Duff Man

Leicester City won promotion in 2014, won 7 of their last 9 (going from 20th to 14th) to avoid relegation in 2015, won the EPL in 2016 as 5000 to 1 preseason longshots, and advanced to the quarterfinals of the Champions League in 2017.

Of the 9 markets below STL in the NBA - 5 have no other teams in the "big 4" leagues. None have the NHL or are represented in more than 2 of the big 4 as STL would be with an NBA team plus the Cardinals and Blues. Counting titles is just a shorthand way to measure tradition and how recently a city has tasted championship glory. If you can at least remember your team going on a playoff run, you have reason to be somewhat invested in your franchise. Think of all the tradition that the Cardinals, Blues - even the Billikens have going for them - well all those other cites who have had NBA teams and won titles over the last 50 years are better suited to draw fans than St Louis. Those teams aren't going to abandon their proven fan bases to roll the dice on St Louis - which has no track record or tradition in the last 50 years (aside from the Spirits which didn't draw well) - not to mention the black eye the region as a whole has been nursing in recent years.

I go into the city roughly every other day for work and typically patronize at least one city establishment every week. I love the city. I live as close as possible to the city as I can while still being in the county for public schools. Downtown for all the progress that's been made since 2000 or whatever still has a long way to go and there's many parts of downtown that are not really open for business after dark. I have been held up at gun point walking to my car after a ball game (in 2009). It's real. It happens. That doesn't stop me from going into the city. Jim Kavanaugh and the Taylors are doing a great thing by reviving the MLS bid and I hope it all works out. The NBA Is a completely different animal though. For this market to truly have the demographics to support an NBA franchise (on top of MLB, NHL, MLS and obvi our Billikens) would require a sea change. It's not as simple as the Taylors bringing a team here - which even if it were as simple as that, would be a long shot.

No. It's not - I'm basing much of this on what I hear from people who live in the "nice parts" of the city...and the "nothing to see here" attitude of denial (prevalent under the previous mayor) is part of the problem. Instead of recognizing that there's several degrees of dysfunction within law enforcement (which may be an at an all time high considering the crap going on between the circuit attorney and the city police) and demanding a regional strategy on crime from our leaders in both the city and county, we're day dreaming about getting an NBA team. There have been over 350 murders in the city in 2017-2018 and per the Metro Police's own data, motive is unknown in 212 of them. Either there aren't resources to handle it or those resources aren't being deployed properly or some combination of the two. It's a black eye for the region to have such a high murder rate year after year and don't think that doesn't come into play when STL is competing with other cities for events/teams. As alaman said, the carjackings might actually be the bigger problem as it's more likely to deter people coming into the city to spend money. re: Downtown I'm glad things are looking better in certain sections. I don't get downtown as much as I did before I had kids. I do know the last time I saw a show at the Opera House/Stifel Theatre there was seemingly nowhere to go within walking distance after the show.

Nobody is complaining just living in reality where the murder rate is out of control and downtown is a shell of even 10 years ago.

Well OKC stole the Sonics with Oil and Natural Gas Money so they're kind of an exception but they along with Memphis only have 1 pro team and it's the NBA. San Antonio has 5 NBA titles in the last 20 years, but the Spurs were rumored to be looking at STL in the 80s (that ship has long sailed though obviously). Detroit has NBA 3 titles in the last 30 years and has supported an NBA team for 6 decades, and are the 13th largest media market in the US. Sacramento should have lost their team, but they are actually 1 spot above STL on the media market ranking, and have 30+ years of tradition in that market. Cleveland is also above STL in terms of media market and have a relatively healthy basketball tradition between the late 80s early 90s and the 2 LeBron eras. Milwaukee has 50 years of tradition and have been compelling at some point in every decade but the 90s. Of those cities, only Detroit has both NBA and NHL. Also, aside from Detroit and perhaps Cleveland - none of those cities have faced the negative public perception from outside that St Louis currently has going.

The region needs to solve its crime problem and get over its political fiefdoms and re-invent itself as a cultural hotbed of innovation where young people want to relocate to and then maybe it can get an NBA team...that's how it works, not the other way around.

Until there's a prominent member of the Taylor family expressing a desire to bring an NBA team to STL, it's wishful thinking to think they're going to focus on the NBA. Also, are we living in a reality where Enterprise Center is a viable long term NBA arena or where there's any prospect for a new publicly funded arena?

What billionaire is out there who is going to drop $1B+ on the Pelicans (or whomever) AND buy into the Blues/Enterprise Center partnership (which I imagine struggles to break even) and pay whatever relocation fee the NBA wants? I know the Chaifetz family has money...but do they (or anyone with local ties) really have THAT kind of $$$ to invest in a market that has no real track record when it comes to supporting professional basketball?

Jeff Gordon trolling for clicks. Nothing to see here. "If there's a gazillionaire that simply HAS to have a team in the STL, money talks" Yes, if someone with stupid money irrationally used it to secure an NBA franchise and relocate it to STL, it could happen.

He was one of the few Crews recruits who (when healthy) looked like he could be part of an NCAA tournament rotation. I hope it works out.

Is Welmer seriously only going to be a Jr next season? Is that actually confirmed or is that one of those "he's going to apply for an exemption and we'll see what happens later" deals...and that's assuming his body holds up. This is a guy who committed in Dec of 2013 when he was a senior in HS and he's seriously going to be playing as college "senior" in 2021? That just doesn't seem possible.

I remember during this event before the 2012-13 season Guy Phillips made some crack to Jim Crews about Bobby Knight and some reference to scandal at IU and Crews was clearly fighting the urge to punch him in the face. Guy is so tone deaf. He isn't really a Billikens fan, he just likes the ego trip. His schtick is so tired. It's a shame that his connection to one single booster has given him an effective lifetime appointment - except on nights when he's got somewhere else to be.

Chyna was a dude

Maybe if we had an actual Mt Rushmore people would learn to spell the names of the people on it. If Grawer is Abe Lincoln, let's be glad Pete Gillen wasn't around to lead the Confederacy.

I'm not quite a big enough creep to have a comprehensive database...but these will have to do...

I don't think he's been mentioned, so I'll throw out honorable mention for Brian Conklin 1st team all conference, best player on the first NCAA team in 12 years, the glue that held things together during 2010-11 and kept the core of that loaded freshmen class from transferring. If not for Conklin, Majerus never gets SLU to the NCAA tournament, and that 3-year Jett/Evans/McCall/Loe run never comes to fruition, and you have to wonder if Ford, Goodwin, Gordon, et al consider SLU a big time enough program to buy into...

In that case I'm going with Mark McGuire, Jim Edmunds, Ed McCauley, and Marshall Falk

All you people are nuts voting for Carlos McCauley. Sure he was a solid defender who could bring the ball up the court and even learned to shoot by his Sr year, but I'm not sure he'd make the Mt Rushmore of the 4-year period he was here. Ed Macauley, Anthony Bonner, Erwin Claggett, and Jordair Jett

25 years ago Ford shot 52.8% from beyond the arc over an entire the season as the 2nd leading scorer on a Final 4 team. Made 101 of 191 attempts. Not exactly a lightweight.

These are the 3 locks... JoJo White: 12 NBA seasons, 837 games, 14.399 points, 17.2 PPG, 2 seasons >20 PPG, 4.9 APG, 2 seasons >6 APG, 7-time All-Star, 2-time 2nd team All-NBA, 2-time NBA champion, 1976 Finals MVP Ed Macauley: 10 NBA seasons, 641 games, 11,234 points, 17.5 PPG, 2 seasons >20 PPG, 7.5 RPG, 7-time All-Star, 3-time 1st team All-NBA, 1-time 2nd team All-NBA, 1-time NBA Champion (1958 Hawks) David Lee: 12 NBA seasons, 829 games, 11,232 points, 13.5 PPG, 2 seasons >20 PPG, 8.8 RPG, 4 seasons >10 RPG, 2-time All-Star, 1-time NBA champion (2015 Warriors) Spots 4 and 5 are open to debate. Beal already has a decent case and he's only 24. Tatum is too young to be anything more than an honorable mention, but certainly will crack the top 5 if he stays healthy. LaPhonso Ellis and Larry Hughes had nice NBA careers and may be top 5 for the time being.

Age 20 Tatum is flashing in the the NBA playoffs. Nobody knows what his ceiling is at this point. Certainly has a long way to go to be the best STL player ever, but he's clearly got it going on at the moment...

That is CRAZY talk. I'm not sure who the 6th best player was in the NBA this year, probably one of these guys Harden LeBron Steph Durant Anthony Davis Giannis You're not going to seriously argue Easy Ed is better than any of them, are you? Tatum has helped carry an injury plagued team to a 2-0 lead in the the Eastern Conference semi-finals at age 20. It's entirely plausible in a few years Tatum could be the best player on the NBA champs. If he accomplished that in this era and he's got it, regardless of how many All-NBA teams he makes.

People in the know (Drew Hanlen?) were indicating SLU had a very real shot. Remember in February 2013-14 (Tatum's soph year) SLU was ranked in the top 10 in the country and in March 2014 Duke got bounced from the NCAA first round for the 2nd time in 3 years. But then SLU finished 14 out of 14 in the A10 in 2014-15 while Duke won the NCAA tournament...and that was that

Well that's a far cry from the narrative that Rick's players could coach themselves and that anyone could have duplicated the success under Crews. I get that Crews turned out to be terrible and many were concerned at the time, but they'd won 16 of 17 (the 1 loss being at Xavier in OT) heading into the Oregon game...when was May supposed to break the news to Crews that he was out after the year? and why the need to rewrite history that Crews didn't do an exceptional job coaching Rick's players? Also, does anyone have any more detail on the NCAA gameday regimen that may have contributed to the atrocious 3pt shooting that doomed their round of 32 performances in 2013 and 2014? That was a pretty big allegation that was thrown out there that multiple people seem hip to but no specifics...