Norman Einstein's
ISSUE 06 (11/09)
"Unbreak My Heart: the Many Sides Of Teams On the Move"
by Jason Clinkscales
[Jason is a staff sportswriter for the New York Beacon, an African-American weekly in New York City. He is also the schizophrenic mind behind a Sports Scribe. Follow him on Twitter to glimpse the rapid-fire method to his madness.]
It can be argued that a town or city's civic pride is tied to sports more than any other aspect of its culture. Sports provides one of the few public venues where thousands of people of differing political leanings, religious beliefs, ethnic backgrounds, and sexual preferences can huddle together and enjoy a few hours of uninterrupted harmony. The individual athletes and teams are looked upon as brands that help these municipalities display an apparent superiority over each other. Yet, that identity the team helps cultivate.
Teams become synonymous with the cities they play in. The Steelers are Pittsburgh. The Yankees New York. The 76ers Philadelphia. The Bruins Boston.
When teams relocate, then, it is inevitably painful.
Even in 2009, time has yet to heal all wounds. Even with departures as old as the Baltimore Colts and the Brooklyn Dodgers, new media adds new chapters to these stories. Though rarely acknowledged even, baseball's most celebrated franchise, the New York Yankees were born elsewhere -- 1901 in Baltimore, of all places -- before relocating for greener pastures. As the sports business matured from the inexact science of the early 1900s into a more sophisticated one, the majority of team moves left more than broken hearts behind in former locales.
While the "town as jilted lover" analogy has become a tired cliche, the idea of an emotional connection between teams and cities is why professional sports exist as they do today. Though, we cry for "the spouse", little is ever said about "the other"; the newer benefactor of the team's tender love, care and merchandising.
Michelle Marcus, a member of the St. Louis Rams faithful, says that much of the love for the NFL team stems from the city's general passion for sports. "St. Louis is a huge sports town, although primarily a baseball town due to the rich history of the St. Louis Browns and Cardinals," she explains. "Still, this is a sports-loving town and we were used to having the football Cardinals and their traditions, so we feel we were owed a team."
Embracing the Rams wasn't particular hard for many in the area, especially when the motivation runs deeper than cheering on the home team. "We wanted to show Bill Bidwill that with proper management, we COULD have a winning football team in St. Louis," Marcus elaborated. "The general public understood that it would require a state of the art new stadium and we were all in favor of that."
That proper management Marcus alluded to plays a predominant role in how a sports organization builds a relationship with its market. Bidwell still owns the Cardinals, the very team that played in February's Super Bowl against the Pittsburgh Steelers. The major story about Bidwell during their run to the league's biggest stage was how thrift hindered the franchise's success in both St. Louis and Phoenix, where it currently plays. Yet, the oldest professional football team in the league was actually born in Chicago back in 1898 and had remained in the city until 1959 after a decade of paltry attendance, poor on-field play, and the city's love affair with the Bears compelled the team's first relocation to St. Louis.
A sense of entitlement is certainly understandable for a town that takes such pride in their teams and the love of them. St. Louis' return to the NFL came in 1995 because Los Angeles was unable to retain the once-proud Raiders (who returned to Oakland) and the longtime laughingstock Rams. When the late Georgia Frontierie moved the poorly performing Rams to her hometown, it was as big of a win as any actual win on the Edward Jones Dome turf. Marcus spoke of the economic boon that returned to the city as "sports is huge in St. Louis and it's such a boost to our economy, specifically drawing people into the downtown area that is otherwise fairly vacated on nights and weekends."
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St. Louis' plight for longstanding football relevance is a story that Michael Jones knows all too well. A young witness to the messy split between the former North Stars and the state of Minnesota, Jones felt some relief when the expansion Wild took up residence in St. Paul starting in 2000. "Throughout the process, I felt a mixture of excitement and resentment," he revealed. "Excitement because I had the chance to see professional hockey in Minnesota again, resentment because the North Stars should have never left in the first place. I've read similar feelings from Cleveland Browns (and even Baltimore Ravens) fans where they're 100% behind their current franchise, but can't shake the anger from the first one leaving."
What made the Stars' move to Dallas after the 1992-93 season so painful over is simple. Hockey in Minnesota is religion. Of course, Jones put that in greater context, saying, "It's more like race or heritage. You can change religions."
Until recent seasons, the Stars found great success in Texas as a perennial title contender; actually capturing the Stanley Cup in 1999. That very success stings a bit more up north considering that hockey is rooted deeply in Minnesota's identity than in a southern, football-crazy state. Jones recalled those sellouts in the Civic Center and the frenzy for North Stars merchandise. "(We) traded stories about the Broten Brothers and Mike Modano and critiqued Jon Casey's performance against Detroit. We didn't just know hockey, we lived out our love every day. The expansion into the south, while expanding the sport to a new generation, has left a lot of fans in the north with a sour taste in their mouths."
The seven years between the Stars' departure and the Wild's arrival were rough for the largest market without a major pro team in the sport. Early on, the fervor around the Wild "had to do with a return to professional hockey culture for Minnesotans," said Jones. "As much as we love high school and college hockey, there's no fighting, little complexity in strategy and at a lower skill level. For the love of God, when the Wild hired Jacque Lemaire, I was excited to see a trap defense. I was excited to see a LACK of scoring!"
There is a point though where you have to be more than happy that the team exists. If you don't win on the ice and in the standings, you can't win with ticket sales or television ratings. The Wild are a middle-of-the-pack franchise that has not made the leap into the upper echelon of the NHL. Yet, Jones was quick to say that a mediocre team it's still better than no team.
"I've never wanted the Wild to go away or wanted to cheer for another team. Like I've said over and over again, I know what it's like to have no NHL team and that prospect is too crushing to consider."
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Where the Rams and Wild fed the appetites of their once-bitten fans, there's the curious case of the Memphis Grizzlies, an organization that has led the NBA in mediocrity and anonymity since its birth in Vancouver in 1995. Unlike the Toronto Raptors, who carved a niche in a hockey-mad city with stars like Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady and Chris Bosh, the Grizzlies' well, they just played, though not particularly well. Just as any other team with consistently bad play and worse management, they struggled so much at the gate that leaving Vancouver became the only viable way that the team can survive without incurring more losses and embarrassment for the league.
Seemingly, little has changed in the South after Michael Heisley purchased the Grizzlies and moved the team following one more season in Western Canada. Allen Law, who goes by the handle 'djturtleface' for the witty Straight Out of Vancouver, is actually a Cleveland native who carries the flag for the Grizz for the greatest of reasons: "During my formative years the Cavs were also really, really awful. I liked the Grizzlies logo and liked Canada, so I actually started following the team when they were in Vancouver."
Though he doesn't hail from Memphis, Law's focus on the Grizzlies revealed a passion for basketball in the River City, although not necessarily for the pros. "For Memphis it's all about the Tigers. Everywhere, everybody loves the Tigers," says Law. "The question in Memphis isn't so much whether the community literally may be too small to support a team, like the situation in, say, Charlotte, but whether the city can afford to back two teams. Memphis is a basketball city, but it isn't exactly rich, so while the passion ball is definitely there, there just hasn't been enough star power or wins to make people drop the cash to go to a Grizzlies game over a Tigers game."
Outside of three playoff appearances in the Pau Gasol era and the eyebrow-raising mix of players this season -- Rudy Gay, O.J. Mayo, Zach Randolph and future Hall of Famer Allen Iverson -- the Grizzlies have still not been able to win over Memphis. Much of this has to do with dissonance between the NBA fan and college basketball fan; displayed in a greater degree in western Tennessee. Law acknowledges that though Grizzlies fans harbor no ill will towards fans of the amateurs, "Tigers fans tend to believe the Grizzlies are a bit of a sideshow or mockery, which might not be an undue opinion."
Over eight-plus years in Memphis, the Grizzlies have acquired and drafted better players compared to their Vancouver days, but still struggle at the gate because of the trend of mismanagement that continues with vastly different personnel. Law says, "The few fans are literally so out of touch that it allows Heisley to make money with a (poor) product and the city is totally apathetic or a few are completely infatuated no matter what happens."
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Not every "old team, new city" story is written as fans hoped. If there is one story that sticks out in recent years, it's the three-city juggling act by the NBA's Hornets. Once considered the expansion model of all sports in Charlotte, the Hornets lost local support as a rape allegation against owner George Shinn tore asunder the relationship between team and community. The scandal shattered Shinn's hopes for a new arena with more revenue-generating luxury boxes -- at no cost to him, he demanded -- and compelled him to move the team to New Orleans in 2002, after being denied Memphis in favor of the Grizzlies. In the new city, the three-year old New Orleans Arena awaited the team's arrival.
Disillusionment decayed Charlotte's relationship with professional basketball, even as the replacement Bobcats try to recapture some of the Hornets' former fan base. Yet, for New Orleans, this was a second chance to show that the NBA has a home along the Gulf Coast after the Jazz moved to Utah in 1979. "I grew up in Lafayette, La., and first became interested in basketball when I started collecting cards in '91 or '92," explains Curry Smith, a diehard Hornets fan. "Turns out this was a damn good time to start liking the sport. With no local team (unless you count the nearby Rockets), I didn't really have a rooting interest." When the Hornets hit the New Orleans Arena floor in 2002, the Tulane graduate was pretty elated, to say the least. "Finally, I'd have an actual team to identify as my own in my favorite professional sports league I moved to New Orleans for college in 2003 and fell for the team; hard." Whether with friends or on his own, he, too found a home in the arena.
What makes the NOLA story more fascinating was that many thought this marriage would end as quickly as it began because of Hurricane Katrina, the most devastating natural disaster in modern American history. Rumors of another move followed the Hornets to Oklahoma City as the city played temporary host for two seasons. Fans in Oklahoma City were excited to see major league sports in their town as they gobbled up tickets quickly, leading to loud, if not premature, chatter about the Hornets' long-term future in New Orleans. Smith recalled that "when there was talk -- mainly from The Oklahoman and a few in the national media -- that the team might never return to New Orleans and that Oklahoma City was a perfect fit for an NBA franchise, I started to cling to the team as tightly as I held on to the city itself."
The greatest factor to what has been a so-far successful return to New Orleans has been the 2004 Draft that ushered in the Chris Paul era. "If you're looking for the story of how a city fell in love with a team, the 07-08 season is it," Smith recalls. "A lot of people didn't know or care that we had a team. And that, unfortunately, was true of some people at the beginning of the 07-08 season. But when Paul, (David) West and (current Charlotte Bobcats center, Tyson) Chandler started clicking, the city took notice. Soon, the games were guaranteed sellouts -- regardless of opponent.
"There was a sort of energy in the Arena, a sense of community at the games, the realization that we were, in fact, watching something very special. We were witnessing the birth of a superstar."
Arguably, that sense of community came from a more accessible and affordable release from the troubles in the area. Compared to the Saints, who made a resounding return home in 2006, there are more games to attend during the Hornets season that can keep fans from thinking of the ongoing rebuilding and rehabilitation of the area (though it is compounded these days by a dramatically weakened economy). Smith says, "The Hornets had planted themselves firmly into the community fabric. It was a magical thing to watch. And, if there had been any doubt before that season, there definitely wasn't any going forward. New Orleans and the Hornets belonged together. And I'm just happy to be in that number."
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Sports have a profound effect on the communities in which they play. No matter the game or city, they continue to help millions build a bond that transcends the individual differences, if only for a moment. The bond that forms is not broken with the fans themselves, even if behavior and personal beliefs create schisms. It is tested in times when the team acts against the wishes and desires of its fans. When a franchise packs its boxes and sets up shop elsewhere, the bond its former fans feel can remain strong and the hurt fresh. Sometimes a new team can assuage that hurt and weaken that bond. Sometimes it takes success on the court or in the field before a community truly accepts a new team.
We do know that when teams move it's never easy and there's never one side to the story.
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