Which Cities Are Poised For Major Sports Expansion?

The NBA, NFL, and MLB have all shown signs of relocating teams and even the possibility of expansion. Recently Adam Silver (NBA commissioner) said he one day hopes to expand the NBA to Europe as did his predecessor, David Stern. Roger Goodell also threw out the idea of expanding the NFL outside of the country to Mexico, Brazil, or Germany, along with relocating to Los Angeles. And even Rob Manfred (MLB commissioner) recently discussed his hope to expand the league internationally.

All three commissioners of the big three sports in the US have indicated future hopes and plans to expand their teams abroad, but I would say, with the exception of expanding to other North American countries–Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, it would be more important to continue to build the brand here before they move overseas.

But how will these leagues be able to fill the rosters? Well, there are plenty of free agents and minor league/semi-pro athletes around there would be plenty of people to fill the space. Will this affect the schedules? Of course it will. But with season lengths of 82 NBA games and 162 games in an MLB season, there is plenty of room to make adjustments. The real questions that need an answer are how many teams to add to each league and where do we put them?

Which Cities Are Poised for Major Sports Expansion?

How Many Teams Can Be Added?

This is the trickiest of the two questions (in my opinion), due to the attempt to keep divisions even. Not only does adding teams cause a shift in what division a team might now belong to, but it also changes the amount of divisions in some cases.

In both the NBA and MLB, I propose adding two teams to each league with one in each conference. This would make the team total 32, which would then be split into two conferences of 16, and four divisions of four instead of the current three divisions of five.

In the NFL, in order to get the already even 32 team league to keep equal division splits, it would either take three divisions of six or uneven divisions. I decided that having uneven divisions for now would be acceptable because all three of these leagues have done so in the past.

The cost of adding a new team in a new city, including a new stadium or arena, is a potential issue. One of many solutions would be to build many luxury suites in the new facility–an easy way to jack up prices and quickly make up for what it cost to build it. This was evidenced in a report completed by a group of professors from Ohio University’s College  of Business in which they found that some organizations generate 50% of their ticket revenues from these luxury seats.

Where Do These Extra Teams Go?

This is where it gets fun. There has often been a pattern in these professional sports where a team will relocate, with another team coming in to replace the team that left.

Recently in the NBA, the Charlotte Hornets left for New Orleans and shortly after, Charlotte had a new team–the Bobcats. In the NFL there was the Houston Oilers that moved to Tennessee and eventually became the Titans, with the Houston Texans joining the league not long thereafter.

And in MLB, there has a been a LOT of shifting including the Milwaukee Braves (originally in Boston) moving to Atlanta, shortly after the Seattle Pilots moved to Milwaukee as the Brewers (the original Milwaukee team name)–the league then allowed Seattle to open another franchise–the Mariners. Washington DC has a similar history in which the Washington Senators moved to Minnesota to become the Twins but were allowed to start another team (also the Senators), which later moved to Texas to become the Rangers. The most recent relocation brought the Montreal Expos to DC as the Washington Nationals.

NBA

This leads into an NBA expansion team in Seattle due to the fairly recent franchise move to Oklahoma City (Thunder). They would take back the name of the Supersonics and reclaim their franchise history (as was recently done by the Hornets and Pelicans).

The next expansion team is the Kentucky Colonels (originally an ABA team left out in the merger). Kentucky is a HUGE hub for basketball with the historic success of the University of Kentucky Wildcats program and the Louisville Cardinals.

These additions will change the division format from three divisions per conference to four as follows:

[Bold=New Team]

NFL

There has been a great deal of talk about teams moving to Los Angeles including the Rams, Raiders, and Chargers–possibly even multiple teams moving there.

Another potential move would be to add a team to Las Vegas. Yes, it is a tourist town and might not bring a ton of permanent fans, but it would give those football fans in Utah, Nevada, and even northern Utah a new team to choose from. Also, if they move a team that already has a fanbase into Sin City, that will help ensure they have a good following. I propose the Chargers move to Vegas, the Rams move to Los Angeles, and that LA (possibly even Anaheim) begin another new team as well.

Finally, to even out the conferences, we add a team in Oklahoma City. With the OKC Thunder having a good run in the NBA, and with Oklahoma’s high quality college programs, Oklahoma City would be a good target for a new franchise.

As a consideration for “foreign” expansion, Toronto seems like the first stop as the Bills had a short stint there; however, the new owner of the Bills plans on keeping the team in Buffalo but doesn’t see an issue with another team eventually settling in Toronto.

[Bold=New Team, Bold Italic=Relocation]

MLB

Major League Baseball may have the best ability to expand across the border (in places other than Canada) because of its wide popularity in other countries, especially in the entire western hemisphere. The most recent opening day showed that there were 230 MLB players born outside of the 50 states with the most being from the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Cuba, and Puerto Rico in that order. This opens the door for a potential team somewhere south-of-the-border for once. However, the two most likely locations (in my opinion) would either be Puerto Rico due to its being part of the United States and because it has held regular season MLB games in the past, or Havana, Cuba due to its proximity to U.S. soil and its rich history of baseball. The biggest issues here are that both locations would most likely have trouble building and filling the luxury suites that make up the majority of ticket sales elsewhere, also that Cuba isn’t as open to the idea of the MLB infiltrating as the U.S. is to the idea of increasing the baseball relationship.

With that being said, I propose an additional two teams, giving each league four divisions of four teams. I suggest a team in Charlotte due to it being the third fastest-growing city in the country and has proven that it can support both NFL and NBA franchises, and to bring a team back to Montreal, probably to go by the Expos. This would follow the pattern of relocating and filling as has been done in the past. Montreal is an easy solution because it has already hosted an MLB team and there is already a team in Canada, making this “foreign” expansion logical.

[Bold=New Team]

Obviously this isn’t the only answer, but it is a logical and possible answer to the big three’s desire to expand in the near future.

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