Why does Richmond not have a professional sports team?

     I like many other Americans am a huge sports fan. I watch hours of sports each week, I watch football, hockey, baseball, basketball, so if you get the idea I will basically watch anything sports related. So why does Richmond not have any major professional sports team? I grew up outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania watching the Steelers, Penguins, and Pirates. So a few years ago whenever I moved to Richmond, I started to wonder and even asked people who were from this area why are there no professional sports teams here in Virginia? I mean Richmond is the capitol of the state and one of the largest cities.

    Some of the people would give me the answer that there are professional teams here in Richmond. At the time there were the Richmond Braves, a minor league baseball team and the Richmond Renegades, which was a semi-professional hockey team. To anyone who has ever been to a professional sporting event you know that the atmosphere is totally different than that of a minor league baseball game or that of semi-profession hockey game. Yes Richmond does a major NASCAR track, but I’m talking about the four major sports in the United States.

    Other people would give me that answer that Richmond was not a big enough city to support a professional team and some people would even say that if there was a team here it would not be completive enough to draw fans. Remember I’m from outside of Pittsburgh, the Pirates have not been a competitive team in over a decade, but they are still making money or the team would have left a long time ago. The rely on the more competitive teams coming to town and drawing crowds of fans to come watch their super stars play. So you don’t have to have to have a winning team to have one.  

    That only leaves the other answer I was given, that Richmond is not a big enough city. According to 2009 statistics the population of Pittsburgh was roughly 311,000 and Richmond was 204,000. So yes Pittsburgh is bigger than Richmond, but you have to remember that a lot of the major cities in the north have professional sports teams. So if Richmond had a team it would draw more people from the surrounding areas to come watch a professional sporting event.

    I understand that it costs money to build a stadium or an arena for a team to play in and someone has to be willing to buy the team and move them here to Richmond. So it does take money to get a team up and running, but professional sports is a billion dollar industry no matter which sport it is. The smaller market teams are even making a profit thanks to the profit sharing methods that all of the leagues use. I think if Richmond brought a professional team to this area it would give the economy a boost with all of the people it would draw to the city. That is just my opinion on this subject and if you can think of any other reason why Richmond does not have a profession sports team please feel free to let me know.