The situation with the Sonics got me thinking about something. (Not anything important, mind you!)

This leaves Seattle with just the Mariners and the Seahawks, right? Two top-flight teams in a city like Seattle.

However, which cities have the greatest combined number of 'top-flight' teams? In other words, teams that are in the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and, for the sake of argument, top-flight college teams from those same four sports. (I think top college teams should be included in the equation too, since I know that college sports are more popular in some parts than the pro versions.)

Hopefully, we should end up with some idea of 'America's most sport-obssessed city!

The New York metro area has two baseball teams, two football teams, three hockey teams and two basketball teams, soccer, lacrosse, arena football, team tennis, you name it, but not usually a lot of excitement for college sports, although occasionally one of the area teams like St. Johns in basketball or, more recently, Rutgers in football will have a good season and whip up interest.

Boston has teams in the four big leagues and is the most sports obsessed city I've lived in or near, but despite having so many college teams, college sports aren't much of a big deal there. College hockey draws pretty well and BC football and basketball do ok, but they're still pretty niche. In Boston, it's all about the Red Sox. The Patriots now have a lot of bandwagon fans, but they didn't 20 years ago. The obsession with the Sox is pathological.

Pittsburgh is very sports obsessed. They don't have an NBA team, but interest in the Steelers is off the charts and is a major part of the city's self-identity. The Penguins (hockey) are only slightly less popular. The Pirates (baseball) have lost a lot of support during their prolonged ineptitude but still have a lot of fans. Unlike most big cities which tend to fixate only on the pro teams, college sports do very well there too. Pitt basketball is very popular. College football support there is probably spread fairly equally among Pitt, Penn State, West Virginia and "other." Small college and high school football draws good crowds there too.

DC has teams in all the big pro leagues, plus several top college basketball teams, but this really isn't a great sports town. Beyond the Redskins, the passion doesn't run very deep. That's largely because it's such a transient city where so many people bring their allegiances from elsewhere. The fever for the Redskins is waning too since they moved to FedEx Field and Danny Boy has ineptly run the team.

Los Angeles:

NBA: Lakers, Clippers
MLB: Dodgers (could possibly count the Angels)
NHL: Kings (could possibly count the Ducks)
College: UCLA & USC basketball and football

That's 8, possibly 10. I'm not counting college baseball, because that isn't really a big deal until the CWS, and even then, it's not really a big deal.

How could you forget the mighty Waves of Pepperdine, this years national runner up in men's volleyball?

Ideally, one would look at this in terms of clubs per capita, in which case I think that Pittsburgh would do very well.

Denver is probably the smallest metropolitan area with teams in all four "major" professional sports (to which one can add Colorado football and University of Denver hockey).

Yeah, I guess 'per capita' is the real factor, otherwise New York and LA would obviously rule.

Would London win ours, per capita? I guess so. Only one RL team, but loads of football teams, almost as many RU teams, and two county cricket grounds. The only other possibility would be Greater Manchester, I'd have thought.

The concept doesn't really travel well, does it?

One of the things about the US is that the boundaries (both in terms of metropolitan areas and leagues) are clearly fixed. That just isn't the case in the UK.

For instance, why wouldn't one include league cricket? And how do you account for country cricket clubs that play in multiple grounds?

London doesn't have any top flight ice hockey any more. And I think the London United basketball team have dropped out of the BBL

If you include league cricket, then Greater Manchester must win easily.

I think only London, Greater Manchester and Leeds have football, cricket, RL and RU teams. That right, anyone?

Wyatt Earp wrote:

QUOTE:
Would London win ours, per capita? I guess so. Only one RL team, but loads of football teams, almost as many RU teams, and two county cricket grounds. The only other possibility would be Greater Manchester, I'd have thought.

Two RL teams: London Skolars lurk at the foot of NL2. And only one of the top-flight RU teams actually plays in London.

Wyatt Earp wrote:

QUOTE:
If you include league cricket, then Greater Manchester must win easily.

I think only London, Greater Manchester and Leeds have football, cricket, RL and RU teams. That right, anyone?

Think so. Tyneside almost qualifies, but the cricket play outside the conurbation in Durham. Would S Wales (Glamorganshire) qualify?

Wouldn't Edinburgh be in with a shout for third spot (in the UK), if we're talking about top-flight teams?

JtS wrote:

QUOTE:
London doesn't have any top flight ice hockey any more. And I think the London United basketball team have dropped out of the BBL

I think both of these situations are scandalous.

Looks like Guildford did the right thing all along, by staying in the second tier.

Reed of the Valley People wrote:

QUOTE:
How could you forget the mighty Waves of Pepperdine, this years national runner up in men's volleyball?

A few years back, UCI won the men's volleyball title, UCI's first national championship. The difference between there and UCLA was really striking--at UCLA, women's gymnastics and lots of other smaller sports won national championships while I was there, and it wasn't really a big deal (though my roommate was the women's gymnastics team's athletic trainer, and he got a championship ring along with the rest of the team, which was really cool). But at UCI, the men's volleyball team became huge. There was a big rally for them and everything.