would be a solid fit. Maybe even Anaheim, 30 miles outside of downtown.
13. Minneapolis: Another solid Midwest sports town, deserving of a team. You can put them in either Minneapolis or St. Paul, they’ll get fans either way.
14. Las Vegas: Sigh. Professional sports has been booming in Vegas with the NHL’s Golden Knights and the NFL’s Raiders coming in this fall. They go from zero teams to three in a span of three years.
15. Vancouver: They’re back! A second team in Canada, this time in the Western portion, giving them two teams in the big four and giving Seattle a natural rival in the Pacific Northwest.
16. Mexico City: Call me crazy, but Mexico is ready for a professional basketball team. It might be tough logistically considering the closest city is a three-hour flight, but the city has proven to be ready for a team, and have an arena ready to go and a whole country behind them. There’s a good chance the real NBA ends up there, so I’ll give them a shot here.
Just missed the cut: New Orleans, Portland, Memphis, Oklahoma City, Kansas City
AJ Hoops 