I hate the Atlanta Falcons (football), Atlanta Hawks (basketball), and the Atlanta Braves (baseball).
I also hate the Tennessee Titans (Nashville football), the Memphis Grizzlies (basketball), New Orleans Saints and Hornets (football and basketball).
When I was a child my father took me to Rickwood Field to see the Birmingham Baron’s play baseball.
We played teams like the Atlanta Crackers, Memphis Chicks, Nashville Vols, and the New Orleans Pelicans.
We played in the Southern League.
Today Birmingham still plays in the Southern league but is the only one of the above cities who doesn’t have a major league sports franchise.
Atlanta, Memphis, Nashville, and New Orleans were our peer cities.
Today the Barons play teams from Chattanooga, Huntsville, Jackson, Pearl Mississippi, Mobile, Montgomery, Pensacola, and Knoxville.
These are now our peer cities.
It hurts to see how Birmingham has fallen and it’s painful to support major league sports in competing cities.
When Atlanta tries to convince us the Falcans or Braves are our teams, it makes me ill.
I mentioned this to a friend and he said, “It makes no sense for Birmingham to have a major league sports team–our market is too small.” Well, that’s the whole point. Why is our market so small while these other cities have grown past us?
I’m not much of a sports fan, but this is not about sports.
This is about a Birmingham metro crippled because of our dysfunctional government structure.
I love we are building Regions Ball Park downtown. It will be great for our city.
One day, however, I hope we have bigger dreams.
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David Sher is a partner in Buzz12 Marketing and co-CEO of AmSher Receivables Management. He’s past Chairman of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce (BBA), Operation New Birmingham (ONB), and the City Action Partnership (CAP).
*Rather than belabor the point of who our peer cities may be at this juncture in history, why not “prolabor” the challenge to be corporately aligned as a region and build it. The building blocks are evident, let’s continue to construct together.
*Don’t hate Atlanta. Strive to make B’ham a better place, but relish the fact that we have a world class city two hours down the road. I believe that the constant refrain of “We don’t want to be another Atlanta” is the mindset behind B’ham remaining what it is. The best thing that could happen to B’ham might be a high speed train to Atlanta (although good leadership or regional cooperation would be nice, as well).
Kevin, I really don’t hate Atlanta or Atlanta sports. As you can tell, I’m trying to make the point that Birmingham could be much more than what it is. People always talk about lack of leadership in Birmingham. But that’s not the problem. There are too many government entities with on one with the authority or scope of responsibility to do anything. The City of B’ham comprises just 19% of the population of our metro area; Jefferson County has 37 municipalities; our State Legislature makes all major financial decisions for our County thanks to our outdated State Constitution. Until we fix our government structure, we will be stuck. Thanks for your comments. Please continue to do so.