Top Five Major League Underdog Towns, No. 3 (Tie) New Orleans and Green Bay

This is the third in a series of articles about the greatest underdog venues in U.S. pro sports. The criteria is simple: small-market towns, communities that get no respect, that personify the under-rated, that constantly challenge the giants of the world, and/or that have suffered some terrible devastation but are rebuilding.

Big Easy and Big Cheese. Frozen Tundra and Sultry Bayou. Lutheran Wisconsin and Catholic Louisiana. Lots of contrasts.

So why are these two towns tied in our rankings? In very separate but equal ways, they both compete in major league sports with significant obstacles.

Could they be combined differently? Of course. We could have combined Green Bay with Milwaukee and New Orleans with Oklahoma City, but after considering intangibles that influence ranking, it seemed that these two teams deserve to share the No. 3 spot for some different and some similar reasons.

Since we referenced New Orleans extensively in the Oklahoma City article, we'll start with them. This city meets most of our underdog criteria.

As a community, they have lost significant population recently. They are a popular tourist destination yet have a staggering amount of poverty and blight in certain neighborhoods and did even before Katrina.

And of course, there's Katrina. Had the Big Easy not qualified as an underdog by any other measure, the effects of Katrina would qualify them at least for a generation.

But there is more, much more. Despite being among the larger metro areas in the United States, New Orleans was slow to receive a major league franchise. Eventually they obtained the Saints and shortly after, the Jazz. 

Then they lost the Jazz. Despite the primacy of football in the region, the Jazz had a loyal following. It was a real blow to the city.

Recently they obtained the Hornets from Charlotte, but timing has impeded the city's ability to fully adopt their new team, not least because the Hornets played in Oklahoma City for two years after the Hurricane.

But then, there's the Saints, known for a few painful seasons as the "Aints." If you're over 40, you remember the thousands of fans in the Superdome wearing paper grocery bags over their heads with holes cut out for the eyes.

The New Orleans Saints have existed for 41 seasons and have yet to make a Super Bowl appearance. They have made only six playoff appearances in that time, winning only two.

Such a record of frustration and futility over such a long span would qualify New Orleans as an underdog town for at least a generation, even if they began to regularly make the playoffs and win more playoff games.

And still, each year the team is competitive in many games, pulls its share of upsets, and the fans remain loyal, with or without grocery bags.

The argument for Green Bay is much shorter. Obviously at first glance, one might question the inclusion of Green Bay on such a list.

But despite winning three Super Bowls in the 40-plus years that Super Bowls have existed, and a few NFL Championships in the pre-Super Bowl era, the Packers have had long droughts in which they have not challenged for a title or a playoff spot and therefore, while they are legendary, they are not dominant.

The real argument,  however, comes simply from their size. The city of Green Bay has a population near 100,000. The Metro Area, with 228,000 is by far the smallest market in the NFL.

The next smallest would be Jacksonville and Buffalo each with 1.1 million. Milwaukee is often counted as part of Green Bay's market, but since games are no longer played in Milwaukee and that Milwaukee is a three-hour drive, we aren't counting it.

Essentially, Green Bay is the last link to the early makeup of the NFL as a semi-pro league made up of industrial teams with corporate or occupational ties, such as the Decatur Staleys.

The fact that this franchise survived intact when all the other franchises in towns of similar demographics such as Muncie, Evansville, Canton, Dayton, Rock Island, Racine, Kenosha, Pottsville, and more either folded or moved to larger cities.

The fact that this one franchise survives, and with its original industrial name, and is competitive, at times bragging the best player in the game (Favre, most recently) is a David killing Goliath act in perpetuity.

And here is the similarity, the link, between these two towns. The Green Bay franchise survives despite all odds. The City of New Orleans survives despite all odds.

The City of Green Bay knows how to win because of a team that should never be. Perhaps the Saints and Bobcats will learn to win one day, because of a city that should never be.