I like to get these franchise ranking lists out before the start of the season but that didn’t happen this year. But no matter, all the tabulations are complete and I’m ready to go with my updated rankings of all 30 active NHL franchises, from best to worst.

Last year’s list is here, and you can see all my great sports-related rankings and lists here.

The Criteria

The categories and point values are as follows:

• 25 points for a Stanley Cup championship (or an NHL title prior to 1927), and 15 points for a Stanley Cup Finals loss.
• 2 points for a playoff berth, counted only from the 1967-68 season forward.
• 3 points for each playoff round win, counted only from the 1967-68 season forward.
• 3 points for finishing the regular season with the most points.
• 1 point for a winning season.
• Consecutive winning regular seasons are worth 2 points starting with the second, 3 points for the third, 4 points for the fourth, and so on. The counter is reset after any non-winning season. So if a team has three winning seasons in a row, they get a total of 5 points.

The main goal of my system is to reward consistently good play in the regular season, and to not give older franchises too much of an advantage just by virtue of being around for so many years. I’ve always felt that using Stanley Cups alone to measure a franchise’s quality is taking too narrow a view.

That’s about it! Let’s get to the rankings, current as of the start of the 2015-16 NHL season.

---

The Top 10

#1. Montreal Canadiens (#1 last year) — 18.18 avg.

#2. Philadelphia Flyers (#2) — 13.85 avg.

#3. Boston Bruins (#3) — 13.63 avg.

#4. Detroit Red Wings (#4) — 12.52 avg.

#5. Edmonton Oilers (#5) — 11.03 avg.

#6. New Jersey Devils (#6) — 10.63 avg.

#7. New York Islanders (#7) — 9.19 avg.

#8. Colorado Avalanche (#8) — 8.43 avg.

#9. Ottawa Senators (#9) — 8.32 avg.

#10. Pittsburgh Penguins (#10) — 8.19 avg.

No changes in the top 10 this year, and only the Red Wings and Penguins managed to increase the per-season point averages. The Oilers and Devils continue to have a hard go of things lately and continue to lose points at decent clip.

I opined last year that the Penguins could be poised to pass the Senators, but that didn’t happen. They have, however, closed the gap to just .13 points.

The Mediocre 10

#11. Toronto Maple Leafs (#10 last year) — 7.92 avg.

#12. Chicago Blackhawks (#14) — 7.90 avg.

#13. Dallas Stars (#12) — 7.51 avg.

#14. San Jose Sharks (#15) — 7.30 avg.

#15. Buffalo Sabres (#13) — 7.30 avg.

#16. Vancouver Canucks (#19) — 6.66 avg.

#17. St. Louis Blues (#16) — 6.62 avg.

#18. Anaheim Ducks (#18) — 6.57 avg.

#19. New York Rangers (#20) — 6.49 avg.

#20. Calgary Flames (#17) — 6.38 avg.

Lots of jostling in the middle of the pack, with only one franchise (Anaheim) staying put from last year’s rankings. Vancouver moved up more than any other team this year, thanks mostly to gaining 15 points thanks to not having a losing regular season since 1998-99.

Their western Canadian neighbors, the Calgary Flames, dropped three spots despite a winning record and a playoff round win last year.

The Bottom 10

#21. Washington Capitals (#21 last year) — 5.73 avg.

#22. Minnesota Wild (#22) — 5.43 avg.

#23. Los Angeles Kings (#24) — 4.72 avg.

#24. Tampa Bay Lightning (#25) — 4.64 avg.

#25. Nashville Predators (#23) — 4.44 avg.

#26. Carolina Hurricanes (#26) — 3.11 avg.

#27. Arizona Coyotes (#27) — 2.17 avg.

#28. Florida Panthers (#28) — 1.90 avg.

#29. Winnipeg Jets (#29) — 0.93 avg.

#30. Columbus Blue Jackets (#30) — -0.21 avg.

This was the least active group in terms of positioning, as only the Kings, Lightning, and Predators moved places from last year’s list. Tampa Bay, however, wins this year’s award for most improved team with a +1.21-point average increase. That puts them quite close to the Kings, who inched up just .05 points from the 2014 rankings.

When we talk about “cursed” sports towns, it’s almost always in the context of things like postseason or championship droughts, heartbreaking losses, or just general futility. In other words, Cleveland. I kid, I kid.

But to my way of thinking there’s something even worse than falling just short of ultimate glory over and over again, and that’s losing a pro franchise entirely. Whether it’s the result of a greedy owner or a lack of fan interest, the death of a sports team is always at least a little sad.

And so I set out to document just with cities and states have lost the most professional teams from the four major leagues (NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL). I could expand it to other leagues as well, but I’m not sure that cities mourn the loss of indoor soccer teams quite like they do baseball or football franchises.

A few caveats are necessary. In the early history of pro leagues team movement was fairly common and it can be hard to differentiate between teams folding altogether or simply taking on new identities. Also, I have taken the liberty of lumping some geographic areas together that may get me into hot water with locals. So all the boroughs of New York City are counted as the same, as are other cities located in the same metropolitan area.

If I’ve made any noticeable blunders please let me know in the comments. Publication images courtesy my companion site, SportsPaper.info.

---

Which State Has Lost the Most Pro Sports Teams?

This one was closer than I thought it would be but indeed, Ohio can rightly be considered the unluckiest state when it comes to pro franchises folding or moving. To date the Buckeye State has lost 20 teams from the four major leagues.

It started with the Cincinnati Reds (or Red Stockings), one of the charter members of baseball’s National League, who were kicked out of the league in 1880 and subsequently dissolved. Since then two other baseball teams, the Cleveland Blues and Spiders (1884 and 1899 respectively) have vanished.

Ohio has also suffered the loss of two NBA franchises. The Cleveland Rebels were a charter BAA franchise in 1946-47 but went out of business after just one season. The Cincinnati Royals, themselves already relocated from Rochester in 1957, departed the Queen City for Kansas City/Omaha in 1972. The team now plays in Sacramento as the Kings.

But it’s the NFL where Ohio has lost the most, which makes sense given that the league was founded there and was heavily concentrated in the Midwest for its first few decades. A whopping total of 14 NFL franchises have either moved or gone belly up in Ohio, although to be fair most of that movement was done by the mid-1930s.

Of note, however, are some notable franchises that were lost. The Canton Bulldogs, one of the great teams from the NFL’s first decade, were kicked out after the 1926 season. In 1946 the Cleveland Rams moved west to Los Angeles. Of course I don’t think I need to get into what happened with the Cleveland Browns in 1996 — and if you think that doesn’t count because the city was awarded a new Browns franchise in 1999, ask local residents how they feel about that.

—

Coming in a surprisingly close second on this list is New York, which has seen 19 teams move or fold. Aside from the infamous moves of MLB’s New York Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers, the Empire State has lost three NBA teams, one NHL team, and nine NFL teams. New York City’s five boroughs alone account for 10 teams on this list.

Here’s the full Top 10:

1. Ohio (20 teams)
2. New York (19)
3. Missouri (14)
4. Indiana (9)
5(t). California, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin (8)
8. Illinois (7)
9(t). Maryland, Michigan (6)

---

Which City Has Lost the Most Pro Sports Teams?

I guess I gave this one away already, but New York City has lost 10 pro sports teams in its history. Some people may take issue with lumping all five boroughs together, but this is my site so my rules.

The exodus began in 1876 when the New York Mutuals, a founding National League club, were expelled from the league as punishment for refusing to make a late-season road trip. Things remained calm for several decades, but the wild and woolly early NFL days brought a host of teams in and out of New York City.

Between 1921 and 1951 a total of six APFA/NFL teams vanished — the New York Brickley Giants (1921), Brooklyn Lions (1926), New York Yankees (1928), Staten Island Stapletons (1932), Brooklyn Dodgers/Tigers (1944), and finally the New York Bulldogs/Yanks (1951).

(See programs for more defunct NFL teams.)

—

Just behind New York City in the loss column are St. Louis and Cleveland, who have each seen nine teams go away. St. Louis most recently saw the NFL’s Cardinals move to Arizona in 1988 and the NBA’s Hawks fly to Atlanta in 1968. More recently, all signs point to the St. Louis Rams returning to their longtime home in Los Angeles soon, at which point the city will tie New York for this infamous honor.

In addition to the Browns’ move to Baltimore, Cleveland lost an entire league when the NHL’s Barons merged with the Minnesota North Stars in 1978.

Here’s the full top 10:

1. New York City (10 teams)
2(t). Cleveland, St. Louis (9)
4(t). Baltimore, Detroit, Washington D.C. (6)
7(t). Kansas City, Milwaukee, Philadelphia (5)
10(t). Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Louisville, Minneapolis (4)

---

What Team Name Has Been the Unluckiest?

Just for fun, I decided to look at what nickname has been associated with the most defunct/relocated franchises. For this exercise, I only counted the name of a team when it went away, even if was known by another name for a longer period. This part is more art than science, unfortunately.

With that said, history indicates that the nicknames that most often portend doom are Maroons, Senators, and Tigers. There have been five teams each that had this name and then were no more.

The most recent Maroons team is probably the most well known, the Montreal Maroons of the NHL (1924-38), winners of two Stanley Cups. Three NFL teams bore the moniker and were from Kenosha, Wisconsin, Pottsville, Pennsylvania, and Toledo, Ohio.

All but one of the Senators teams were based out of Washington D.C., the exception being the original Ottawa Senators of the NHL. Three separate MLB franchises used the name, folding or moving in 1899, 1961, and 1972. Only hardcore NFL history junkies would know about the Senators that played just one season in the APFA/NFL (1921).

As for the Tigers, the last of them to go extinct was the NFL squad known for most of its existence (1930-44) as the Brooklyn Dodgers. Three other NFL teams were known as the Tigers and were from Chicago, Detroit, and Columbus. The latter of these was also known as the Panhandles.

People found this post by searching for:

"https://www grayflannelsuit net/blog/what-city-and-state-has-lost-the-most-sports-teams"

Here’s a gem from the NHL of the 1970s. It’s an undated pennant for the California Golden Seals. The franchise began play in 1961 as the WHL’s San Francisco Seals, changed to the California Seals in 1966, and became the Oakland Seals when they became an NHL expansion franchise in 1967.

The team was purchased by Oakland A’s owner Charlie Finley in 1970. Finley promptly changed the team’s colors to the same green and gold as the A’s, and also changed the name to California Golden Seals.

Another element you can see on the pennant is the artistic player rendering. That is actually based off a real player, in this case Carol Vadnais, who was the team’s captain until he was traded in February 1972.

The Seals and their neat pennants disappeared in 1976, when the franchise relocated to Cleveland to play two ill-fated seasons as the Barons.

—

Don’t forget to check out the rest of my Pennant Fever entries.

Last year I took a look at the best and worst franchises in NHL history, split across two posts. This year, on the eve of the 2014-15 season, I’m making it easier for you, dear reader, to quickly learn the truth about all 30 National Hockey League teams in one handy list. (Don’t forget to check out all my other fantastic sports lists as well.)

I didn’t see the need to introduce any major changes to my calculation system. However, I did go back and correct some minor data entry errors I discovered from the previous year. None of this had a noticeable impact on the rankings, so fret not.

The Criteria

The categories and point values are as follows:

• 25 points for a Stanley Cup championship (or an NHL title prior to 1927), and 15 points for a Stanley Cup Finals loss.
• 2 points for a playoff berth, counted only from the 1967-68 season forward.
• 3 points for each playoff round win, counted only from the 1967-68 season forward.
• 3 points for finishing the regular season with the most points.
• 1 point for a winning season.
• Consecutive winning regular seasons are worth 2 points starting with the second, 3 points for the third, 4 points for the fourth, and so on. The counter is reset after any non-winning season. So if a team has three winning seasons in a row, they get a total of 5 points.

The main goal of my system is to reward consistently good play in the regular season, and to not give older franchises too much of an advantage just by virtue of being around for so many years. I’ve always felt that using Stanley Cups alone to measure a franchise’s quality is taking too narrow a view.

That’s about it! Let’s get to the rankings, good through the end of the 2013-14 season.

---

The Top 10

#1. Montreal Canadiens (#1 last year) — 18.25 avg.

#2. Philadelphia Flyers (#2) — 13.96 avg.

#3. Boston Bruins (#3) — 13.69 avg.

#4. Detroit Red Wings (#4) — 12.34 avg.

#5. Edmonton Oilers (#5) — 11.38 avg.

#6. New Jersey Devils (#6) — 10.92 avg.

#7. New York Islanders (#7) — 9.29 avg.

#8. Colorado Avalanche (#8) — 8.62 avg.

#9. Ottawa Senators (#9) — 8.38 avg.

#10. Pittsburgh Penguins (#11) — 8.11 avg.

Say hello to the newest member of the Top 10 Club — the Penguins! Despite winning just one playoff round in 2013-14, Pittsburgh did enough to leap past the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Leafs, meanwhile, are sinking like a stone thanks to making the playoffs only once since the last league lockout.

Elsewhere in the top 10, there’s not a lot of movement from last season. The biggest drop in average came out of Edmonton (down by .38 points), which is still in this group thanks to the golden years of Gretzky and Messier.

I wouldn’t expect a much different look to this group next year, although Pittsburgh moving past Ottawa is a very real possibility.

The Mediocre 10

#11. Toronto Maple Leafs (#10 last year) — 8.01 avg.

#12. Dallas Stars (#12) — 7.65 avg.

#13. Buffalo Sabres (#13) — 7.49 avg.

#14. Chicago Blackhawks (#14) — 7.41 avg.

#15. San Jose Sharks (#15) — 7.09 avg.

#16(t). Anaheim Ducks (#18) — 6.50 avg.

#16(t). St. Louis Blues (#17) — 6.50 avg.

#18. Calgary Flames (#16) — 6.39 avg.

#19. Vancouver Canucks (#19) — 6.35 avg.

#20. New York Rangers (#20) — 6.29 avg.

Other than the Leafs getting relegated to the second tier, every club that was in this group last year is still here. The Rangers and Sharks both turned successful seasons into big point gains, moving their averages up .35 and .38 points, respectively.

The only teams from this group to see their point averages drop were the aforementioned Leafs (-.05), Stars (-.10), Sabres (-.20), and Flames (-.18). Not coincidentally, the Stars were the only squad here to make the playoffs.

The Bottom 10

#21. Washington Capitals (#21 last year) — 5.46 avg.

#22. Minnesota Wild (#22) — 5.00 avg.

#23. Los Angeles Kings (#24) — 4.67 avg.

#24. Nashville Predators (#23) — 4.40 avg.

#25. Tampa Bay Lightning (#25) — 3.43 avg.

#26. Carolina Hurricanes (#26) — 3.24 avg.

#27. Arizona Coyotes (#27) — 2.26 avg.

#28. Florida Panthers (#28) — 1.95 avg.

#29. Winnipeg Jets (#29) — 0.50 avg.

#30. Columbus Blue Jackets (#30) — -0.08 avg.

Bottom feeder teams be bottom feedin’. This list is unchanged save for the Stanley Cup champion Kings moving up one spot and raising their average nearly one whole point in the process.

That said, all but three of these franchises improved their averages from 2013-14. Other than the Kings, the best of the bunch was Columbus, who gained .42 points thanks to making the playoffs for just the second time in their history. One more good year and they’ll move out of negative territory!

One of the great rivalries in sports is set to resume tonight when the Boston Bruins face off against the Montreal Canadiens in the 2014 Stanley Cup Eastern Conference Semifinal round.

It’s the first time these two storied teams — each one of the ten best NHL franchises of all-time — have met each other in the playoffs since 2011, and the 10th time overall. Boston has yet to lose a playoff series to the Habs since their first meeting in 1929.

In honor of the rivalry I thought I’d share some more great 35mm color action shots by Arthur Rickerby. I don’t have an exact date for this game, but based on the uniform research I conducted here I’d say it took place sometime during the 1965-66 or 1966-67 season. The only player I can say with certainty I can identify is legendary Bruins goaltender Gerry Cheevers (#30), seen with his iconic “stitch” mask. (Thanks to my Twitter pal Sully, #16 has been ID’d as Murray Oliver.)

Click each image for a full-size version.

So THAT’S what that stick-in-rink logo is supposed to be! See, now that’s the kind of cool logo you get when you don’t hire some soulless marketing firm to do your work for you.

I can’t be certain when this photo was taken, but I think that’s Glenn Hall wearing the #1 jersey for the Chicago Black Hawks. If so, this dates from 1967 or earlier.

I’m also fairly certain that I see Chico Maki wearing #16 for Chicago. I couldn’t even guess who the New York Rangers player is here.

The 2014 Stanley Cup Playoffs are about ready to start, so I thought I’d provide a brief update on where my official ranking of the all-time best and worst NHL franchises stands.

First, I should note that the rankings have changed a bit since I published my lists last year. I went back and tweaked the formulas a bit, and also corrected some data entry errors. So the revised list for the conclusion of the 2012-13 season looks like this — 1. Canadiens, 2. Flyers, 3. Bruins, 4. Red Wings, 5. Oilers, 6. Devils, 7. Islanders, 8. Avalanche, 9. Senators, 10. Maple Leafs. Sorry Dallas, you got bumped.

The Best

With the revised top 10 in mind, there are some changes coming on the next list. Already I can tell you that there is a switch at the #10 position, and we will be saying goodbye to the Toronto Maple Leafs.

After failing to qualify for the playoffs this year, the Leafs have been bumped out of the #10 spot by the Pittsburgh Penguins. If the Penguins make it deep enough into the playoffs they could bump the Senators out of the #9 spot, so I’ll be keeping my eye on them.

The Worst

The Columbus Blue Jackets still sit all the way at the bottom position, but thanks to a good regular season and playoff berth they are less than a tenth of a point away from bringing their overall average into positive territory. Otherwise, there’s not much going on in the bottom 10 this season.

At this point it looks like the team with the best chance to improve their chances of breaking out of the bottom 10 is the Minnesota Wild. A Stanley Cup trophy would certainly put them right into the middle of the pack, but even making it to the Finals would be enough to move them past the Capitals.

—

Of course you’ll want to check out my complete collection of sports lists, right?

This week I started rolling out my newest and most ambitious project yet, and paradoxically the one I’ve spent the least time promoting — The Press Room. Basically, the Press Room is an extension of my popular and beloved gallery of American Football League covers but with one major difference.

Not content to waste dozens of hours scouring the internet for vintage AFL programs, I’ve decided to expand to all four of the major North American pro sports leagues — MLB, NFL, NHL, and NBA. So I’ve begun the long, painstaking task of assembling a collection of images from those four leagues featuring game programs, media guides, yearbooks, and more. I’m hoping to be able to cover just about everything up until the early 1990s.

I use that as the cutoff point for no particular reason, other than I think that’s when pro sports started feeling way too corporate and homogenized for my liking. That could also have to do with my age as well, as I entered college at about the same time. Who knows. In any case, I have to put some kind of cutoff in or I’ll go nuts collecting this stuff.

In a perfect world I would have rolled this thing out fully formed. But it’s not a perfect world and I’m too damn impatient. So as of right now, all I have are a handful of NFL items for the San Francisco 49ers and Chicago Bears. I am adding new teams and items as quickly as I can, which is one of the reasons the blog has been fairly quiet as of late.

I’m really excited about this project, as I’ve wanted to get it off the ground for some time. The response to my AFL site has been positive and I think you’ll love this one as well. Because the scope is so vast, I’m going to depend pretty heavily on user submissions to help. So if you want to provide me with any images for the Press Room, please read this.

I’m really looking forward to seeing this thing become more fully formed, and I hope you will dig it too. Don’t forget to spread the word via Twitter, StumbleUpon, and the usual social channels. I don’t make a dime off this stuff, but it’s nice to see it take off just the same.