The Detroit region of Michigan is losing one of its professional sports teams. The AP is reporting that the Detroit Shock, of the WNBA, will be sold and relocated to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Despite winning three championships the Shock become the latest fringe sport victims of this region.

Detroit is a great sport town that has supported four major pro sports teams. Two big time college programs, and still found the time and money to support team in fringe/minor league teams. However due to circumstances outside the fans control many of these teams have folded for other business related interests.

Of course in recent years these teams have been failing due to poor attendance. That is the case with the Detroit Shock. Who were often treated like the red headed step children of the teams owned by Palace Sports and Entertainment.

The Shock have never drawn all that well, even though a record WNBA crowd of 22,076 fans saw the Shock win their first WNBA title in 2003. However for their 12 year history 8,463 fans per home game. Even though by WNBA standards the Shock drew above the league average.

Now part of the problem here was holding home games at several different stadiums within the Detroit area. The Shock actually won their second world title at Joe Louis Arena, located in downtown Detroit. They also held games at Eastern Michigan University located about an hour west of Downtown Detroit.

Since Palace Sports and entertainment own so many different sports teams, and promotes many different kinds of events at the Palace of Auburn Hills that the Shock often found themselves searching for a place to hold a game. On top of that the team was never able to negotiate a local TV deal to add some additional revenue to the team, it is just the latest sports team to leave Detroit for business reasons.

Even if we go way back to the days of the USFL and the Michigan Panthers. The Panthers won the first USFL championship, but owner A. Alfred Taubman had no desire to move to the fall schedule and to compete with his longtime friend William Clay Ford Sr. owner of the Detroit Lions.

When the USFL owners met to decide on the move to a fall schedule Taubman sent his son to the meeting with a message, move to the fall and the Panthers will merge with the Oakland Invaders and be gone. So even though the Panthers had a loyal following, they were gone.

It has been said that the adverse jury award the USFL eventually won against the NFL was so small in part because of the league’s abandonment of the Detroit market.

Another Championship football team the Detroit Drive, of the Arena League, left town because its owner bought the Detroit Tigers. The Drive played their home games at Joe Louis arena, also the home of the Mile Illitch owned Detroit Red Wings.

Starting in 1988, the team’s first year, the Drive played in sixth straight Arena Bowl championships winning four of them. For the six years they played in Detroit they averaged more than 14,000 fans per home game. However Illitch sold them off so they would not compete with his newly purchased Tigers.

In the end Detroit area sports fans are pretty good about supporting their local sports teams. However with double digit unemployment, and no signs of recovery fringe sports will have to seek their fortune elsewhere.