Jets Nation
Is there a state with more well-known professional sports franchises than New York?
The answer is debatable.
Both Texas and California will come up in the discussion. Rightfully so, too. Yet, the Empire State has one thing going for it that the other two don’t: Legalized sports betting. Not only can many of New York’s franchises strike more lucrative partnerships with some of the best betting websites for sports, but the sheer allowance of sports gambling drives heightened interest in teams. And with that interest comes more money. Lots of it.
So it comes as little surprise that in Forbes’ most recent rankings of the most valuable franchises in all of pro sports, four of the top-10 finishers call the New York market their home.
Overall Top-10 Rank: No. 4
Franchise Valuation: $7.55 billion
Don’t stop us if you have heard a lot about this franchise before. We know you have. The New York Yankees are perhaps the most storied organization in all of professional sports. Though the Dallas Cowboys ($10.1 million valuation) are more commonly referred to as America’s team, the Yankees’ history dates back further, and they play in the league (MLB) of the sport that’s considered America’s pastime (baseball).
Clubs with rich histories always get a financial bump. True to that, the Yankees’ 27 World Series titles do a lot of the heavy lifting here. Across all four major sports leagues—MLB, NBA, NHL, NFL—no other squad comes close to touching that kind of success. The Montreal Canadiens of the NHL have 24 championships, and loom as New York’s biggest threat. After that, you’re looking at the NBA’s Boston Celtics (with 18) and Los Angeles Lakers (with 17).
Granted, it helps the Yankees’ case that they’re hyper-relevant today. They have won at least 90 games in six of the past eight seasons, and are on pace to eclipse that threshold again for the 2025 schedule.
Overall Top-10 Rank: No. 5
Franchise Valuation: $7.50 billion
Finishing inside the top-five valuations across all sports leagues is a wild accomplishment for the New York Knicks. Indeed, they are a flagship team for the NBA. But they do not have nearly the same historical cachet as the aforementioned Yankees, or as NBA rivals like the Celtics and Lakers.
Still, the New York City market remains virtually undefeated. It also helps that the Knicks are no longer schlepping through their era of futility. They have acted like a properly run organization, for the most part, over the past half-decade or so, rather than one run by the nepo-baby billionaire buffoon that is James Dolan.
Moreover, the Orange and Blue are definitely getting a valuation bump from two recent NBA team sales. The Celtics sold this past March at a valuation of $6.1 billion. What’s more, the Buss family agreed in June to sell the Lakers at a...
