ESPN SportsNation Maps.

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The SEC is horribly overrated, especially Alabama

Your grasp of college football is apparently just as strong as your grasp of history.

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This is interesting.  Maps of NFL fandom generated by Facebook mapping which teams got the most "likes" in every county in the USA:

https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-data-science/nfl-fans-on-facebook/10151298370823859



And most common friends:

Was totally going to post this.  Awesome map, and more up-to-date than the old stuff at http://www.commoncensus.org/.

Now let's all join together and laugh at the New York Jets, and their one measly piddling little county.  (I wonder whether Nassau is larger or smaller than the Jaguars' area here, it has to be close.)

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Also, the fact that Southside Virginia is Dallas Cowboys country really frightens me.  All the Steelers territory in the Carolinas is a little confusing, too.  I know they have a national following, but I'd expect the Panthers to extend a little further.  Really, the restrained circles of Redskins and Panthers fans in VA/NC/SC is the only part of the map that has me confused.

The Raiders having the largest LA following is unsurprising, of course.

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My team wins a single county.

Apparently the Tim Tebow signing was just as successful off the field as it was on the field!

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Now let's all join together and laugh at the New York Jets, and their one measly piddling little county.  (I wonder whether Nassau is larger or smaller than the Jaguars' area here, it has to be close.)

At least the Jets can win a county within their own metro. lol raiders.

Yeah, they really should just move back to Los Angeles.  I wouldn't be that surprised if they do, in fact.

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Being a Jets and Mets fan is not about being popular or happy. It takes a special person to continually get kicked in the nuts and keep coming back for more. However, there is something to be said for loyalty and it does generate some excellent gallows and black humor. And for me this is part of the allure of being a fan. These teams are always finding new ways to disappoint and test your patience.  Out of my office window I can see Citi Field in the distance.  I can't wait for some mediocre to awful baseball.  

Mets fans are the best in any sport.  It's not close, either.

Y'know, if I was pressed I'd have to say that the best fans in American sport are Seahawks fans.  Deeply passionate, loyal through lots of lean years, but also generally intelligent and respectful.  And completely ignored, because Seattle is far away, so they don't get excessively romanticized like Browns or (sorry) Mets fans.

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I love the Packer county in the Florida Panhandle, lol

Not as funny as the inexplicable Steelers domination of Hawaii and South Carolina.

Hawaii is explicable- they're so far away from everything that it makes sense they'll just root for the team with the most "national" follwing, and that's between the Steelers and Cowboys.  South Carolina is much more surprising.

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Wow. The Houston Texans are like the LA Clippers of the NFL when it comes to fanbases.

Hey, at least they have Harris County and the Houston metro, which isn't that bad when you consider they're only ten years old and Dallas has such a national following. 

The real LA Clippers of the NFL are, of course, the Jets.

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The border between the Giants and Bills is reminiscent of the 2010 gubernatorial election.

I'm actually a little surprised that Syracuse and Ithaca are Giants country.  Albany makes sense, since they have training camp stuff up there and Albany is closer to NYC, but once you get into Syracuse I'd have thought that Buffalo would be trying to increase their reach into more of Upstate beyond just Buffalo and Rochester.  Western NY is a pretty small area to build an NFL fanbase on.

Of course, success breeds followers, and one of these teams has had a much better past 15 years.  Maybe if the Bills were really good and the Giants weren't, that would push the line east.  Or maybe it wouldn't- I know that the Cubs and Rangers have many, many more followers despite the White Sox and Devils having more success as of late.

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I'm actually a little surprised that Syracuse and Ithaca are Giants country. 

Ithaca is filled with college students from the NYC metro area.

Mm, true.  I guess Syracuse University might have a similar effect, though it ought to be diluted by virtue of Syracuse being significantly larger.

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Neat - surprised there aren't more KC fans in Nebraska.

They sure shove the Chiefs down our throats.  Even when there are important AFC games, we still get meaningless Chiefs games in week 16.  It's quite frustrating.

But I rarely see Chiefs gear.  You see the teams you always see, Cowgirls, Fudgepackers, Stillers, Cheatriots.

I would imagine the most popular football team in Nebaska is the Huskers.

Also, the full fan friends chart is now here:

http://vizwiz.blogspot.com/2013/02/just-in-time-for-super-bowl-who-should.html

Twenty-two teams have the Jaguars as dead last.  Twenty-two!

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First there needs to be a team in LA.

That's true. But so far Goddell is very reluctant to do so, in addiction to the current LA politics that doesn't give a damn about football.

Very likely under Goddell's leadership a medium sized city like San Antonio, Portland, and Salt Lake City are more likely going to have a team before LA.

The NFL needs to do exactly two things: the Los Angeles Raiders, and the San Antonio Jaguars. 

The Toronto Bills would be nice except that it would kill the CFL and that wouldn't really be sporting.  So they can stay in Buffalo and try and win the hearts of Ontario from across Niagara Falls, and if they really want to move to SLC or Portland or Virginia Beach someday then I guess that wouldn't be the end of the world.

(The Saints play in a metro area that's just about as small as Buffalo, but they have a much stronger regional draw, for many good reasons.  So they're fine in NO.)

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Oakland's fanbase is pretty hardcore.  I wouldn't move them. 

Jacksonville should move to LA.  Expand the league by a couple of teams when you want to head into San Antonio. 

Their fanbase may be hardcore, but it's actually really small from having to share the metro with the 49ers, and the Coliseum is actually a dump (unlike many of the stadiums that are perfectly usable but their owners want replacing), and Oakland does at least have history in LA.

I guess the Rams could always move back, too.  St. Louis is unique in how much more they care about baseball.  The only other city where people care more about MLB these days is, well, New York, and we're too large for that to be any sort of problem.  But it is a problem for the Rams.

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The CFL's rules are sufficiently different that I'm not sure it would work to make it a formal developmental league.  Though, of course, they're sufficiently similar that it's possible for individual players to switch.

And, of course the NCAA functions as a de facto minor league as well.  But I'd rather see an honest, non-exploitative minor league system than the farce that is FBS.

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Come on Harry. The CFL is the only all-Canadian professional sports league. Please, just give us at least that?

It depends on what the meaning of the word "is" is.

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Which team should be ranked No. 2 behind Florida State?

Choices are "Undefeated Ohio State" (53%) and "One-loss Auburn" (47%). No points for guessing which color is which.

why is the West pro-OH St?

Because f[inks] the SEC, that's why.  

What I want to know is what's up with VT and DE?  Why are they so wrong?  (Also, good on ya West Virginia.  Glad to see there's some sanity left.)

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Let me get this straight... the states that are hosting the Super Bowl want a blizzard?

Hell yes we want a blizzard!  Playoff football is meant to be played in inclement weather and it's a travesty that the Super Bowl has been insulated from that until now.