A story in The Charlotte Business Journal not yet online reports that season tickets sales for the Charlotte Bobcats are not a weak 7000 as previously reported, but only an alarming 5300. Better still, the Journal wrangles a quote from Mayor Pat McCrory to the effect that it is “not his line of work” to worry about Bobcats ticket sales because the team is responsible for all operating costs for the arena. Talk about whistling past the graveyard, Mayor. The city has revamped its entire structure around a successful NBA franchise in a lavish, publicly-funded arena in Uptown. Selling Bobcats tickets became Pat McCrory’s job with the first shovel of dirt turned at the arena site.

Can anyone doubt this? Thought experiment — Bobcats go poof in 2008. How’s the city doing then, Mayor?

In the interim, Charlotte’s hotels and restaurants — who are fronting for the city and the Bobcats by hitting their customers up for millions in hotel-motel tax money — are beginning to notice that there are risks to this deal. If fans are not, in fact, drawn Uptown by the thousands 41 times a year for Bobcat games, how do those establishments recover revenue lost due to the tax? More importantly, the Bobcats are explicitly in competition with the hotels and restaurants for dining dollars, what with the team’s emphasis on upscale fare. How does this all shake out?

BTW, and it should not matter, but I should be an easy mark for the NBA in Charlotte. I well remember thumbing to the back of The Charlotte News looking for NBA scores and standings in six-point type, the only coverage the league got circa 1978. I recall staying up past Mike McKay’s “Those Were the Years” on WBTV to watch the NBA Finals on tape delay. In the late 80s I got out the tin foil and did the UHF dance to pull in Hornets games no matter I was living in the Carolinas and dropped by the Hive for electric games when I could. I even sprang for a Bobcat game last year and came away impressed by the energy and effort of an out-gunned team.

But the price hikes this year left me cold and Bob Johnson’s vaunted money-back guarantee to season ticket holders — remember that? — came across as yet another marketing gimmick from an outfit that really does not understand Charlotte. And I’m not alone. Just today I had yet another member of Charlotte’s business community volunteer that his sports-mad firm was not renewing their Bobcats tickets due to the new arena’s high price and the NBA’s loss of appeal in recent years.

Of course, because I am a silly sports person, I understand that winning will fix any Bobcat popularity woes. The question is can they win fast enough? That unknown is what has the Uptown elites on edge tonight.