Arguments about state superiority in the NBA are common. There are still west coast versus east coast fights with Chicago or the whole state of Illinois sneaking in. Sometimes there are articles on how many NBA players hail from each state, but they can lack detail or context: California has the population of a fairly large-sized nation by itself, so it naturally produces many athletes. And a state that has three bench warmers does not compare to one with a superstar.
How do we adjust for those? Let’s measure the states by how many NBA player minutes they produce. For example, Texas nets 2498 minutes from LaMarcus Aldridge in 2014. Then we convert these numbers into per million residents values so we can fairly compare California and, say, Alabama. Finally, I use population estimates from 1986 — it’s roughly when the average player was born — because I’m working with birthplace stats here. A few million people born in California since the year 2000 has no relation to how many adult athletes a state has created.
A complete table is provided below with the stats for every state. Note this only uses minutes from 2014. California supplies a sixth of the NBA talent, but that’s largely due to population. Note that with a single season per capita values are easily influenced with small states. Alaska, for example, only has one player, Marion Chalmers, and rates as one of the best. That doesn’t even count Carlos Boozer, who grew up there, because he was born in Germany on a military base. (This is what the “military” row means in the table.) But the winner by far is the District of Columbia with a rate nearly 6 times the average. The reigning MVP Durant and his 3000 plus minutes trace their origins to D.C., and with a population near half a million he has a great effect. However, it’s not just him: D.C. has five other players. It’s a basketball powerhouse.
| State | Total minutes | % of NBA Minutes | Per Million Residents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | 7481 | 1.3 | 1874 |
| Alaska | 2178 | 0.4 | 4002 |
| Arizona | 1736 | 0.3 | 525 |
| Arkansas | 8054 | 1.4 | 3454 |
| California | 73575 | 12.4 | 2715 |
| Colorado | 1139 | 0.2 | 352 |
| Connecticut | 2653 | 0.4 | 823 |
| Delaware | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| DC | 7335 | 1.2 | 11492 |
| Florida | 21248 | 3.6 | 1821 |
| Georgia | 19429 | 3.3 | 3193 |
| Hawaii | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Idaho | 1141 | 0.2 | 1152 |
| Illinois | 22429 | 3.8 | 1970 |
| Indiana | 26576 | 4.5 | 4873 |
| Iowa | 5673 | 1.0 | 2032 |
| Kansas | 161 | 0.0 | 66 |
| Kentucky | 3218 | 0.5 | 873 |
| Louisiana | 20447 | 3.4 | 4640 |
| Maine | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Maryland | 17566 | 3.0 | 3915 |
| Massachusetts | 3375 | 0.6 | 572 |
| Michigan | 10485 | 1.8 | 1149 |
| Minnesota | 5654 | 1.0 | 1345 |
| Mississippi | 8731 | 1.5 | 3366 |
| Missouri | 10404 | 1.7 | 2071 |
| Montana | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Nebraska | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Nevada | 1193 | 0.2 | 1217 |
| New Hampshire | 690 | 0.1 | 673 |
| New Jersey | 16768 | 2.8 | 2200 |
| New Mexico | 449 | 0.1 | 307 |
| New York | 27163 | 4.6 | 1523 |
| North Carolina | 13290 | 2.2 | 2102 |
| North Dakota | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Ohio | 19236 | 3.2 | 1793 |
| Oklahoma | 3918 | 0.7 | 1205 |
| Oregon | 6734 | 1.1 | 2509 |
| Pennsylvania | 20349 | 3.4 | 1727 |
| Rhode Island | 33 | 0.0 | 34 |
| South Carolina | 10255 | 1.7 | 3068 |
| South Dakota | 1707 | 0.3 | 2452 |
| Tennessee | 8356 | 1.4 | 1763 |
| Texas | 34651 | 5.8 | 2092 |
| Utah | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Vermont | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
| Virginia | 5545 | 0.9 | 954 |
| Washington | 19679 | 3.3 | 4420 |
| West Virginia | 3405 | 0.6 | 1809 |
| Wisconsin | 5583 | 0.9 | 1174 |
| Wyoming | 956 | 0.2 | 1929 |
| Military | 4945 | 0.8 | NA |
It’s easier to digest the results visually. The map below shows player minutes per million residents translated into a shade of red. Patterns are more apparent this way. The south produces a lot of basketball player, specifically Louisiana; the Rockies and New England are wastelands. Indiana has the highest rate for the 50 states, and it sticks out in the Midwest even next to basketball rich Illinois.
The northeast is pretty crowded, so I made a separate map for them. The entire Maryland-D.C. region is strong. They have a strong argument over historic New York City for basketball dominance, based on per capita stats.
Of course, there are other ways of visualizing where players come from. This will lead to future posts looking at countries and then high schools, as that is crucial in basketball development. But for now, the D.C. area reigns supreme.
