It is one of the most heated discussions in the North American sports landscape: what is the best sports city? Championships, winning records, all-time greats, dynasties, they are all throw into the mix to determine which city can claim this illusive title.
In recent years many have argued Boston to come out on top. Bleacher Report did so in 2014, through a rather extensive analysis, in which Beantown scored 90 out of 100 available points. On Ranker the public has also voted Boston to be #1, far ahead of Chicago and Pittsburgh. Look across the internet and there are many other sources to be found that conclude the same thing as the two mentioned above.
Boston is currently on the verge of accomplishing a feat that no other city has accomplished before. Something which will cement their claim as the #1 sports city, at least for the foreseeable future. I will dive into this shortly, but first, let’s take a trip down memory lane…
There are a few notes to make before we start off:
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In this article I will refer to the NFL, NHL, NBA and MLB as the major sport leagues in North America and use only those in the analysis. This has nothing to do with a personal prejudice towards leagues such as the MLS, CFL or other league. It is simply that these leagues are often seen as the Big Four and that makes this article a bit easier to comprehend.
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Some team locations are rounded up so to say. The New England Patriots are counted towards Boston, the Brooklyn Dodgers are New York, Anaheim is Los Angeles and there might be other cases such as that.
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All leagues are only considered in their current form. Meaning the NFL started in 1967, NHL in 1927, NBA in 1947 and MLB in 1903.
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The Super Bowl is always played around January and the World Series around October. The NHL and NBA finals however overlap a bit. Most of the years the NHL champions is crowned before the NBA champions. Therefore, this order is used in the analysis, ignoring possible outliers.
Silverware loving cities
Some cities just attract more silverware than others. It can come from the talent they are able to attract, from the long lasting dynasties they shape or simply because they have a lot of teams in all four major leagues. So which cities have been able to lay claim to the most titles?
#1 – New York
The Big Apple has won 50 titles in total, the most of all cities in North America. The biggest contributor to this have been the New York Yankees, winning 27 MLB titles. The others have been won by the New York Mets, Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants (MLB), New York Rangers, New York Islanders, New York Giants (NFL), New York Jets and New York Knicks. A wide spread of title winners, across all four disciplines.
New York thus has a strong case for being the best sports city in North America, but the problem is that they rely a lot on past times. Their last title comes from 2012, when the Giants beat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI. Since the turn of the century the city has only laid claim to 4 of the available 73 titles, which is rather poor from a city that for example won 11 out of 80, between 1980 and 1999.
#2 – Boston
Boston has won a total of 39 titles. The biggest contributor are the Boston Celtics, who have won 17 NBA titles, of which 11 came between 1957 and 1969. The Boston Red Sox, Boston Braves, New England Patriots and Boston Bruins amassed the other crowns, making Boston another city that has tasted victory in all four leagues.
The story here is however rather different than in New York. Success has been much more recent. Since 2000, Boston has won 12 titles, with at least one coming from each league. So their recent past has volume, but is also spread out across sports. The best depiction of this recent success comes in the form of ‘Sign kid‘: 17 year-old Jason from Haverhill, who has witnessed 12 parades in his life. Oh, the envy of so many New York teens…
#3 – Montreal
New York and Boston have seen their titles come in from different leagues and different teams. This is not the case for Montreal’s 23 titles. Every single one of them was won in the NHL, by the Montreal Canadiens. Unfortunately for many Montreal fans, this legacy is also coloured by their historic teams. The last Stanley Cup title win for the Habs comes from 1993. Since that title they haven’t made another trip to the finals yet, with two Conference Finals losses (2010 and 2014) being their best results.
To be fair to Montreal, it is not as if they’ve had many chances in the other leagues. With the Expos, they only ever had a MLB team, between 1969 and 2004, before it relocated to Washington. They reached the postseason just once, in 1981.
10 titles or more
Next to New York, Boston and Montreal there are 8 other teams have been able to lay claim to 10 titles or more, making it 11 cities in total. Here you’ll find an overview of them all, split per league.
The biggest hoarders of them all
With many cities competing in multiple leagues, it isn’t unusual to have more than one title being in possession of one city. Over the past, it has happened on 19 occasions that 2 titles were held by the same city at the same time.
During the period between 1927 and 1946 there were only two leagues yet: the MLB and the NHL. Both leagues were also rather small: in the 1946 season the MLB existed off 16 teams, the NHL still only had the Original 6 competing. There was quite a bit of overlap between these leagues: New York, Chicago, Detroit and Boston had teams in both leagues. It was therefore rather surprising to see that there were ‘only’ 6 times in which one city held 2 titles at the same time during this period:
In 1947 the NBA got added to the mix, starting a two decade period (1947-1966) in which three leagues were played. During this stretch, not a single city was able to hold 2 titles at the same time. It was after 1967 – the year in which the NFL came into existence – that we saw more occasions in which cities claimed a double. This feat has been accomplished by 5 different cities so far, combining for 13 occasions.
Interestingly enough, none of the teams we saw in the first 6 doubles, were involved in any of the other 13 duets. Not even the New York Yankees, who would still win 17 of their 27 titles after 1947. The other teams – in the NBA, NHL and NFL – simply couldn’t match their victories.
It is no coincidence that I specifically state ‘2 titles‘ and not ‘2 titles or more‘. The simple fact is that not a single city has ever held 3 – let alone 4 – titles at the same time. This fact brings us back to the ‘verge of history’ that I mentioned in the introduction. A verge that the city of Boston is currently getting close to…
Boston’s chance of a unique trilogy
It is October 28, 2018. Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles. Chris Sale strikes out Manny Machado, the Red Sox win 5-1 and claim their 9th World Series title in franchise history.
Fast forward to February 3rd, 2019. Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta. In a rather dull Super Bowl LIII the New England Patriots beat the Los Angeles Rams (13-3) to win their record-tying 6th NFL championship.
Boston now holds two major sports championships.
The NHL title is currently in possession of Washington, the NBA title went to Oakland. Time for the Bruins and Celtics to step up. If either of them can claim their respective championships, Boston can become the first city ever to hold 3 major titles at the same time.
Wednesday, May 8th, 2019. The Boston Celtics leave the court of the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee with their heads held down. After dominating the Indiana Pacers in the first round of the NBA Playoffs – sweeping them 4-0 – they couldn’t stop the #1 seed Milwaukee Bucks. After taking game 1 – on the road even – they lost 4 game straight, being outscored by 65 points over those games. The Celtics will not give Boston their 3rd title.
Monday, May 27th, 2019. The Bruins are still holding up their end of the deal: they reached the Stanley Cup Finals. After beating Toronto (4-3), Columbus (4-2) and Carolina (4-0), they now face the St. Louis Blues. Coming off 10 days rest, they will either be fit and good to go, or they will be sluggish and out of it.
After 1 minute in the 2nd period, the Blues take a 0-2 lead, so it looks to be the latter. However, before the period is over, the score is back to 2-2 and Boston seems to be in control. They finish the game with a 38-20 shots-on-goal advantage, they win more face-offs, are better at both powerplays and penalty kill, ultimately winning the game 4-2. That’s the first of four needed wins in the bag.
Boston’s chase for the trilogy is on. June 3rd is the first possibility for the Bruins to claim the title, if they sweep the Blues. If it happens, I am sure it will become a historic day for the city. One they will never forget. The day that they become the first city in North America to ever hold 3 major sport titles at the same time, cementing their claim as #1 sports city even further. At least for the time being, Boston will likely be dubbed Titletown, USA.
Or can St. Louis play spoiler in all of this…?
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