Ranking the NBA home crowds

The Warriors are known for having one of the more diverse, die-hard fan bases in the NBA. Think about how loud the arena can sound on TV during a Steph Curry or Klay Thompson heat check; imagine how hard it is for opposing players to communicate with teammates. Even though the Warriors have struggled a bit at home the past two seasons (they have only the 10th-best home record this year), the home-court advantage is still evident once the playoffs begin. It will be interesting to see how the team's move from the Oracle Arena in Oakland to the Chase Center in San Francisco next season will impact its home-court advantage, however, because many of the hardcore fans are likely going to be priced out of tickets or unable to make it across the bridge in time for games.

When you think of the fans at the Chesapeake Energy Center, one word that should immediately come to mind is loyalty — especially as it relates to Russell Westbrook. Westbrook is only one of the Westbrook-Kevin Durant-James Harden trio remaining, and the fans in Oklahoma City are protective of him despite his polarizing play and personality. The Thunder definitely benefit from being the only professional team in town and, in addition to having a sellout crowd every game, the Chesapeake Energy Center is known for being one of the loudest, if not the loudest, arenas in the NBA as well. 

Toronto fans have to be feeling pretty confident heading into the playoffs knowing that their team's boogeyman, LeBron James, won't be around to humiliate them this spring. Seriously, if it weren't for "LeBronto," the Raptors probably would have made the Finals two out of the past three seasons. While it won't be easy to make the Finals this season either, the Raptors' home-court advantage should help them at least get close, as they had the best home-court record in the league last season and the third-best this season. Toronto's fan base clearly takes pride in being the league's only Canadian team, which makes the Scotiabank Arena one of the most difficult places to play for visitors. 

If you've ever watched a Spurs home game, especially in the playoffs, you have undoubtedly heard their fans chanting, "Go, Spurs, go! Go, Spurs, go!" It might seem a little amateurish, but hey, it seems to work. To better understand the Spurs' home-court advantage, look no further than their home vs. road record and splits. This season the Spurs are 29-8 at home with a plus-7.1 net rating. On the road, they're an ugly 14-23 with a negative-4.0 net rating. Much like the Thunder in Oklahoma City, the Spurs benefit from being the only major professional team in San Antonio. Fans are loyal to a fault and have shown the ability to cheer their team through air conditioner "malfunctions" (Game 1 of 2014 NBA Finals) and numerous bat attacks as well.

When you think of Celtics fans, you think of tradition. Does the sports media have the tendency to overhype the impact of the Boston home crowd from time to time? Sure, but some of that has to do with the fact that a number of sports media personalities are die-hard Celtics fans. A lot of it also is because they are the winningest franchise in NBA history with 17 championships. Thus, while the national Celtics love can be a little overwhelming at times, their fans deserve credit for the loyalty and passion they bring to the game. At home this season, the Celtics have a 26-12 record and a plus-6.9 net rating. 

Did you know the Mavericks have had the top attendance in the league four of the past five seasons? That's pretty impressive, considering the team made the playoffs just twice during that same stretch of time. A lot of that has to do with the franchise's cornerstone, Dirk Nowitzki, being such a likable superstar. A lot of it has to do with Mark Cuban being a smart owner. A lot of it has to do with the city of Dallas having loyal and excitable fans. With a bright future built around young superstar talents Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis, Dallas' home crowd is now poised to reap the rewards of its loyalty for years to come. 

Despite losing its star player, Victor Oladipo, to a knee injury halfway through the year, the Pacers are still in line to be the four seed in the Eastern Conference. How are they accomplishing this? Well, they have excellent depth, they play great defense, they have good coaching and they dominate at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse. The Pacers are 28-9 at home this year with the third-best net rating (plus-9.1) in the league. Compare that to a 17-20 record with a minus-1.3 net rating on the road. After losing a hard-fought playoff series vs. the Cavaliers last season, the Pacers will need to take care of business at home, as they will again square off against a more talented, but flawed, opponent (likely the Boston Celtics). 

"Trust the Process." The 76ers fan base has adopted the mantra initiated by former general manager Sam Hinkie in 2013. The "Process" was a theory that the best way to build a contender was to give your team the most opportunities possible to draft superstar players, who are usually drafted in the first couple of picks. So from 2013 to 2017, the team tanked (lost on purpose), stripped its roster of good veteran players and took as many swings at drafting a superstar as it could. The Process has worked, as it yielded two young superstars in Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons. Thus, while Philadelphia fans didn't attend many games during the tanking seasons (can you blame them?), they've been one of the better home crowds in the league since Embiid and Simmons started playing. This season the Sixers are an impressive 29-9 at home with a plus-7.7 net rating and only 18-17 with a minus-1.7 net rating on the road. The fans at the Wells Fargo Center certainly know how to bring it now that they have a contender to root for.

Did you know that back in 2004 the Kings were actually the only team in the NBA with a perfect attendance  record? Me either. Although things went a little south on Sacramento over the next 15 years, Kings fans have, for the most part, always shown up to cheer on their team — they even had a top-three attendance record in 2017 and 2018 despite having one of the worst teams in the league. De'Aaron Fox and Co. finally began to reward their loyal fans by winning 23 home games so far this season. I'm guessing the Kings crowd is even higher on this list in the coming years. 

Milwaukee fans have a lot to be thankful for right now. They get to root for the team with the best record in the league. They get to root for the next face of the NBA in Giannis Antetokounmpo. And they get to root for Giannis and the Bucks in the brand-new Fiserv Forum. At the same time, the fans have done their part this season as they have the second-best attendance in the league ( up from 22nd last season), which clearly has a positive impact on the team's 30-6 record at home.  

Much like the team it roots for, the Blazers home crowd is solid at every component of fandom. Portlanders sell out games, they understand basketball, they're loyal to a fault (Bill Simmons used to refer to Blazers fans as the Portland "soccer moms" because of how protective they were of Blazers players any time he made fun of them) and they're loud. Damian Lillard and Co. are comfortable playing at home too, as they're currently 28-9 with a plus-7.8 net rating. The Blazers are probably the 10th- or 11th-best team in the NBA, and their home crowd is probably around the same.

Knicks fans have a reputation of being among the smartest and most passionate fans in the NBA. Superstars love to put on a show at Madison Square Garden. Unfortunately the Knicks have failed to put an exciting or enjoyable product on the court for most of the 21st century, leaving MSG's home crowd stuck with talking itself into young, overmatched prospects or rooting for a superstar on the visiting team to put on a great performance. It's a shame, but as you've probably heard, there's a chance Knicks fans get to root for Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and/or Zion Williamson next season. Therefore, the Knicks get a top-12 spot on this list based on reputation. We expect it to be higher if the product on the court improves. 

The Denver home crowd is difficult to place on this list because despite having a league-best 30 wins at home (and the second-best net rating), the Nuggets are in the bottom half of the NBA in attendance. Visiting teams going to Denver tend to be more concerned about playing in altitude than playing at the Pepsi Center. We'll give the Nuggets the benefit of the doubt here and assume that their attendance will to continue to improve because they finally have a young contender to root for after a number of uneventful lottery-bound seasons. 

The Cavaliers are also difficult to peg because it's hard to separate LeBron James from the Cavaliers fan base. When LeBron was on the team, the Cavs had one of the best home-court advantages in the NBA. Look no further than the must-win Games 3 and 6 of the 2016 NBA Finals. Those crowds were absolutely insane and helped the team immensely, especially at the start of those games. The crowds at the Q are still sellouts, but the impact of those crowds obviously isn't the same as when the team was competing for titles. If it's any consolation, Cleveland has one of the highest variances between home crowd and team performance this season. 

The Bulls have some of the best home crowds in the league...when they have a good team. Unfortunately, the team is in the midst of a multiyear tank, causing fan attendance to fade like an errant Zach LaVine jump shot. Until the past two seasons, the Bulls were right there with the Mavericks as having the best-attended home games in the league. Home games haven't been what they used to be for Chicago fans recently, as the team is actually worse at home than it is on the road (9-28 at home vs. 12-25 on the road). Yes, the Bulls are in a bit of a rut. However, that could all change this spring with a couple of lucky bounces...of the lottery ping pong balls, that is. 

While I wouldn't describe them as being "fair weather," Rockets fans' interest in the team seems to ebb and flow depending on how exciting the team is expected to be that season. The attendance rankings since the beginning of the James Harden era reflect this as well. Rockets fans are a little like the LeBron-Wade Miami Heat fans in that they might show up after the opening tip during regular-season games, but once the playoffs get rolling they can have a serious impact on the team's performance. 

Even though they're still the little brothers borrowing their big brother's arena in the City of Angels, the Clippers' home crowd finishes ahead of the Lakers' this season. Yes, their attendance is in the bottom third of the league (22nd), but they have four more home victories than the Lake Show and bring a different energy to games. The Lakers expected to be great and are bad, while the Clippers expected to be below-average and are good. Clippers fans probably enjoy this team more than any they've had before because the players play their asses off, they have entertaining players (like Lou Williams) and they are playing with house money this season. 

Although they have the reputation of being fair-weather fans, it's an unfair label to place on the Heat's home crowd. The Heat have been in the top five for attendance for basically this entire decade. Yes, the fans do tend to show up late to home games, but when Dwyane Wade is making plays during pivotal moments, AmericanAirlines Arena can get as loud as any. Heat fans get docked a bit for the team having a better road than home record this season though. 

Boooooo!!! That's what the Lakers fans have done a lot of this season. Despite landing the free agent in LeBron James in the offseason, the Lakers have had a disaster of a 2018-19 season, and their fans often let them know about it. Before James' injury, the Lakers were actually a pretty good team at home. Today, they're 19-17 with a negative net rating (-0.4) in front of the home crowd at the STAPLES Center. While the crowd is usually star-studded and enthusiastic, it's being penalized a bit for drinking too much of the Magic Johnson Kool-Aid and thinking the team would sign a bunch of veterans who couldn't shoot and waltz to the postseason. 

Based solely on the past attendance records (they haven't finished better than 15th in attendance this decade) and team performance at home (tied for 22nd in home wins), the Grizzlies belong near the bottom of this list. However, anyone who ever tuned in to a playoff game during the Grit-N-Grind era knows how energetic the crowd could get. Memphis' DJ would bump hip-hop instrumentals during game play and dead balls that would get so loud that you could hear it through your TV. I'm not sure there's a more intimidating scene than seeing Zach Randolph and Tony Allen nodding their heads to court-rumbling bass while you're trying to execute a late-game play. It'll be interesting to see if Jaren Jackson Jr. and the new-age Grizzlies will be able to draw that out of their fans the way the team did earlier this decade.

The Jazz's home crowd is probably a little lower on this list than it should be due to the recent event involving Russell Westbrook and an unruly fan. Part of the fallout from the controversy was that a number of current and former NBA players came out and said that this kind of behavior is commonplace at Jazz home games. Comments like that make it tough to put the Jazz in the top half of the league for these rankings despite the team being 23-12 with a plus-6.4 net rating. 

The Magic's home crowd knows how to bring it when the team is good. The tough part about that is that the team hasn't been good for the better part of this decade. When Dwight Howard was blocking every shot in sight and not ruining team chemistry, the Magic had one of the most consistent fan bases in the league. The team is actually playing pretty well at home this season (22-16) and could potentially reward its fans with a playoff appearance if it could just win a couple of games on the road down the stretch.

The Hornets hosted the All-Star Game, and it was emblematic of their fan base as a whole: solid effort but unmemorable results. Sometimes the Spectrum Center can get wild after a Kemba Walker highlight play, but ultimately people will forget whether the crowd was any good because everyone tends to go quiet after all of the close games the Hornets lose. Unfortunately for Hornets fans, they're probably in for more of the same for the next few years unless they stumble upon a hidden gem in the draft. 

It's tough to argue with numbers, and the numbers are not kind to the Pistons fans. Despite opening a new arena in 2017 (this one actually located in downtown Detroit instead of the suburbs), the Pistons have had the second-worst and worst attendance in the NBA the past two seasons. Last season was a little more understandable, but this season the team is actually playing pretty well and has a legitimate All-NBA player on its roster in Blake Griffin. Any time you have an All-NBA player and still cannot get people to come to your games, it's a really bad sign. 

The Brooklyn home crowd has a bit of an identity problem. As any team that moves to a city with another NBA team nearby quickly discovers, it's tough to develop a strong fan base for a while, especially when the first couple of seasons are spent rebuilding from the pits of hell like the Nets did. As a result, even though Brooklyn is one of the more entertaining teams in the league this season, it ranks 26th in attendance. Further, the Nets are the 11th-best road team compared to being the 21st-ranked home team. The good news for the Nets is that they're back on the right track, and if they continue to develop they'll have plenty of fans in no time. 

I really feel bad for anyone who identifies as a Wizards fan right now. First, the John Wall-Bradley Beal backcourt topped out as a second-round playoff team. Then, Wall got an extension, got out of shape, got injured and quickly became the worst contract in the NBA. Now, they have to root for a Beal-led team with a ceiling as a fringe playoff team. The future is dark in the District. That still doesn't excuse the fans for perpetually ranking in the mid- to late-20s in attendance each year. 

The Hawks are notorious for having attendance problems and a weak fan base. There are numerous theories as to why fans don't go to games — ticket prices, too many transplants, demographics, etc. — but it's been a problem for years and remains one today. It's a shame because Atlanta has had some entertaining teams over the past decade and appears on the verge of really turning the franchise around with the help of "Ice Trae" Young and John Collins. Maybe those two, with the help of Migos (who coined the "Ice Trae" nickname), can help garner some local interest in the team over the next few years. 

Let me tell you, from personal experience, the Smoothie King Arena fan atmosphere is nothing to call home about. New Orleans is many things — a cultural melting pot, a 24/7 party, a football town. It sure as hell isn't a basketball town though. I randomly found myself at a Pelicans game on a weekend in December a couple of months ago, and it had the feel of a college basketball game over winter break (only with more lights, fire and video promos). This was before Anthony Davis demanded a trade. This was when the Pelicans were an intriguing mix of talented players trying to get in sync after a great playoff run the season before, and the crowd was a complete nonfactor. Can we please send the Pelicans to Seattle?

Another random NBA arena I've had the pleasure of watching a game at is Talking Stick Resort Arena. While the franchise definitely tries to put on a fun event, the product on the court is often pretty rough, which leads to very few fans most nights. With NFL and NHL teams in the same city, the Suns become a bit of an afterthought for fans if the team isn't winning. You might not blame them, but that has to hurt the home crowd ranking. 

Perhaps it's the weather, but Timberwolves fans seem to put in about as much effort as Andrew Wiggins puts into his game every offseason. Here's a mind-boggling stat: The Wolves have finished in the top 15 in attendance only one time since the Kevin Garnett era (which ended in 2007). That's pathetic. The funny thing is that the Wolves are actually a decent team at home this year, currently at 23-11 with a plus-4.4 net rating. Go watch Karl-Anthony Towns, people!