Most popular sports/teams in your area

[ftballfan]

Where I live now, the pecking order is:
1. University of Michigan
2. Lions
3. Tigers
4. Red Wings
5. Michigan State University
6. Pistons

In most of Michigan, at least one of the Packers, Cubs, Bears, and Patriots are ahead of the Pistons. Outside of Ann Arbor and Lansing, Michigan and MSU are closer to each other in the pecking order

Man, that's a sign how far the Wings have fallen. A few years ago they'd have been #2.

Even though Detroit is Hockeytown the Red Wings were never really above the Lions or Tigers. Detroit is a town that goes with the team based on the season and attendance to these teams is based on if they are winning or losing at the time. Like in 2017 the Tigers lost 98 games and their attendance has been declining since 2014 as they are only middle of the pack in the AL in attendance these days.

Even a losing Tigers team managed to be the best drawing team in the AL Central in 2017. Cleveland is notorious for low attendance despite their being successful in recent years.

[Buck87]

1. Ohio State Buckeyes
2. Cleveland Indians
3. Cleveland Browns
4. Cleveland Cavaliers
5. Michigan Wolverines
6. Pittsburgh Steelers
7. Detroit Tigers
8. Cincinnati Reds
9. Detroit Red Wings
10. Columbus Blue Jackets

[webny99]

Buffalo Bills
Buffalo Sabres

[Alps]

Buffalo Bills
Buffalo Sabres

Rochester? NY Yankees still rate.

[Flint1979]

Where I live now, the pecking order is:
1. University of Michigan
2. Lions
3. Tigers
4. Red Wings
5. Michigan State University
6. Pistons

In most of Michigan, at least one of the Packers, Cubs, Bears, and Patriots are ahead of the Pistons. Outside of Ann Arbor and Lansing, Michigan and MSU are closer to each other in the pecking order

Man, that's a sign how far the Wings have fallen. A few years ago they'd have been #2.

Even though Detroit is Hockeytown the Red Wings were never really above the Lions or Tigers. Detroit is a town that goes with the team based on the season and attendance to these teams is based on if they are winning or losing at the time. Like in 2017 the Tigers lost 98 games and their attendance has been declining since 2014 as they are only middle of the pack in the AL in attendance these days.

Even a losing Tigers team managed to be the best drawing team in the AL Central in 2017. Cleveland is notorious for low attendance despite their being successful in recent years.

That might be because there was still some drawing power there but I think they'll drop under 2 million in 2018 just because no improvements have been made to a terrible team. Only thing they did right was got rid of Brad now they need to go further and get rid of Avila too. Cleveland was really bad at drawing fans in their old ballpark and it seems to have carried over with their new ballpark too (well I guess it's 24 years old now but still seems new to me) after the newness of it wore off and the late 1990's teams they had faded. The White Sox are pretty notorious for low attendance too.

[webny99]

Buffalo Bills
Buffalo Sabres

Rochester? NY Yankees still rate.

Right right. But baseball is not that popular, at least among people I know. Our biggest loyalty is to the Bills.

[Buck87]

Cleveland was really bad at drawing fans in their old ballpark and it seems to have carried over with their new ballpark too (well I guess it's 24 years old now but still seems new to me) after the newness of it wore off and the late 1990's teams they had faded.

It was perfect storm of 3 factors coming together that produced the Indians 455 game sellout streak from June of 1995 to April of 2001:

1. The team was playing very good baseball (5 straight division titles and 2 pennants during the streak)
2. The ballpark was new (opened in 1994)
3. The Browns were gone for 3 years during this time (1996-1998)

But yes, once all of that wore off things went pretty much back to normal for Indians attendance....and as a result they recently reduced the capacity at Progressive Field down to 35k.

[Flint1979]

Cleveland was really bad at drawing fans in their old ballpark and it seems to have carried over with their new ballpark too (well I guess it's 24 years old now but still seems new to me) after the newness of it wore off and the late 1990's teams they had faded.

It was perfect storm of 3 factors coming together that produced the Indians 455 game sellout streak from June of 1995 to April of 2001:

1. The team was playing very good baseball (5 straight division titles and 2 pennants during the streak)
2. The ballpark was new (opened in 1994)
3. The Browns were gone for 3 years during this time (1996-1998)

But yes, once all of that wore off things went pretty much back to normal for Indians attendance....and as a result they recently reduced the capacity at Progressive Field down to 35k.

That makes sense.

[Sctvhound]

In this region (Charleston, SC) the teams that people follow have changed very much over the past couple of decades.

NFL: Before Panthers came, Charleston was a DC market. Local radio carried the Washington games, and TV (usually CBS) carried the Redskins. When Fox picked up the NFL rights, they went more Falcons and national games. That was the year before the Panthers came (1995).

There was Panthers fever immediately, as they made the NFC Championship in their 2nd season (1996). For a brief time, the Panthers were as popular as any other team around here. The Panthers never sustained it, so they lost a lot of their bandwagon. Cam Newton getting drafted pretty much saved the fan base around here. The year before he got drafted, we missed 2 regular season games because the Panthers were so bad. We haven't missed 1 since iin 7 years.

Most of the folks who grew up in the 90s who followed the AFC were Dolphins fans, because that was what NBC showed here. A few gravitated toward the Jags when they started, but now most of the AFC folks are Pats or Steelers fans.

MLB: Until the early 2000s, nearly everybody was an Atlanta Braves fan. They were hugely popular on TBS here, and local Fox picked up every Braves game they could. The local sportscasters would travel to Atlanta to cover playoff games. There were a few stray Cubs and Yankees fans, but that was about it. Now, it is probably the Braves tied with the Yankees and the Red Sox (and a few Cubs fans).

NASCAR: NASCAR was huge around here until about 12-15 years ago. Every race was intently followed locally, with even qualifying results on local news. The Daytona 500 was one of the biggest sporting events of the year. Now, even though it is followed here more than probably 90% of the country, the sport has a fraction of the following it used to.

NBA: We used to have a lot of Charlotte Hornets fans here (games were on local TV), but when they left the first time, the fan base disappeared and has never really come back. The Knicks also did their preseason training here, and hosted a preseason game, but they never really gained many fans.

College sports: It depends on the year and who is good. Probably 5-10% of the fan base flips between South Carolina and Clemson football depending on the year. Now it is probably 55-45 or even close to 60-40 Clemson. Most of the Citadel football fans are old alums and that fan base is slowly dying off.

College basketball is even more divided. Most of the middle and high school kids that follow sports are Duke or UNC folks. That first game they play (usually in February) is the "beginning"  of the season for them. Until last year's Final Four run, not many people followed South Carolina around here. Same with Clemson. The three local teams (College of Charleston, Citadel, and Charleston Southern) have following depending on the year. CofC is the biggest.

College baseball pretty much replaced NASCAR around here. All the local schools are good, and it fills a big void in between football and the summer. South Carolina's baseball is probably 2nd to football statewide (they won back to back national championships in 2010 and 2011). The basketball teams are followed more in and around Columbia.

[SP Cook]

Couple of comments based on some of the above.

Redskins.  The depth of the Redskins fandom into the south, has always been strong, and there are still plenty of such fans deep into the Carolinas.  If you go back in history, one of the reasons for the founding of the AFL was the Redskins unwillingness to allow expansion in TEXAS, as they considered the entire south to be their territory.  The like "fight for old D C" in the Redskins fight song is bowlderized, it used to be "fight for old Dixie".  The oddest thing to be is the Redskins following in SW Virginia.  The loyality seems to be near 100%, even in places that a vastly closer (and culturally vastly more similar to) Charlotte, and for that matter Nashville and Cincinnati.  Redskins fandom even bleeds over into the Tennessee Tri-Cities (which shares TV between TN and VA counties).  I just find it odd.

NASCAR.  EVERY board I post on, on lots of subjects, we eventually get the OT board over to Brian France and what he has done to NASCAR.  And I have yet to find ONE person that does not share the opinion that his changes to NASCAR have been 100% negative and not ONE person that does not report a massive decline in the sport's impact.

[jp the roadgeek]

Redskins.  The depth of the Redskins fandom into the south, has always been strong, and there are still plenty of such fans deep into the Carolinas.  If you go back in history, one of the reasons for the founding of the AFL was the Redskins unwillingness to allow expansion in TEXAS, as they considered the entire south to be their territory.  The like "fight for old D C" in the Redskins fight song is bowlderized, it used to be "fight for old Dixie".  The oddest thing to be is the Redskins following in SW Virginia.  The loyality seems to be near 100%, even in places that a vastly closer (and culturally vastly more similar to) Charlotte, and for that matter Nashville and Cincinnati.  Redskins fandom even bleeds over into the Tennessee Tri-Cities (which shares TV between TN and VA counties).  I just find it odd.

Regional fandom beyond the immediate home territory of today is not that rare.  Until the AFL came along, Giant fan loyalty in New England was probably about 90% because Boston didn't have a steady NFL franchise of its own.  There were probably some legacy Redskins fans from their Boston days, but the old Boston Yanks had come and gone, and never drew a fan base.  Other than in CT where the NY/Boston split is 50/50, you still see strong evidence of Giant fandom in places despite the Pats having been in existence for 58 years, and in the NFL for 48.  There was an auto glass place in Boston called Giant Glass, so named because the owner was a huge Giants fan.  Their advertising was all over the Fenway Park area, including one on the center field wall.  And northern Maine still has a very strong Giant fan base.  It's not like the Red Sox/Yankees rivalry; until 2007 Week 16 and SB XLII, being a fan of both the Giants and Pats really wasn't discouraged because they came from different leagues, play in different conferences, and rarely played meaningful games against each other.  Another example is in baseball with the Cardinals.  Until 1958, they were the only successful team that played west of the Mississippi (the Browns and the A's notwithstanding), and were the southernmost team in MLB until the Braves moved to Atlanta in 1966.  So they pretty much had the southern tier and west of the Mississippi all to themselves until the Giants and Dodgers moved to California.   

[slorydn1]

NASCAR.  EVERY board I post on, on lots of subjects, we eventually get the OT board over to Brian France and what he has done to NASCAR.  And I have yet to find ONE person that does not share the opinion that his changes to NASCAR have been 100% negative and not ONE person that does not report a massive decline in the sport's impact.

You sir, speak the absolute truth. I had been a regular poster at Motorportforums.com since 2001 (and the NASCAR subforum moderator since 2010). In my early days there, even though the forum was european based (the admin lives in England) the NASCAR subforum was only slightly behind the F1 subforum in new threads and post count. By the time I took over as the moderator the post count was way down, and now is only a trickle of what it once was. Heck I haven't even logged in for about a year or so, so I am not sure I am even on the staff anymore.

No one cares anymore. Brian France has done everything he can to make NASCAR like a stick and ball sport. I can understand the concept, actually. Afterall, the US is primarily a stick and ball country. We love our football, baseball, basketball and hockey.

What he failed to undertstand is that those of us who love motorsports love it because of the speed, the action, and because its different from the stick and ball sports. There aren't supposed to be time outs in racing. A driver has to be on top of his game, even under caution, or he is going to lose track position and possibly his chance to win the race.

We loved the fact that a season was really one big race in and of itself, with each race of the 36 counting just as much as any other. Win the Daytona 500, get max points. Win the Bristol night race in August, get max points. Win the final race at Homestead, get max points.

We knew that some seasons were going to be blowouts, that one team and driver was really that much better than everyone else that year, and although we might groan some about it, we were fine with it. That's what made seasons like 1992 so special, when it came down to the last lap of the last race at Atlanta and Kulwicki beat Bill Elliott by just the 10 point bonus for leading the most laps in that final race.

The press started beating the "must have change" drum in 2003 after Kenseth ran away with the championship and he only won one race. Ryan Newman won 8 races, but found ways to crash out every other week, so he didn't get it done.

The Chase started in 2004 and the rest is history. Some new fans became intrigued but most hard core fans started drifting (actually flooding) away. I still watch the races, but I keep score using the old Latford points system and just for fun the FIA 25 point win system that F1 uses as well. I really don't care who wins the real life championship any more, I just don't.

It's kind of sad, actually, because the last few years since the Gen6 car debuted the on-track product has been pretty good.

[NWI_Irish96]

NFL - Bears
NHL - Blackhawks
College Football - Notre Dame
MLB - Cubs
NBA - Bulls
College Basketball - Probably Notre Dame right now due to recent success but historically DePaul

[hotdogPi]

NBA - Bears

[NWI_Irish96]

NBA - Bears

I fixed it, but really the Bears are that popular and the Bulls haven't been good in a long time.

[formulanone]

Huntsville / Tennessee Valley Area:

1. College Football - it's king, end of that discussion.
A. Alabama Crimson Tide
B. Auburn Tigers
C. University of Tennessee
D. Other SEC teams, based on where you transplanted from/went to school
E. Troy or University of Alabama Birmingham; they rarely have games on TV, anyhow.

2. NFL
A. Probably a tie between Tennessee Titans and Atlanta Falcons. I'm going to guess it's because the Nashville didn't have a team until 1998, so Atlanta was the default team.
B. New Orleans Saints, they're a bit more popular in the southern half of the state. If the other two A-teams aren't playing at the moment, their game is on TV.
C. Dallas Cowboys or Pittsburgh Steelers, because they have legions of fans everywhere.
D. Miami Dolphins, mysteriously. Some folks have tried to explain to me here were coaching links between them and the Crimson Tide many years ago, or the Mike/Don Shula family tree. Probably the 3rd-6th choice to broadcast regionally after all the other games have ended, which really doesn't mean anything.

3. High School Football. I don't really care, but I know it's a big deal to some people.

4. It's a long way back to baseball. Atlanta Braves, and that's about it. The minor-league team left a few years ago, and there's talk of another team in a new stadium.

5. Basketball: Not discussed much, unless you like a team that's out of the area. Turns out Auburn and Alabama are actually doing pretty good in the SEC at the time of this writing. NBA is bigger during the playoffs, but other than occasional Atlanta Hawks talk, not much.

6. Hockey kind of picked up a little interest when the Nashville Predators made it to the Stanley Cup Finals last year. Otherwise, not much discussion...it's kind of seen as a Yankee/Canadian thing. The University of Alabama-Huntsville has a hockey team, and the Huntsville Havoc is a minor-league affiliate, so other than Alabama A&M's football squad, the only games in town.

7. NASCAR has it's fans, but I think it's only a big deal during the two times they come to Talladega, about three hours away. You see more fans' tributes to Dale Earnhardt and Davey Allison than anyone else, save maybe Jeff Gordon/Dale Jr...so I think its overall popularity is waning now that they've retired. There's a bit more popularity of other motorsports in the Birmingham area, since the Barber course is nearby.

8. Soccer...well, it's way down the pecking order. I help out with my kids' games so I might have some bias; thus, I'm putting it in #8.

In terms of locally-popular sports (off the beaten path), disc golf is quite the pastime. There's a fair number of courses in public parks in the area, and they're usually in use on the weekends.

[ce929wax]

I live in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  Western Michigan and the K-Wings have a decent following in town, although I have not made it to either's games.  I see a lot of Red Wings, Lions, and Tigers gear around here, even though 1660 AM is a flagship station for the Cubs.  There are a few Chicago sports fans around here.

[ET21]

MLB - White Sox

[Desert Man]

The LA Rams aren't in this year's super bowl, but locals into football really like em, LOL. My Mom is a 49er fan while she doesn't like the Patriots, one former Patriot is now a 49er: Jimmy Garoppolo. And will the Raider fan base in Nor and So Cal root for a Las Vegas team?

[jeffandnicole]

In Philly: The Phillies can go 0-162 this year, and not a single person will notice.

[Jardine]

I live close enough to Omaha the only sport I'm aware of is football and the only team I ever hear about is the Huskers.