[Joe Strummer]

Originally Posted by bedir than average

I guess what I'm getting at is there a minimum number of teams that would indicate an adequete spread?

In MLS case, it doesn't have the Pacific NorthWest and its more than 10 Million people who could care about watching it on TV at all. This is especially true, as it isn't a top level league in the world, and so without a tiny bit of local interest someon is just going to watch the Premiership instead. By also ignoring the South the league misses out on huge populations probably well over 60 Million.

For the NHL I'm only referring to it as it exists in the USA, and not Candada as I dont' know enough about Canadian demographics to have a chat about that.

United States Population Map, USA Population Map, Population Density Map of United States, Population Map of USA, Population of Metropolitian Areas of USA

That link has a great map to visualize the population situation of the USA.

If you take all the markets over 2.5M add in Denver so the Mountain states get something that would be 19 markets.
Comparing the top leagues by team sport - MLS is only in 7 of those markets, the NHL is in 13, the NBA is in 15, the NFL is in 17, and MLB is in all of them.

The MLS tried it down south before, both of those teams failed really fast. The MLS knows to go in places were there is support, like the south west were there are many Hispanic people that are soccer crazy. Georgia for example doesn't really have any soccer background. Maybe back in the 1970's they had a NASL teams for a year but that might be it.