 |
With little room to grow, Charlotte’s minor league ballpark is an unlikely option for an MLB team.
Photo by: GETTY IMAGES
|
CHARLOTTE
|
|
|
|
Income profile (annual):
|
■ Household median: $54,836
|
■ Household, 60th percentile: $69,257
|
■ Household, 80th percentile: $111,095
|
■ Median, family of four: $80,232
|
■ Discretionary, family of four (rank): $14,740 (44th)
|
■ MSA population (rank): 2.43 million (22nd)
■ Since 2010: +9 percent
■ Major pro teams: Panthers, Hornets
■ Nearest teams: NHL: Carolina Hurricanes (166 miles); MLB: Atlanta Braves (244 miles); MLS: Atlanta United FC expansion franchise in 2017 (244 miles)
■ TV teams: Hurricanes, Braves, Washington Nationals, Baltimore Orioles, Cincinnati Reds
■ TV households (rank): 1.17 million (22nd)
■ Metro GDP (rank): $152.4 billion (22nd)
■ Fortune 1000 HQs (rank): 12 (23rd)
■ Employment profile: A banking town that’s trying to repackage itself as something more has 1.11 million jobs, over-indexing by almost 30 percent in two sectors: business and financial operations (29 percent higher concentration than elsewhere) and computers and math (27 percent more).
■ Places to play: A downtown ballpark that opened in 2014 has topped minor league baseball in average attendance in each of its first three seasons. With a capacity of 10,200 and little space in its footprint to expand, it’s an unlikely option for a big league club. There hasn’t been substantive discussion of other possibilities — yet — but in the last decade the city built an arena to recapture its NBA slot, erected a minor league park near the center of its downtown district and put $75 million of public money into stadium renovations for the Panthers. So don’t rule out movement if the opportunity arises in baseball or MLS. An old football stadium at the edge of downtown could yield the right footprint for an MLS project.
— Bill King
Appraisal
|
Charlotte has been an on-again, off-again market since landing its first major pro team in 1988 — way on, then way off, and now mostly on for the NBA; on more than off for the NFL; and out-of-nowhere on for downtown minor league baseball.
As in many Sun Belt markets, there are cultural questions to answer. But the metrics of the market are sound — almost identical to Portland, but with the added benefit of nearly twice as many Fortune 1000 headquarters.
Charlotte has a higher GDP than three-team markets Tampa Bay, Pittsburgh, Kansas City and Cleveland. It’s just shy of the 2.6 million
|
median MSA of three-team markets, but with 9 percent growth in the last five years it’s on target to get there soon. Its dozen Fortune 1000 headquarters are only one short of the median. It’s way short on TV households but gets there with the logical addition of Raleigh-Durham, which doubles its size.
Charlotte has been on MLB’s radar for a decade, thanks in part to its position as headquarters to Bank of America, a longtime MLB sponsor that also has sponsorship and banking ties to many teams. An MLS franchise could make sense for the Carolinas but might fit better in Raleigh-Durham, where there is less pro sports competition and a well-established youth soccer community.
|
