ESPN; The Magazine gave what it called its ultimate standings in which they take the big four professional sports (baseball, football, basketball and hockey) and ranked them by worth from one to 118. The publication rankings included such determining factors as stadium experience, coaching, ticket affordability, players, championships. According to fans and writers the Green Bay Packers are the best and Cincinnati Bengals are the worst. The most surprising aspect of the piece was the disappointment in the city of Chicago.

The fact of the matter is out of all the Chicago sports franchises, the highest ranking was 82, which proves once again the city of broad shoulders has been in a constant slouch for almost a decade now.

Yes, the third largest city in the country doesn’t have a nationally recognized franchise in 2003 to save themselves.

The Chicago Cubs achieved their highest ranking of 82 due to the curse of the goat and the fact they celebrated their 95th season without a championship by raising ticket prices 25 percent. Somebody needs to take a business course.

The Chicago White Sox were given a ranking of 85th because ownership decided to fan support of a struggling team by putting the new Comiskey Park 200 feet from a inner-city ghetto. Come on, who didn’t see that one coming?

Yes, the lovable loser in the city of broad shoulders is considered the best franchise in Chi-town. However, for all of you scoring at home, the Cubbies finished 56 spots behind the now-bankrupt Ottawa Senators. Let’s all give the Tribune company a big hand!

The Chicago Bears were ranked 95 mostly because they had to travel down I-57 to Champaign to play home games. Good news is that’s only temporary, bad news is that the quarterback situation isn’t.

The Chicago Bulls got a fair rating of 104 since the Jerrys have become a non-stop cartoon riot since pulling their best impression of Yoko and performing the biggest overall break up of the era.

Last but not least, my favorite hockey team – the Chicago Blackhawks, come on down! As much as it pains me, the Hawks’ 108 rating was the fairest of all for one simple fact. No matter, if Eastern Illinois University blocks out Fox Sports Net Chicago for a whole week (thanks a lot), I still wouldn’t be able to see a Hawks home game. Why?

The ownership doesn’t allow home games to be televised locally to promote ticket sales. Brilliant, simply brilliant. Because of high ticket prices, the United Center gates are only at 69% capacity so even though the Hawks have a pretty good club, it’s obviously a private one.

Ladies and gentlemen, this simply proves the state of professional sports is constantly changing. Sadly, if Chicago doesn’t begin to change along with it, it won’t take very long for it to become another Cleveland. Ouch, nobody wants that.