With the recent NBA weekend series in London and rumors that the NBA is looking to become more globalized I find myself unable to resist discussing the reasons why the NBA should direct its Globalization attempts toward Canada and the beautiful city of Montreal rather than Europe.
I think Montreal is a viable city for an NBA team and I will now present five reason why Montreal needs/deserves an NBA team.
Let’s get started!
1: Population
With 3,859,318 people living in Montreal, not including the many people living in surrounding areas that would be close enough to drive to games, Montreal certainly has enough people to merit the acquisition of an NBA franchise.
With the current population Montreal would rank fourth in the league trailing only New York, Los Angeles and Toronto.
With this many people they would certainly rake in a boat load of new fans for the NBA I guarantee that the passionate Montreal fans will stand behind their team from the get go.
Speaking of fan support…
2: They will have the support of the fans
In October 2010 an astounding 22,114 fans jam packed the Bell Centre in Montreal to see the Toronto Raptors play their final Pre-season game of the year. That’s right 22.114 people came out in Montreal to see an NBA pre-season game!!
To help you understand how monumental of an achievement this is let me put it into perspective… The Chicago bulls are currently averaging the highest attendance in the league, and why not right? They are one heck of a storied franchise and they are an elite team in the East.
So how many fans are they averaging per home game this season…21,613 people.
What does this mean? It means the Toronto Raptors were able to surpass the team with the highest regular season attendance in the league this season while playing…
1. A pre-season game and
2. In another city to boot, which technically made them the road team.
What can this tell us about the future of NBA basketball in Montreal? Well at the very least, it tells us that there is some pretty big potential for NBA success in Montreal.
This incredible display of support for Canada’s basketball team is a perfect testament to the passion of Montreal sports fans as well as Canadian sports fans as a whole.
An NBA team in Montreal would never overcome hockey as the dominant sport in the city yet I would argue that given time to grow and develop it would certainly become very popular in Montreal and it would be able to draw a huge crowd like the best of them!
3: The Montreal Expos
Before you have a chance to make any wise cracks about the Expos being relocated I would like to point out that the Expos did not fail in Montreal because of a lack of fan support. Baseball has historically been very popular throughout the province of Quebec and the fans and the support was certainly there.
The fans loved their MLB team, however, as is the case with any sports fan base they were only capable of enduring so much, and understandably so.
There are two main reasons why things did not work out for the Expos in Montreal:
1. Management was unwilling to dish out the money that was necessary in order to keep big name free agents from leaving.
2. The 1994 MLB Strike: The Expos were tops in the MLB and they were poised to win the World Series, however, this was not meant to be as the season was cut short due to the strike and they lost most of their star players in the off-season.
The strike was essentially the deal breaker in Montreal. Management and the players were unable to recover from the heart break that was the 1994 MLB season and as result their stock fell immensely leading to their deportation to Washington.
That being said, I truly believe this will not be the case if an NBA team was to come to Montreal…
Montreal is a big market city and the NBA is a big market game. With an arena already in place all they need to do is find the right people to manage the team and then with a little help from Molson this project could pay off huge for Canadian basketball as well as for the NBA.
4: Globalization of the NBA
If the NBA wants to become more globalized then they need not look overseas to London, they simply have to look north of the border and bring a team to Montreal.
Montreal is a very likable place and can almost always be found on lists of the world’s most livable cities. It is often referred to as Canada’s cultural capital and I think many NBA players English or French will fall in love with the city for its unique and multicultural atmosphere, its buzzing downtown area and shopping district as well as its happening night life.
I do not understand why the NBA would be willing to expand to London; a city that does not even have a Euro league team and would pose huge problems in regards to scheduling, yet they have no interest in bringing a team to Montreal.
If the NBA truly wants to expand then I think they should look to Canada first and not the European Union. That being said, Montreal is clearly the best choice.
5: We invented the damn game
Way to milk us for all we’re worth and then kick us while we’re down NBA.
Basketball is a Canadian invention and that being said I think we deserve to have more than one team in the NBA, especially when we have quite a few cities that offer much more stability and potential than many of the current US cities with NBA teams.
James Naismith was born in Toronto (Okay they have their team) and he studied physical education in Montreal (alright so now give Montreal the team they deserve).
Make Naismith proud and bring a team to Montreal!
Conclusion:
In the Domain of baseball and basketball Canada is currently batting 500 when it comes to professional sports teams.
Things may have ended on a sour note with the Montreal Expos and the Vancouver Grizzlies, however, at the same time the Toronto Raptors and the Toronto Blue Jays have fared quite well.
Add in the fact that Canada also has many other professional sports teams that are doing quite well for themselves including: 6 NHL teams, one MLS team and the Canadian Football League and I would say Canada is doing just fine in the when it comes to professional sports teams.
That being said, I think it is about time we throw our hat back into the mix and push to bring an NBA team to Montreal which could be the start of a big professional sports movement in this country.
Other big cities like Calgary Ottawa, Quebec are just waiting to join the party and I say the sooner the better so let’s get the ball rolling and bring an NBA team to Montreal.
Thanks for reading and if you agree with me make sure you comment and let me know!
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