Rankings
Website: South Carolina Natives are Some of the Most Likely to Become Professional Athletes
Casinos.com looked into the birthplace of every athlete across the four major sporting leagues in America and compared it to the current birthrates in every state in order to reveal the odds of a child becoming a sports star in every US State. Their results showed that South Carolina ranks as the state with the eighth-highest chance of becoming a sports star with an average of 2.52 athletes per male births across the four major leagues.
The following table ranks the top 10 US states where your child is most likely to become a sports star in order of athletes per 1,000 male births:
State | Male Births | Number of NFL Players | Number of NBA Players | Number of MLB Players | Number of NHL Players | Total | Athletes per 1,000 male births |
Louisiana | 28,719 | 90 | 13 | 11 | 0 | 114 | 3.97 |
Alabama | 29,027 | 82 | 9 | 20 | 1 | 112 | 3.86 |
Georgia | 62,037 | 162 | 24 | 51 | 0 | 237 | 3.82 |
Mississippi | 17,578 | 49 | 6 | 10 | 1 | 66 | 3.75 |
Florida | 108,130 | 218 | 22 | 114 | 8 | 362 | 3.35 |
Minnesota | 32,213 | 29 | 11 | 11 | 52 | 103 | 3.20 |
Delaware | 5,241 | 6 | 4 | 4 | 0 | 14 | 2.67 |
South Carolina | 28,593 | 46 | 9 | 15 | 2 | 72 | 2.52 |
California | 210,304 | 222 | 59 | 236 | 11 | 528 | 2.51 |
Michigan | 52,490 | 62 | 18 | 17 | 34 | 131 | 2.50 |
Even without a single NHL player from the state, Louisiana top the ranking with close to 4 athletes per 1,000 male births, mainly thanks to their disproportionate representation in the NFL with 90 players in the league hailing from the Pelican State.
Alabama and Georgia children complete the podium of most likely to become a sports star with them both having a rate of athletes per 1,000 male births of 3.86 and 3.82, respectively. California, who have the highest total amount of athletes across all four leagues at 528, rank 9th place overall due to their relatively high birth rate.
The following table ranks the 10 US states in which a child is least likely to become a sports star:
State | Male Births | Number of NFL Players | Number of NBA Players | Number of MLB Players | Number of NHL Players | Total | Athletes per 1,000 male births |
Vermont | 2,692 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 |
West Virginia | 8,599 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 4 | 0.47 |
Idaho | 11,214 | 5 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 7 | 0.62 |
Alaska | 4,684 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 0.64 |
Montana | 5,616 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 0.71 |
New Mexico | 10,696 | 3 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 8 | 0.75 |
Maine | 6,003 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 5 | 0.83 |
New Hampshire | 6,313 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 6 | 0.95 |
Rhode Island | 5,232 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 0.96 |
North Dakota | 5,056 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 6 | 1.19 |
When it comes to the states where your child is the least likely to become a sports star, Vermont stands alone as the only state in the US to not have a single athlete across any of the four major sports leagues. West Virginia comes in second place with just 4 sports stars currently playing in the NFL and MLB, and Idaho places third with just 0.62 athletes per 1,000 male births.
You can read the full article here.