ATHLETE PRODUCTION PATTERNS (Places That Are Straight-Up NASTY @ Sports)

[xpanther206]

Just finished up a project I started in October with the purpose of tracking the geography of MLB, NFL & NBA players at the regional, state and metro area levels. The result is a powerful way to estimate the overall quality of a sport at the high school level in a given area. The output statistic for this study was a "Players Per 1 Million Males" ratio. Here are the results:

BASEBALL (MLB Players on Active Roster/Disabled List at any point in 2006)

Regional Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) West (10.33 : 326)
02) South (8.20 : 376)
03) Midwest (4.18 : 132)
04) East (3.64 : 106)

State Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) California (13.21 : 223)
02) North Dakota (12.48 : 4)
03) Florida (11.93 : 93)
04) Nevada (10.80 : 11)
05) Georgia (10.68 : 43)
06) Washington (10.22 : 30)
07) Oklahoma (10.02 : 17)
08) Hawaii (9.86 : 6)
09) Louisiana (9.71 : 21)
10) Mississippi (9.46 : 13)

Large Metro Area Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) San Diego CA(25.44 : 36)
02) Louisville KY-IN (18.14 : 9)
03) Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater FL (16.45 : 19)
04) Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County CA (15.27 : 124)
05) Orlando FL (14.83 : 12)
06) Houston-Galveston-Brazoria TX (14.18 : 33)
07) Jacksonville FL (13.07 : 7)
08) Atlanta GA (12.32 : 25)
09) Salt Lake City-Ogden UT (11.91 : 8)
10) Sacramento-Yolo CA (11.35 : 10)

Football (NFL Players on Active Roster/Practice Squad at any point in 2006)

Regional Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) South (22.88 : 1048)
02) West (13.86 : 431)
03) Midwest (12.20 : 386)
04) East (8.21 : 239)

State Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) Louisiana (40.22 : 87)
02) Mississippi (40.04 : 55)
03) South Carolina (30.27 : 59)
04) Florida (28.21 : 220)
05) Alabama (27.49 : 59)
06) Georgia (27.31 : 110)
07) Hawaii (21.36 : 13)
08) Texas (21.35 : 221)
09) Nebraska (21.34 : 18)
10) Virginia (19.59 : 68

Large Metro Area Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) New Orleans LA (48.44 : 31)
02) Miami-Fort Lauderdale FL (41.13 : 77)
03) Jacksonville FL (41.09 : 22)
04) West Palm Beach-Boca Raton FL (29.26 : 16)
05) Norfolk-Virginia Beach-Newport News VA (28.46 : 22)
06) Houston-Galveston-Brazoria TX (26.64 : 62)
07) Atlanta GA (26.61 : 54)
08) Dallas-Fort Worth TX (23.46 : 61)
09) Cleveland-Akron OH (23.34 : 33)
10) Cincinnati-Hamilton OH-KY (20.81 : 20)

Basketball (NBA Players on Active Roster at any point in 2006-2007)

Regional Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) South (2.92 : 134)
02) Midwest (2.76 : 87)
03) East (2.75 : 80)
04) West (2.16 : 68)

State Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) Mississippi (8.74 : 12)
02) South Dakota (5.34 : 2)
03) Maryland (5.08 : 13)
04) Illinois (4.61 : 28)
05) Pennsylvania (3.88 : 23)
06) North Carolina (3.80 : 15)
07) Kansas (3.76 : 5)
08) Washington (3.75 : 11)
09) South Carolina (3.59 : 7)
10) Oregon (3.54 : 6)

Large Metro Area Rankings (Players Per 1 Million Males : Total Players)
01) Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill NC (8.57 : 5)
02) Philadelphia-Wilmington-Atlantic City PA-NJ-DE-MD (7.05 : 21)
03) Portland-Salem OR (6.22 : 7)
04) Orlando FL (6.18 : 5)
05) Kansas City MO-KS (5.77 : 5)
06) Charlotte-Gastonia-Rock Hill NC-SC (5.44 : 4)
07) Columbus OH (5.29 : 4)
08) Houston-Galveston-Brazoria TX (5.16 : 12)
09) San Antonio TX (5.16 : 4)
10) Dallas-Fort Worth TX (5.00 : 13)



Baseball-Football-Basketball Combined

To integrate the three sports together, I calculated the ratio between the average proportion of athletes from the given area for each sport over the proportion of that area's general population. So if California is 10% of the US population but is home to 20% of the players in each of the three leagues, the MLB-NBA-NFL PROD RATE = 2.0, and it would read something like "California produces athletes at a rate 2.0x the national average."

Regional Rankings (MLB-NFL-NBA PROD Rate : Total Players)
01) South (1.27 : 1558)
02) West (1.07 : 825)
03) Midwest (0.82 : 605)
04) East (0.70 : 425)

State Rankings (MLB-NFL-NBA PROD Rate : Total Players)
01) Mississippi (2.43 : 80)
02) Louisiana (1.76 : 115)
03) Florida (1.54 : 334)
04) Georgia (1.49 : 165)
05) Alabama (1.36 : 83)
06) California (1.30 : 5.33)
07) South Carolina (1.29 : 73)
08) Texas (1.28 : 341)
09) Washington (1.27 : 81)
10) Maryland (1.14 : 58)

Large Metro Area Rankings (MLB-NFL-NBA PROD Rate : Total Players)
01) Houston-Galveston-Brazoria TX (1.92 : 107)
02) Miami-Fort Lauderdale FL (1.85 : 104)
03) Orlando FL (1.79 : 28)
04) San Diego CA (1.78 : 66)
05) Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater FL (1.74 : 45)
06) New Orleans LA (1.68 : 36)
07) Atlanta GA (1.68 : 87)
08) Louisville KY-IN (1.66 : 17)
09) Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County CA (1.55 : 286)
10) Jacksonville FL (1.54 : 29)


** When it comes to excellence in the world of sports, I hereby declare the South to be the best region, Mississippi to be the best state and Houston-Galveston-Brazoria aka H-TOWN to be the best city.

 

[xpanther206]

I also took the player database & geocoded each individual high school into some basic mapping software to get an idea of specifically where within a metro area talent is eminating from. Here is an example of a strong metro area in each sport, and an example of how the three sports are related to each other geography:

Baseball in San Diego

Football in Miami

Basketball in Philadelphia

All 3 Sports in Los Angeles

 

[Fucky McFuckerson]

Just cus Mississippi has the MOST, doesnt mean that they are the BEST. You need to be a bit more specific when you post shit like this.

Quantity does NOT=quality

 

[xpanther206]

Just cus Mississippi has the MOST, doesnt mean that they are the BEST. You need to be a bit more specific when you post shit like this.

Quantity does NOT=quality

True, I understand exactly what you're saying.

However, there is usually a "normal curve" in terms of the talents of the athletes from a given state. I.E. for every X amount of players from a city, there are A Pro Bowlers, B Starters, C practice squad players. The ratios usually don't change that much across the board.

How do I know this? Because somebody who conducted similar research about five years ago, found that his state rankings did not change much at all when he tallied "dollars" rather than simply players. By using salaries, he was normalizing for the fact that, like you pointed out, not all players are created equal.

Here is a link to his report: "Where's All the Talent Coming From"