Last updated: 26th December 2022
With this post, I wanted to present which cities are winning most often, among top 5 professional sports in North America: Football, Hockey, Baseball, Basketball, Soccer.
Few things to have in mind:
- The championships won are recorded for the cities only, not the individual franchises
- When a team relocates to a new city, the number of championships won in the prior city remain with that city
- Cities from suburbs and metropolitan areas, are mapped to the “main” city (e.g. Oakland to San Francisco)
- Please scroll down for the complete explanation of methodology, as well as the source links
Most successful sports cities of all time
1st chart is presenting all the teams that have won more than 10 titles combined
Similar data, presenting all the teams that have won more than 15 titles in total, but presented through the time, can be seen on the next chart.
Most successful cities during the last 50 years
Most successful cities in the 21st century
Important to note:
- All titles won in 2001 or later
- Only exception is NFL Champion of 2000 season
- NFL consider it is as a season for year 2000
- That's why here it is not counted for 21st century
- Although technically, Super Bowl has been played in 21st century (January 2000)
New York City - The "mecca" of sports
New York, the city with most championships won, deserved a small separate section.
Please note that we have 2 different Giants team on the chart, explanation is given below the chart.
Complete overview of all sports cities with at least 1 title in pro sports
The table below offers a complete overview:
- All teams that have won at least 1 title
- Alphabetically ordered
- Breakdown per sport
- Search option
Methodology and sources
Baseball - MLB
- Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_World_Series_champions
- 1904,No World Series
- 1994,No World Series due to a players' strike
Football - NFL
- Source: https://www.pro-football-reference.com/years/
Hockey - NHL
- Source 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Stanley_Cup_champions#Appearances
- Source 2: https://www.hockey-reference.com/playoffs/
- NHA/NHL vs. PCHA/WCHL/WHL champions (1915–1926)
- NHL Champions since 1927
- 1919, season cancelled due to pandemic
- 2005, season cancelled due to the 2004–05 NHL lockout
Basketball - NBA
- Source: https://www.basketball-reference.com/playoffs/
- ABA champions not counted
Soccer - MLS
- Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MLS_Cup_finals
- Old NASL champions not counted
City mapping
Original city name of the team, that has been mapped to metropolitan area or to the city they belong to:
- Arizona - Phoenix
- Anaheim - Los Angeles
- Brooklyn - New York
- New Jersey - New York
- Canton - Cleveland
- Anaheim - Los Angeles
- Carolina - Raleigh
- Colorado - Denver
- D.C. - Washington
- Florida - Miami
- New England - Boston
- Frankford - Philadelphia
- Golden State - San Francisco
- Minnesota - Minneapolis
- Oakland - San Francisco
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