Small market teams in the NBA always seem to struggle attracting free agents. Lacking the greater marketing opportunities that the big cities enjoy, these teams are less likely to be able to afford to pay luxury taxes, and may have less appeal to free agents considering their career beyond basketball.

This leads to a self compounding problem–if they can’t get star players, they don’t win, leading to even less attraction to sign in such a place.

It raises the question of what, exactly, would we define as a small market? And are those teams, on average, less successful than large market teams?

Looking at metropolitan area populations of NBA cities, there are 4 clear distinctions on market size. Starting with the list of metropolitan areas in the US, and inserting Toronto at the #6 spot, the first thing you notice is that the NBA has all of the big markets well covered.

Of the 15 biggest markets on the list, 14 have NBA teams. The lone exception is Riverside/San Berdnardino counties, and it’s a safe bet there is a heavy Lakers fan base there.

Big Markets

If a player really wants to sell sneakers or make music videos, it’s clear that there are 2 markets that stand head and shoulders above the rest:

New York – metro area population: 19 million
Los Angeles – 14 mil (not counting Riverside)

Between their sheer size, their links to the entertainment industries, and worldwide recognition, there is really no comparison between these two, and any other NBA city. It’s not surprising that these are the only two cities with two teams each.

While the Lakers are the only team among those 4 with any championships in the last 40 years, both New York teams have made the finals twice, and both have been reasonably successful at attracting free agents.

And despite the drama of the Clippers, and even though they did not make Forbes list of the 10 most valuable NBA teams in 2014, recent speculation indicates they are, most likely, one of the few billion dollar franchises in the league.

Large-Mid Market

Beyond the bright lights, there are 12 cities that we might call large-mid markets, with a population in the range of 4 to 9 million.

Chicago – 9.5
Dallas – 6.8
Houston – 6.3
Toronto – 6.1
Philadelphia – 6.0
Washington – 5.9
Miami – 5.8
Atlanta – 5.5
Boston – 4.7
SF/Oakland – 4.5
Phoenix – 4.4
Detroit – 4.3

Half of these teams have championships in the last 20 years, and 4 more have won them at some point in the past, although in the Hawks case it was back in St. Louis. Only the Suns and Raptors are lacking titles in this group.

Some may see the Celtics and Bulls as having comparable draw to LA and NY for a basketball player, just due to their history. But in terms of pure marketability, they both belong in this second group.

That covers 16 teams–ironically, the same number of teams that make the playoffs. However, only 11 of this years playoff teams came from these larger markets.

Small-Mid Market

Measured purely by size, Minneapolis could be the previous group. But it in terms of market appeal, it compares to the group of 9 we would call small-mid market, with populations in the 2 to 3 million range:

Minneapolis – 3.5
Denver – 2.7
Charlotte – 2.3
Portland – 2.3
San Antonio – 2.3
Orlando – 2.3
Sacramento – 2.3
Cleveland – 2.0
Indianapolis – 2.0

The Spurs are the only team among these cities with a multiple championship history. Portland’s only title came in 1977, and the Kings claim the Rochester Royals of 1951 in their history. Only 3 of these teams made the playoffs this year. None of them have made any recent news for a free agent signing.

Small Market

That leaves 5 teams in the pure small market category:

Milwaukee – 1.6
Memphis – 1.3
Oklahoma City – 1.3
New Orleans – 1.2
Salt Lake City – 1.1

The limited success seen by the teams in these cities–along with San Antonio’s disproportionate success in the previous group–has clearly been a direct result of the draft.

The only trophy in this group, for the Bucks, followed drafting Lew Alcindor. the Jazz made the best 13 and 16 pick combo in history in consecutive years to build their playoff history. And the Thunder are currently riding their #2 pick into the playoffs.

And, of course, the best thing that ever happened to the Spurs was losing their best player for a year, leading to the #1 pick.

Perhaps the billionaires from smaller markets should think twice about trying to bring an NBA franchise to their home town.

Seattle, the next most likely city to get an NBA team, falls between Detroit and Minneapolis in metro population. Its appeal as a destination for free agents may not be strong enough to get it in that second group, and will more likely fall into the small-mid market group.

Unless they buy a team that already has stars (Clippers, anyone?), they will likely have to count on good draft choices to build a winning team.

They better hire good scouts.

Player comparisons from different eras are difficult for a number of reasons. Aside from the players themselves, the game has changed substantially over the years.

Counting awards would seem to give an inherent advantage to more recent players, as the the league has added numerous awards over the years, and has also increased the number selections for the All-Star and All NBA teams. On the flip side, there were fewer teams in the league, so even with fewer selections, a higher percentage of players made the cut.

And with the 3 point shot added in the 80’s, the potential scoring opportunities have increased. Of course the rebounds per game have dropped substantially, so those numbers have universally declined. The number of rounds of playoffs has also changed, making it more difficult to compare championships.

For the calculations on this site, we have just accepted that many of these factors balance each other out. We add up the awards we can count, and don’t worry about the ones that didn’t exist at a given point in time.

To get a better idea of the differences, the following table compares four different seasons, each 15 years apart.

*First round bye for top 2 (1960) or top 6 (1975) seeds

Championships are the pinnacle achievement in any sport. With team sports, it becomes more challenging to rate the importance of a championship in the career of a single player.

Many fans of Michael Jordan will point to championships when comparisons with younger players are mentioned. Of course, if taken as an absolute measure, that argument must defer to Bill Russell. In fact, it also puts several of Russell’s teammates ahead of Jordan as well, and even old school Celtic fans would not place Sam or K.C. Jones at that level.

To apply a point value to championships for the purpose of calculating total accomplishments, I needed a balancing factor to account for the other talent on the team. So I use a calculation that adjusts the points awarded for each championship according to the number of All NBA or All-Star teammates a player had that year.

For example, the 1963 Celtics had 3 All-Stars in Russell, Bob Cousy, and Tom Heinson, with Russel also winning the MVP that year. So Sam and K.C. had the MVP plus 2 All NBA 2nd teamers as mates, but Russel only had the other 2 award winners to help him.

To account for that, I allot a starting value for a championship, and subtract points for each All-Star teammate. I created 2 separate levels of teammates, with a top level for “MVP or All NBA 1st team”, and a second level for “Other All-Star or All NBA teammates”.

(Although Heinson and K.C. Jones are not included in the player list on this site, I still count Heinson’s All-Star appearance when evaluating the value of that championship for Cousy and Russel.)

For my default values, I’ve assigned 5 points for each championship, less 2 points for the top level teammates, and 1 point for the other All-Star teammates. For Russell in 1963, I would subtract 1 point each for Cousy and Heinson from 5, and award 3 points for that championship. Cousy gets 2 points, since I would subtract 2 for the MVP teammate and one more for the other All-Star. And Jones gets 1 point, after subtracting 2, 1, and 1 from 5.

In Jordan’s case, there was one championship year (1991) where Scottie Pippen did not make the All-Star or All NBA teams (only the All Defensive 2nd team, which I’m not adjusting for), so he gets the full 5 points for that one.

Only few dozen players need to be included when considering the greatest ballers of all time. I wanted to extend beyond the typical top 10 list, but the conversation only stays interesting through the top 20 or 25. I wanted to start with a pool of players at least 3 times that amount.

The players included meet one of two criteria:

• at least 8 All-star games, or
• selected to the NBA list of 50 Greatest Players in 1998

As of 2013, there are 55 players with at least 8 All-star games (I’m counting Artis Gilmore’s ABA games). That covers the majority of the historically significant players, and leaves out the young guys that are still building their legacy.

But there were a few notable players that didn’t reach that mark, including some that I wanted for comparison purposes, such as Scottie Pippen and Sam Jones. While those 2 players are easy hall-of-fame selections, they are also clearly not the in same league as their more famous teammates, Michael Jordan and Bill Russel. Since I wanted to award credit for championships, the inclusion of Pippen and Jones provides a comparison point as to whether those championships are properly valued compared to other stats.

So I was looking for a clearly definable, and justifiable, accomplishment that would include the players I felt were important. I realized that they are all a part of the 50 Greatest group.

There are 35 players on both lists, giving a combined list of 70 players. In the coming year, only Dwight Howard is in a position to be added to the list, with Carmelo Anthony, Chris Paul, and Amare Stoudamire each needing 2 more All-Star selections to make the cut.

Listing the best basketball players based on their accomplishments requires a measurable placed on each accomplishment. The two types of accomplishments in hoops are statistics, and awards.

Stats include per-game numbers like points per game, and career totals like total rebounds. They also include calculated numbers like the PER, or player efficiency ratio.

The awards include thing like an MVP or All-Start game selection. A championship is also an award, although it is obviously a team award.

Awards are things a player can receive multiple times, where stats are put in to a list where a player  occupies a position on the list. When assigning a point value to measure stats and awards, the award points can be multiplied by the number of awards to come up with a total, so if I give 4 points for an MVP, a player with 2 MVP awards gets 8 points.

For lists of statistical leaders, I use a declining scale of points. So if I give points to the top ten players on the list of total career points, the first player on the list gets 10 points, the second gets 9 points, and so on. The 10th player on the list would get 1 point.

Championships are a little trickier, since they are held out as very important, but hard to attribute to a single player. To give credit with appropriate balances, I’ve compiled stats on the number of all-NBA first team and All-star players on each championship team. It seems logical that the more All-star teammates you have, the less credit you get for winning a championship. So in calculating the points for a championship, I deduct points for each all-NBA and All-star teammate.

Most of the stats are based on the common ones that have been tracked since the early days. I have also given smaller credits for leaders of late-era stats, even though they are not available to the early-era players. There are a number of compensating factors that I felt justified this, at least for the lower point values I gave them.

One late-era award I wanted to give decent points for is the Finals MVP, which was first awarded in 1969. Given that 10 of the 19 NBA championships prior to that award were won by the Celtics, the only player that misses out significantly is Bill Russel (the other candidates, most notably George Mikan, are far short of the top tier in total career stats). So I included a couple of very legitimate accomplishments that are unique to Mr. Russel, allowing for an open argument about whether those feats are worth more or less points than a Finals MVP. In my default calculation, I’ve given him 3 awards with the same value as Finals MVP awards.