Blazers trail in fan-player relationship.

Byline: JEFF WRIGHT The Register-Guard

On-court temper tantrums. Off-court criminal records. Out-of-touch ownership. What else could go wrong for the Portland Trail Blazers?

How 'bout being dead last in the standings?

No, not the NBA standings. We're talking ESPN Magazine's Ultimate Standings, which rank the Blazers last in fan-player relations.

And not just among the National Basketball Association's 29 teams, mind you. We're talking last among the nation's 121 professional franchises in basketball, baseball, football and hockey.

OK, overall, the Portland hooligans ... er, hoopsters ... placed 110th in the magazine's first-ever Ultimate Standings poll. The survey uses eight criteria to measure "which teams do right by their fans and which put the hurt on their loyal followers."

While the 110th ranking places the Blazers slightly ahead of hockey's Atlanta Thrashers, baseball's Tampa Bay Devil Rays and football's Cincinnati Bengals, it's far behind rival city Seattle's Mariners (36th), SuperSonics (55th) and Seahawks (78th). And waaay behind the nation's No. 1 fan-focused team, the Green Bay Packers.

It would be easy to dismiss the Blazers' lowly ranking as just more media bashing from back East - except that much of the survey's research was conducted by three University of Oregon MBA students enrolled in the Warsaw Sports Marketing Center.

Guided by professor Dennis Howard, the students - Adam Antoniewicz, Doug Williams and Hyun Joong Yoon - spent weeks researching season-ticket prices, not to mention the cost of hot dogs, beer, souvenir caps, team programs and stadium parking, at all 121 franchises.

Their numbers-crunching figured in the standings' Bang-for-the-Buck category, which measures out-of-pocket fan costs divided by the number of team wins over the past three years. The playoff-experienced Blazers actually showed pretty good bang, ranking 33rd in that category.

But the Blazers fared poorly in the Affordability, Coaching, Stadium Ambiance, Number of Championships and Ownership categories, and stunk up the joint with last-place finishes in Fan Relations ("ease of access to players, coaches and management") and Players ("effort on the field; likability off it").

On the bright side, ESPN Magazine said, Blazer fans "get to pay about three bucks above the league average for the pleasure of watching this expensive ($105 million) reservoir of talent go to waste."

Via the Internet, ESPN says it asked 34,000 fans - close to 300 per team - to grade their favorite franchises. Howard, the UO professor, said it's hard to know how valid the survey really is, given the level of fan subjectivity.

One lesson the standings seem to show is that winning isn't everything. The Seattle Mariners' biggest draw, for example, isn't any one star pitcher or slugger. According to surveyed fans, it's Safeco Field - a baseball stadium with more concession stands per fan than any in the country.

The price of admission is also important: The anonymous Ottawa Senators, for example, scored one place higher than the storied New York Yankees - in large part because of low ticket prices.

(Unfortunately, that may help explain why the Senators - a hockey team, by the way - recently declared bankruptcy.)

Another crucial factor is how fans view team owners.

"You've got the Mark Cubans of the world, who respond to fans' e-mails and seem as much a fan as the fans," said Howard, referring to the Dallas Mavericks' owner. "And then you've got (Trail Blazers owner) Paul Allen, who's very aloof. Fans have no sense of who he is or how much he cares about the team."

The Ultimate Standings also show that fans clearly care about player deportment, Howard said.

"In the '70s, '80s and '90s, the fans had a true love affair with the Blazers," he said. "I won't say this love has turned into a complete divorce, but people are very troubled. Part of the reason is, they care so much. The emotional investment is just amazing."

A Trail Blazers spokeswoman said Thursday that the team doesn't comment on surveys and polls.

ULTIMATE STANDINGS

ESPN Magazine, with help from UO sports marketing students, ranked 118 professional sports franchises on fan value. The Cincinnati Bengals finished last overall.

Top 5 rankings and where West Coast teams finished:

1. Green Bay Packers

2. Arizona Diamondbacks

3. San Antonio Spurs 

4. Sacramento Kings

5. Dallas Mavericks

10. Anaheim Angels

11. Oakland Athletics

30. Vancouver Canucks

31. San Francisco 49ers 

33. Oakland Raiders

36. Seattle Mariners

37. Los Angeles Lakers

45. Los Angeles Kings 

46. San Jose Sharks 

51. San Francisco Giants 

55. Seattle Supersonics

56. Los Angeles Dodgers 

59. San Diego Padres

75. Anaheim Mighty Ducks

78. Seattle Seahawks

80. San Diego Chargers 

103. Golden State Warriors 

105. Los Angeles Clippers

110. Portland Trail Blazers

More information:

espn.go.com/magazine/

Note: Three expansion teams not ranked in "Bang for Buck" category or total ranking

CAPTION(S):

Portland's Blazers, including Rasheed Wallace, ranked last. Associated Press The small-town Green Bay Packers were rated as pro sports' most fan-friendly team.