In the later seasons of Coach, when Craig T. Nelson had left the campus of Minnesota State for the NFL’s expansion Orlando Breakers, the series took on a pretty sour story arc: Moving the franchise.

See, the team’s owner—played by “Mona” from “Who’s the Boss?”—had an offer for a new stadium deal in Los Angeles. Even though her team was an expansion franchise, the Breakers played in a garbage stadium in front of not-so-many fans. The team was losing money…and a lot of games. So Mona’s decision didn’t seem so poor, and it seemed that the Orlando Breakers would be the Vancouver Grizzlies of the imaginaryFL: an expansion franchise that didn’t pan out, and was thus moving to LA, a city which had lost two NFL franchises in a few years (the situation made as much sense then as it does now. Just saying).

Of course, the potential move of the Breakers team was a heartbreaker (this “breaker” business is going to get annoying) for the Orlando fans, who staged a poorly attended rally at the team’s crappy stadium to voice their love for the team.

This being a television show, Mona didn’t relocate the team. Being a woman, she was so moved by the speech of one fan---who said the team had brought him closer to his son—that she decided to stay in a money pit and hemmorage cash. (Which is why I want Sharon Stone to buy the Pirates. That, and because, well, you know).

Point is, it’s tough to move a pro sports franchise, because so many things need to fall into place. Besides needing to be owned by a person with no heart, the team needs a crappy stadium on the tail end of its life, a lack of profitability, AND the support of the league (Used to be you had to have no fan support, but then they moved the Browns and the Whalers). In short, the move needs to be financially beneficial to the franchise, the league, the owner, and the city receiving the new team.

You probably think I’m talking about the rumors that the Penguins are moving to Kansas City. But I’m not. I’m talking about Oklahoma City.

Wait….what?

That’s right. I’m talkin’ basketball. Pro basketball. On a Pittsburgh website. And I’m talking about a team from New Orleans that plays in Oklahoma City. And if David Stern means what he says, we’ll be seeing a team—the New Orleans squad or another one—there permanently:

“I can say without reservation that Oklahoma City is now at the top of the list [of possible relocation spots],” Stern said.

While I’d like to believe that Stern is just giving lip service to the idea, this is the NBA, a league that recently moved a franchise to New Orleans---a city that had already lost a team to UTAH---from Charlotte, only to put a new team in Charlotte TWO years later (And this wasn’t the Browns to Baltimore situation: The Hornets moved because they were hemorraghing cash). So I wouldn’t put it past Stern to be serious about “rewarding” Oklahoma City for what they’ve done with the Hornets team.

Hurricane Katrina made a lot of Americans into heroes. Police officers, national guardsmen, regular people rose to the occasion to help evacuate the city and save more residents from joining the enormous ranks of victims of the catastrophe.

When faced with an NBA franchise as a tenant for a year, the citizens of Oklahoma City rose to the occasion as well, and they’ve done a great job creating a temporary home for the Hornets, welcoming the team with the sixth-highest number of season tickets sold of any team in the league.

But let’s not get it twisted: The citizens of Oklahoma City are not heroes for putting up a basketball team. City officials are not performing community service for hosting basketball games. And whoever’s the landlord for the arena sure ain’t no Superman for taking in boatloads of money at the gate.

The actions of the people of Oklahoma City barely qualify as laudable, and they shouldn’t give the city a free pass to a major pro sports franchise. This is the number 48 metro area in the U.S., behind such whoppers as Rochester, NY, Grand Rapids, MI, and West Palm Beach. This is a city whose tallest building, the Chase Tower, rolls in at around 152 meters. I know we don’t do a lot of metric in this country, so I’ve made a diagram of the world’s tallest buildings:

That’s right: The Chase Tower is shorter than a pile of dinosaur shit.

But I’ll lay off Oklahoma City. It’s not my intention to bash the budding metropolis, but the statement that Stern made, and (hopefully) his status as the all-seeing overlord megagod of pro sports commissioners (Why? Because saying stuff sucks SELLS in this business, especially on the internet. Don’t hate me: I don’t make the rules.). I’m just not sure I’ll be able to.

It would be easy for me to pass off Stern’s motivation with the same argument many are using against the league’s dress code: Stern continues to try to white-ify the game. I could easily joke—like so many others have—about the scheduling of country stars Big & Rich as the halftime entertainment at last year’s All-Star Game. And while I agree (and who wouldn’t) that the league is more P Diddy than Conway Twitty, the Oklahoma City statement—like most of Stern’s policies—is profit-driven.

You see, the NBA actually thrives in small markets like Oklahoma City: In Sacramento, a town with just a few hundred thousand more citizens than OKC, the Kings are, well, king. And in Portland, where the next most popular team might be the high school cross country squad, the Blazers are a hot ticket. And, I mean, Salt Lake City? In smaller towns where the team can assert itself as the only game in town, the NBA has a tendency to flourish. And if the early season ticket numbers mentioned above are any indication, Oklahoma City seems to be fitting that argument. For now.

I use that qualifier for a reason: It’s much too early to know if Oklahoma City fans will continue to support a pro franchise over time. Sure, the Hornets can put fans in the OKC stands for now--they’re a new franchise. It doesn’t matter how the team performs: They’ve got that new car smell, and everybody’s just excited to take a ride.

Even the Pirates could draw when they opened PNC Park, bringing 2.5 million fans through the gates in 2001. It wasn’t long, of course, before everyone realized that they could hand a photo of the Pittsburgh skyline above their fireplace, and they wouldn’t have to spend $15 and watch Kip Wells get shellacked while the offense left ten men on. Attendance nosedived.

The Hornets could be in for a similar fate if they remain the New Orleans of Oklahoma City franchise that they are today. This was the NBA’s second-worst team in 2004, a club that won 18 games in the regular season and then traded away their two best players (Baron Davis and Jarome Magloire). So when the luster wears off, Oklahomans might find their way back to the OTHER games in town: Oklahoma football, Oklahoma State basketball (I realize these are far away, but you think folks in OKC don’t root for ‘em. And you don’t think a lot of people will travel to do so rather than sit through a dreadful Hornets drubbing?).

But it’s too early to know. Stern could be a genius. He could be an idiot. If he goes through with the statement, only time will tell. But that’s not the point. The point is this:

Oklahoma City is boring.

To the casual basketball fan (or the on-the-cusp non-fan—me—you could draw in), what’s the allure of Oklahoma? The state has no character, and no basketball history that doesn’t involve “Big Country” Bryant Reeves. So while the city might be a viable spot for a franchise, it’s not hooking thousands of non-fans in bigger cities (I bet you think I mean Pittsburgh) by being, you know, interesting. By moving a team to OKC, the NBA would be missing out on some prime real estate in cities big and small (I swear, I’m not going to say Pittsburgh. We couldn’t even keep a CBA team). Here’s one fan’s ideal choices (still not gonna say it):

5. Kansas: I just spent 1,400 words ranting about why a small town in the middle of nowhere shouldn’t get an NBA franchise, and the first place I suggest as an alternative is a 82,000-square mile cornfield with a population of 2.68 million. But I ain’t crazy: Kansas is the birthplace of basketball, and the folks there don’t care if you’re black, white, or polka dotted so long as you’re throwing orange balls at peach baskets. The state goes nuts for KU hoops the way Nebraska rocks it out for Husker Saturdays.

Think I’m crazy? Call Stern up, tell him to start a team called the “K-Hawks,” grab a couple Kansas alums to come off the bench, and tell me you don’t need your own silo to fill with Bennies.

4. Kansas City: They’ve got the fan base, they’ve got the arena, and they’re already trying to get a team to fill the winter/spring months between pathetic Chiefs defense and pathetic Royals everything. Right now, they’re trying to do it by stealing the Penguins. Instead of trying to pilfer from the greatest fans in the universe (and creating a possible situation where the team name is changed and Mario’s number doesn’t get retired), why not yoink a hardwood squad like the Hornets? Or the Atlanta Hawks?

3. Cincinnati: Forget the numbers that say that the Queen City would be the next logical choice for a pro team. Sure, they’ve got the numbers, but what makes Cincy so primed for an NBA franchise isn’t even in Ohio.

It’s Kentucky.

The home of the Bungles sits right on the state line. And I mean RIGHT on the state line: Some of the homers Adam Dunn hits out of the Great American Ballpark actually land in the Bluegrass State. And what do they got in Kentucky besides bourbon, horseracin’, and a Toyota factory?

Absolutely batshit basketball fans.

Kentucky and Louisville are hotbeds for the college game, and the city has a pro past, with the ABA’s Kentucky Colonels (a team that was folded at the merger, among others). These square dancing insanos would lay down some green to see some more of the game so close to KY. But it’s not just the ability to fit those initials into a column that slides (get it?) Kentucky up to #2. It’s their number one fan who does that:

2. St. Louis: It wouldn’t be an “only game in town” situation, and St. Louis is hardly a small town, but the city’s a perfect spot for an NBA team. Why?

Absolutely rabid fans: If you’ve ever met anybody from St. Louis, you know they’re rabid about five things: Budweiser, St. Louis, the Rams, the Cardinals, and Budweiser (I’ve never really met a Blues fan). They’re almost like Pittsburghers with a better baseball team and an Iron City that’s known nationally. St. Louisians (that could use some work) are absolutely batshit for their sports teams.

Instant Rivalries: I’ve got a friend who just moved to St. Louis, and he says that wearing a Cubs hat on the street is the equivalent of waltzing on Auburn’s campus dressed like Bear Bryant or into Heinz Field in a Browns jersey: You’re liable to get yourself gutted like a pig doin’ it. Old ladies come up to him and tell him off for the Chicago hat, and everyone he meets immediately asks him if he’s a Cubs fan, using it as a determining factor for friendship. (In fairness, Chicago’s Old Style beer displays billboards that say “More refreshing than anything from St. Louis,” and Cubs fans told me they would rather the White Sox won the World Series than the Cardinals.)

So slap a team in St. Louis and put them in the Bulls’ division. Pick up a former Chicago player or two, and get Scottie Pippen to coach the team with a supporting cast of Toni Kukoc and B.J. Armstrong. Creating that sort of insta-hate with a major market team will sell tickets like you ain’t never seen in cowboy country.

And of course, Awesome History: Putting a pro basketball franchise in St. Louis would also allow the league to revive its most awesome logo, of the ABA’s Spirits of St. Louis. Not only would this properly celebrate America’s favorite Nazi-sympathizer transatlantic pilot, it would create the first pro sports team of the century to legitimately put the city after the team’s name. Which would just piss Anaheim off, since they’ve tried it twice—the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim and the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim—and everyone ignores them.

It’s almost like Anaheim’s the nerdy kid in the teen movie with the great idea that everyone’s ignoring, and St. Louis is the captain of the football team who accidentally reads the nerdy kid’s idea aloud and is lauded as a genius. Of course, he needs the nerd’s help to land the girl, who eventually figures the whole thing out and ends up with the nerd, something that would never happen in reality. Which proves one thing: If the Angels and Cardinals had made the World Series, Pujols and Co. would have swept.

Didn’t follow that? I ain’t slowin’ down.

1. Pittsburgh: I know it’s a bad idea and the team would completely flop, but I couldn’t resist. Know that I’m doing this just because I’m grew up loving The Fish Who Saved Pittsburgh and am a huge sucker for those old Pittsburgh Condors uniforms. The team would probably fold after a year, so you’d have to slap some black and gold on that old logo to make the team a lock for the playoffs (with some help from the Theory of Uniform Change). And once they’re in the tournament, you know they’ll be a force with quintessential playoff role player and Shaler High School grad Danny Fortson on the squad. Even if they fall to Yakima in the finals and immediately fold, Big Country and Oklahoma City ain’t got nothin’ on the ‘Burgh.

----Greg

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