I always hear the term “Small Market” thrown around when the media is discussing the Charlotte Bobcats and it got me wondering, “population wise” how does the city of Charlotte stack up against other cities in the NBA. Now, I know other things get thrown into determining what is a viable NBA market, but I would say population is the most important one.

Well, the information I found was surprising to me. According to multiple sites Charlotte is ranked 17th in the country in population and is the first/second/third fastest growing city (depending on which site you visit). Then, out of the 16 cities that are bigger than us, 10 of them have NBA franchises (New York has Knicks/Nets, Dallas/Fort Worth have Mavericks so I counted them as one and I gave San Francisco the Warriors even though technically they are in Oakland).

So what does this mean? It means that out of the 29 teams in the United States the Charlotte Bobcats would fall into the #12th spot in terms of population and that Charlotte is bigger than over half of the cities in the NBA with teams.

This may mean nothing to you. However, is said to me that Charlotte is bigger than it gets credit for and that we have more than enough people to support an NBA franchise….so I say we Bring Back the Buzz

(l realize we have a relatively small metro area, we also have a pretty low population denisty and like I said “I know other things get thrown into determining what is a viable NBA market, but I would say population is the most important one”

My main message was that Charlotte has more than enough people to support an NBA franchise)