JonnJonzz, I've heard those excuses before, and while I'll agree with #1 and #2 to a small degree (I don't think Charlotte is a small market when you factor in the population within an hour's drive), I think there are more complex things that need to be factored in:
1 -- The city residents resenting the building of Bobcats Arena. The voters voted against it and they were circumvented and it was built anyhow. Many people still resent that.
2 -- The NBA as a whole is down. The level of play is down and many find it unappealing to watch.
3 -- Very poor marketing. Bad log, bad team name.
Initially, the game experience was geared towards african americans. They've since changed that and made it more widely universal, but many non-african americans were turned off by the presentation and game experience.
4 -- The horrendous decision to sign with Time Warner and Time Warner ONLY. Most any sports fan in the Carolinas has some sort of Satellite system.
5 -- Poor choice of coaches. Bickerstaff and to a greater degree Vincent are poor NBA coaches that didn't and don't utilize their talent effectively.
6 -- Since the team's inception, they've had a near 80% turnover in staff in the front office. They've completely changed the basketball operations side, marketing side and ticket sales side as well and there were some former employees that were threatening to sue them about a year ago.
How can they fix it? Change the uniform design (coming, although they made the blue the predominant color already). Change the coach (probably coming), and fix the TV deal so that people can easily see more than 10 games a year. I can't get to many games due to my job and my small children, but I watch on TV when I can. I'd watch more if I could, but I despise Time Warner.
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