The real formula for success

Numerous cities around the country claim to hold the distinction of being the nation's premiere "Title Town." Detroit, Green Bay, Wis., and New York have staked their claim as the nation's number one host for championship parades, but those three cities have cornered the market in only one sport -- hockey, football and baseball, respectively. It got me thinking which town in the U.S. is in fact the Title Town. So, I did some research. I looked at the four major sports: baseball, hockey, basketball and football and narrowed the cities down by requiring that the city have teams in at least three of the four major sports. Unfortunately for Green Bay, cow tipping goes by the wayside here -- and you're out.\nHow does one classify a Title Town? That's a good question. Does the town with the most titles automatically vault itself to the top of the totem pole, or are there underlying factors giving certain cities advantages? If you count championships -- straight up, New York City can boast the most professional sports titles, however, they do have two football teams, two hockey teams, two -- at one point three -- baseball teams, and they've had sports teams since the dawn of the 20th century. Should a city with young franchises be penalized, then? I say no, and hence devised a not-so-simple formula to find out, once and for all, which American hotbed can be anointed as Title Town, USA. \nCollege football has the BCS, college basketball has the RPI -- I, on the other hand, have devised the TMFT poll. The formula for the "Too-Much-Free-Time" poll is a complicated one, so here goes an attempt to explain it to you. \nCities were judged on a point system. I rewarded one point for each -- a Super Bowl win, an NBA title, a World Series ring and bringing home the Stanley Cup. I gave a half point for the NFL Championship before there was a Super Bowl -- not sure why, it just seemed right. And seeing as the goal of my research was to find which city, and not which franchise is most title-prone, I deducted a quarter of a point for a championship won by a city whose team has since relocated. Following me so far? After adding up the points in each sport, I then divided the point total by the number of years the team had been in its respective city. I then added the results of each sport in each city getting the final total, creating my rankings. \nTake a breath.\nDetroit, a title town? While their 10 Stanley Cups are impressive, the Tigers and Lions leave much to be desired as Detroit finished tenth in the poll. How about New York, with their 35 combined baseball titles and 52 overall championships? Well, New York couldn't escape the year's aspect of the TMFT formula and its 52 titles were good enough for only fifth in the rankings. \nThe league that seemed to aid most cities was the NBA. Boston's 16 NBA titles are staggering, but another city benefiting greatly from the NBA category is a city's current team has never won the NBA crown. Before they won nine titles in Tinseltown, the Lakers called Minneapolis home, which should make sense to the casual fan seeing as there are no lakes in Los Angeles. From 1948 to 1960, the Land of 10,000 Lakes served as home for the Lakers, winning five titles in that stretch. And even with the deduction of points for relocation, the Twin Cities still scored an NBA high, .3125 in the TMFT poll. \nSo which city claimed the highly contested and coveted top spot of the TMFT poll?\nWith a combined TMFT score of .40736 the city of Boston -- who hasn't won the World Series since 1918, the Stanley Cup since 1972, or the NBA Finals since 1986 -- captured the top spot. How, you ask? Bill Russell, Larry Legend and the 1914 Boston Braves. \nRounding out the top six are: Number 2, Minneapolis ('BlackJack' Morris and those original Lakers), number 3, Denver (aided by John Elway's final two years and the Avalanche's two titles in only seven years since their move from Quebec), number 4, Los Angeles (Magic, Kareem and those inspiring RecSpecs), number 5, New York and number 6, Chicago (which was crippled by the Cubs and White Sox title drought -- even Michael couldn't get the Sox to win).\nAnd with the top six revealed, you may, or may not be asking yourself which city has been starved for titles. Well there might be a reason why many critics claim Atlanta is the worst sports city in the country. The Jewel of the South has teams in all four major sports, yet has only one championship to its credit -- the 1995 Braves -- garnering the ATL with a TMFT score of .02702. \nSo what does it all mean? Is this just an arbitrary formula devised by a kid who needs to get out more? I'll let you be the judge, but the Super Bowl bound New England Patriots are doing their part to lend some credence to the TMFT poll. And don't look now, but the Minnesota Timberwolves are in first place… \nFor the complete TMFT rankings please check out Cakes' Takes on the web at www.idsnews.com/sports.