Jonah Lehrer looked at the latest research and found:
…the percent of professional athletes who came from cities of fewer than a half million people was far higher than expected. While approximately 52 percent of the United States population resides in metropolitan areas with more than 500,000 people, such cities only produce 13% of the players in the NHL, 29% of the players in the NBA, 15% of the players in MLB, and 13% of players in the PGA.
Why is this? Lehrer posits several theories, but the one that intrigues researchers the most is that small towns are less competitive than big cities. Play is less structured. Children try their hand at a number of sports, rather than being forced into a single track at an early age. This seems to help them develop the characteristics — persistance, hand-eye coordination, etc — that make them superior athletes. Read the whole thing here.
