Despite a small market and terrible national economy, Ravenomics look pretty healthy as the NFL season opens, reports Kevin Van Valkenburg in today's Sun. The team has sold out home games again for the 2009/2010 season. It's 7th from the bottom in market size but near the top in revenue. It has renewed leases on nearly all the luxury suites. It renewed 99 percent of its season tickets.

Part of the story surely is Baltimore's 60 years of pro football tradition, the dedication of the fans and the team's winning record. But the greatest fans in the universe can't compensate for the 16 percent unemployment rate in metro Detroit, where, as Van Valkenburg reports, Lions management anticipates empty seats and a TV blackout. Even a team touted to be division champions can't make up for the 10 percent unemployment of metro San Diego, where the Chargers face the same problem. And in Jacksonville, a tiny market, mediocre team and Florida's housing crash mean 17,000 season ticket holders didn't renew this year, KVV reports. A year ago unemployment was 6.4 percent in Jacksonville. Now it's 10.5 percent. The place has lost 6 percent of its jobs in the last two years.

By contrast the metro Baltimore economy, for all its challenges, is doing OK. Unemployment is 8 percent. The region has lost jobs at only half the rate of Jacksonville and a quarter the rate of Detroit. Combine that with the fact that Baltimore incomes on average are higher than those of many NFL towns, and you have the right environment for a full house and long concession lines. Unlike the Redskins, the Ravens don't sue season-ticket holders who find they can't pay for the seats, as the Washington Post's James Grimaldi recently reported. But it doesn't sound like they would even need to.