With Labor Day weekend behind us, summer is now officially over. That means that fall has begun, and you know what that means, right? You guessed it: Football season is here. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on your perspective, though, so let's take a look at the best and worst cities for sports fans as determined by WalletHub. Finally, a geographic analysis that will help you figure out where to go to get your sports fix — or where to go to avoid sports all together! It seems long overdue, doesn't it?
WalletHub compared 341 cities in total, using over 50 metrics to perform their analysis. These metrics included data points like the average price of a game day ticket, the number of sports bars in the city, and the rates of game attendance. But since not all sports have an equal amount of fans, WalletHub also relied on previous rankings they had conducted to figure out how much weight to give to football, basketball, baseball, hockey, and soccer this time round. The final ranking shows the overall trends, although if you're a fan of one particular sport, it's still worth looking into how invested in your sport of choice any particular city is.
So: Which cities ranked where? Here are the five best and five worst cities for sports fans, according to WalletHub's ranking; head on over to WalletHub to see the full list of all 341 cities. That's a lot of fans!
The Best Cities for Sports Fans:
1. Boston, Mass.
Boston is home to many great professional sports teams, so it's no surprise that they made the top of the list; however, what clinched the deal was their hockey ranking, which came in at number five. Football, basketball, soccer, and baseball all came in second through fifth, respectively. If you're a sports lover, this New England city is the place to be.
2. Denver, Colo.
Colorado is apparently one of the best places to be if you're passionate about professional sports: It came in at number two on the overall rankings. Football seemed to give them the most pull with a ranking of number four. Go, Broncos!
3. East Lansing, Mich.
East Lansing is another city that topped the list thanks to its football rankings; they came in at number two for that particular sport and number three for sports overall. Although this city doesn't have an NFL team, Michigan State University in East Lansing does, with it being so popular that ESPN's GameDay is headed there this Saturday.
4. Pittsburgh, Penn.
Pittsburgh earned a lot of high rankings by WalletHub, as they came in third place for football, second for baseball, and first place for hockey on their list. With such a high amount of enthusiasm across three different sports in the city, this is definitely the place to be.
5. Washington, D.C.
Our nation's capital is a great place to be if you love sports, as they ranked fifth overall in WalletHub's list.
The Worst Cities for Sports Fans:
1. Catonsville, Md.
Coming in at number 337, this Maryland city is definitely not the place to be if you're a big sports fan. If you've never heard of Catonsville before, it's probably because the population is only a little over 41,000. It doesn't boast any professional teams.
2. Oneonta, N.Y.
Oneonta came in last place with every sports ranking with one exception: Soccer, in which they ranked at 106. The city does boast a soccer club, which could explain how they avoided coming in dead last for that sport.
3. Hampton, Va.
Hampton was another city that scored in dead last for every sport except for one, which was baseball. Hampton is home to an amateur baseball club, the Peninsula Pilots; it also boasts a NASCAR speedway, so perhaps they aren't as anti-sports as you might think.
4. Vestal, N.Y.
Vestal is not exactly the place to be if you love sports, since they came in second to last place on WalletHub's overall rankings.
5. Hackensack, N.J.
This is the worst place to be if you love sports overall, as they came in last place in the overall rankings. But hey, at least you've got all the nearby New York teams to support, right?
Images: Aboutmycitydotcom, Quintano, Artbybernadette, McD22/Flickr
