Sport Cities Rankings - Cities With 0 Teams

Here is a new 6 part series I am going to write about. I am going to rank the cities that have 0 through 5+ sports teams in regards to their existing teams, and whether or not they deserve more, less or are good as is. The first part will be a little different, I am going to rank 10 cities that do not have any current sports teams among the 4 major sports in terms of which ones deserve a team the most. Here we go (the population is of their major metro area as of 2008, not just the city):

1. Las Vegas (1.8 Million):

This one is easily #1. Vegas should have a sports team. These population statistics don't include the millions of drunk travelers who come there each year, and those that have money left would probably love to catch a game. The major sticking point though is the gambling and the potential for fixed games. One easy solution would be the NBA because their games are already fixed. Problem solved. But in reality, baseball would be the best fit as it is hardest to fix.

Pros: Drunks with money; Seigfried and Roy's tigers could maul visiting Boston teams; No worries about April or October games being snowed out; Celebrity sightings at games (and potentially getting pelted with beer; Strippers, lots and lots of Strippers.
Cons: Celene Dion singing the National Anthem; Team Name, The Las Vegas Bellagio Presented by Bally's; World Series of Poker being shown on JumboTron during game.

2. Austin, Texas (1.6 Million)

This is a city growing by leaps and bounds and has one of the greatest nightlife's in the country. The problem might be its location as it sits right in the middle of Dallas, Houston and San Antonio. The best chance for a team to succeed here would probably be baseball as the other Texas teams kinda suck.

Pros: College town = College Coeds; No city ordinance against women appearing topless in public; I think that's enough.
Cons: Sitting behind big ass cowboy hats at game; guys in sleeveless Aikman jerseys, the potential appearance of the gay "Hook 'Em Horns" hand signal at games.

3. Norfolk/Virginia Beach, Virginia (1.65 Million)

If you also include the Richmond metro area nearby that is another 1.2 million for the fan base. Lets go ahead and throw a football team here as this area of the Eastern seaboard is huge on football.

Pros: Would piss off Dan Snyder, Not many sports teams to compete with and huge population of males in their 20's.
Cons: Michael Vick lives in the area, Fan related deaths on $1 Moonshine Taps night.

4. Louisville, Kentucky (1.2 Million)

This is basketball country so lets give them an NBA team, but would there be too much competition from the colleges and its proximity to Indianapolis and Cincinnati?

Pros: Significantly less murders than surrounding cities so you should be able to keep fan base longer; Home to Papa John's Pizza so you could have one fan win an opportunity to throw a basketball at the Papa John's annoying founder from 5 feet at all home games.
Cons: Lawsuits from people slipping on the grease in Rick Pitino's hair;

5. Albuquerque, New Mexico (850k)

I think this would be a great spot for a baseball team, not sure why. No major sport competition.

Pros: Key scouting area for aliens in Roswell they could sign.
Cons: Horse poop, lots and lots of horse poop.

Ok, for the next 5 we are just going to do some quick hits.

6. Hartford, Connecticut (1.2 million) - We will give them a hockey team as one of the greatest teams of all time, the Hartford Whalers was taken away from them to move to the hockey hotbed of Carolina or Florida or something like that. This also might be convert some Boston Bruin bandwagon now that they are good fans so they wont be such dicks. And being in CT, maybe ESPN will cover someone other than Boston and NY.

7. Birmingham, Alabama (1.1 million) - This is football country with a lack of a professional football team, well actually I think Birmingham lacks a professional anything. The hardest part I think would be trying to give the locals directions to the stadium.

8. Boise, Idaho (600k) - The 2 closest cities with sports teams have NBA teams, so lets give them a hockey team, though Boise State does pretty well in the football area as well as pansy RB's who propose to their girlfriends during BCS bowl games. Not sure if they even like hockey here as I really don't know much about Boise other than potatoes and skiing, or was it potato skiing?

9. Raliegh, North Carolina (1.1 million) - This is basketball country so lets give them an NBA team as there really isn't any competition in the state for NBA basketball. The other NBA team is being "run" by Michael Jordan and average -14 wins a year. The one problem though is that the state of North Carolina does seem to have an epidemic of churning out no talent douchebag white guys from the college ranks.

10. Omaha, Nebraska (850k) - I think a baseball team could survive here, but what the hell, lets give them a Cricket team just to mess with them.