Is Milwaukee Among Most Desirable NBA Free Agency Destinations?

Few American cities share the connection to the NBA that Milwaukee does, with the Bucks calling the Cream City home since launching in 1968 and Giannis Antetokounmpo spurring on a franchise-wide renaissance along the banks of Lake Michigan.

As NBA free agency gets underway, BetWisconsin.com paused Wisconsin sports betting updates and compiled a system to determine the most desirable destinations within the league using a series of metrics.

Most Desirable NBA Cities

We compiled data on state tax burdens (data from WalletHub), media market ranking (data from USTVDB.com, via Nielsen’s 2022-2023 DMA rankings), city popularity (World'sBestCities.com, via Resonance Consultancy), as well as attendance rankings since the 2018-19 season (ESPN.com), winning percentage since the 2019-20 season (Basketball-Reference.com) and 2024 NBA Championship Odds (SportsOddsHistory.com) to construct an aggregate ranking.

Toronto was not included on the list as we utilized US data only. We did not include attendance data from the 2020-21 NBA Season, as COVID protocols varied across the league. For Washington D.C.’s state tax income, we utilized data from nearby Virginia. 2024 NBA Championship odds are up to date as of July 5, 2023.

Rank	City	City Aggregate Rank	Team Aggregate Rank	Total Aggregate Rank
1	Philadelphia	9.67	3.67	6.67
2	Miami	9.67	6	7.83
3	Boston	13	4	8.5
4	LA (Lakers)	10	9	9.5
5	LA (Clippers)	10	9.33	9.67
6	Dallas	11	9	10
7	Denver	15.67	5	10.33
8	San Francisco	13.67	8.33	11
9	New York	10	14.67	12.33
10	Phoenix	13.67	12	12.83
T-11	Brooklyn	10	16.67	13.33
T-11	Chicago	11.67	15	13.33
13	Atlanta	8.67	21	14.83
14	Portland	16.33	13.67	15
15	Milwaukee	24.33	6.33	15.33
16	Houston	10.33	22	16.17
17	Salt Lake City	20	13	16.5
18	Orlando	11.67	22.67	17.17
19	Memphis	19.33	15.33	17.33
20	Washington DC	11.33	23.67	17.5
21	Cleveland	22	14	18
22	Oklahoma City	20	11.67	18.67
23	San Antonio	19.67	19	19.33
24	Detroit	13.67	25.33	19.5
25	Sacramento	22.33	17	19.67
26	New Orleans	20.33	19.33	19.83
27	Minneapolis	19.67	21	20.33
28	Charlotte	17.33	23.67	20.5
29	Indianapolis	23.33	22.33	22.83

Milwaukee In Middle Of NBA’s Free Agent Rankings

The city of Milwaukee ultimately tanked the Bucks’ ranking among the NBA’s best free agency destinations, with the city ranking (24.33) coming in dead-last among the 29 markets that BetWisconsin surveyed.

That lowly city ranking doomed Milwaukee to the 15th spot leaguewide, despite the Bucks posting the fifth best team aggregate score in the league (6.33), behind Philadelphia (3.67), Boston (4), Denver (5) and Miami (6).

Overall, Milwaukee’s total aggregate rank of 15.33 finished behind Portland’s 15 and ahead of Houston’s score of 16.17.

The top five leaguewide free agent markets in terms of total aggregate rank were Philadelphia (6.67), Miami (7.83), Boston (8.5), the Los Angeles Lakers (9.5) and Los Angeles Clippers (9.67).

Conversely, the bottom five markets leaguewide for free agents were Sacramento (19.67), New Orleans (19.83), Minneapolis (20.33), Charlotte (20.5) and Indianapolis (22.83).