May 18, 2013

Browns Owner, City Disrespected

July 24, 2008 by 32 Comments

I saw this over at Yahoo sports and was disappointed…

It seems that Michael Silver of Yahoo Sports doesn’t have a high opinion of Browns owner Randy Lerner, or Cleveland for that matter. This isn’t about power rankings or preseason predictions, but rather a ranking of NFL owners. Lerner was ranked #20 in Silver’s article, but it was the comments rather than the actual ranking that got me going.

Randy Lerner: Some people in Cleveland, noting the promise displayed by the organization last season, might argue that Lerner should be higher on this list. I would argue that Lerner probably isn’t one of those people. Chances are, he’ll read this and shrug. He seems far more concerned with Aston Villa, the soccer team he owns in the English Premier League, and the frequent trips to London that gig necessitates. Perhaps because his late father, Al, was such a prominent figure in Cleveland – or perhaps because it’s, you know, Cleveland – the younger Lerner doesn’t appear to share the same enthusiasm for the home of the Browns. Lerner recently hired former league employee Mike Keenan as president, finally filling the job that opened after John Collins lost out to general manager Phil Savage in a power struggle in 2005. He also refuted a rumor that he’s moving to London full time to be Villa’s CEO. In terms of NFL dealings, one owner says of Lerner, “He’s not very decisive. Whoever gets to him last has got him, and he leads the way in terms of manipulating the revenue-sharing agreement to his advantage. It’s very disappointing.”

First of all, I bet that Silver is right on one point- Lerner will certainly not lose sleep over this opinion. Rock did an excellent piece on Randy Lerner and his connection to the English Premier League earlier. Does anyone in Cleveland feel slighted by Lerner’s ownership of Aston Villa? Lerner has made it known that he intends to let football people, namely Phil Savage, run the Browns. The one time that Lerner really needed to handle a situation was with the Collins/Savage situation, and let’s just say that Randy made the right decision there!

What really irks me is this line- “because it’s, you know, Cleveland”. Mr. Silver why do you have to add your name to the list of pompous jerks that feel it appropriate to look down upon Cleveland every chance you get? Have you even been to our city? I’m glad that you live in some sort of magical enchanted metropolitan area that has no problems. Perhaps you might use your infinite wisdom for good and offer some suggestions for how to improve the city and it’s image. Otherwise keep your derogatory comments to yourself. Believe it or not sir, there are many who live in Northern Ohio because WE CHOOSE TO. We are not trapped, under some spell, or otherwise unable to relocate. We could find jobs in other parts of the country, as I have done before, but would much rather live here than anywhere else.

Rank Randy Lerner wherever you want. I don’t have the first clue about most NFL owners, but it seems to me that an owner willing to spend money putting a quality product on the field, while not hovering over the  shoulder of his GM would be a good thing.

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  • joe

    i read that and was equally irked. that comment in particular added nothing to his analysis or to the article as a whole. it was just a poor attempt at being funny based on an outdated stereotype of cleveland. nothing but lazy (and arrogant) writing. i sent him an email discussing the same, but have not yet received an apology :)

  • http://www.spacebooger.com Fred

    Well written and good point.
    I sometimes wonder if the “whole woe is us” from Clevelanders is caused by outside media members.

  • http://www.waitingfornextyear.com Scott

    wow, great find, Rick.

  • http://www.waitingfornextyear.com RockKing

    Nice work Rick. I really enjoyed this piece. You’re right in that there’s way Lerner actually cares about this. And maybe Mr. Silver should talk to, you know, actual fans of the Browns before he decides to speak for us. Who amongst us is bothered by Lerner’s relationship with Aston Villa? I’m certainly not. It’s a totally different sport in a totally different country on a totally different continent. Frankly, I love the way Lerner runs the Browns and I rather enjoy that he has decided to step out of the limelight and let our football people run things.

  • joe

    rockKing – exactly. id much rather have an owner who doesnt really know football on a day to day operating level to stay out, than an owner who doesnt know what he is doing but is overly meddlesome. i care about as much about lerner being into his aston villa team as i am about dan gilbert having an interest in quicken loans or fathead.

  • joe

    fred – i dont think it is totally. the fact is, cleveland of the 1960s-early 1980′s WAS a complete dump and deserved to get ripped on. compound that with the city’s teams all sucking during that time and the “woe is me” attitude was self-inflicted, but definitely exacerbated by the national media. today’s cleveland is much different than it used to be and is slowly improving. however, lazy national media writers cling to outdated sterotypes (like silver wrote in that article) in order to try and get a cheap and easy laugh. the rest of america, most of which has never been here, will chuckle and move on but maintain that same outdated image in their heads. silver’s comment was pure laziness. a poor attempt at being funny.

  • Dan

    I can’t wait till Google overtakes Yahoo and all these toolbags lose their jobs

  • http://thedaveburbarevolution.blogspot.com/ Todd S.

    Joe — you are right. I can’t really get offended by the comment/joke because it just wasn’t that funny or clever. “Wow Mike Silver, haven’t heard that one before. You’re like Mark Twain of the Internet!”

    And I’m surprised this yuppie writer didn’t consider Randy Lerner’s ownership of a Euro soccer team a positive. Afterall, doesn’t it make Lerner that much more “cultured” and “worldly” and “not Cleveland-ish?”

  • joe

    lol..nice todd. i bet silver’s next article will be groundbreaking news about how the nets have dumped future salary in an attempt to lure lebron when (not if, but when) he leaves cleveland. has anyone heard anything about this?!!

  • steve

    Not that it matters, but the title should be “…Cities disrespected”. Villa is in Birmingham, not London. But facts shouldn’t get in the way of some Cleveland bashing.

  • http://blog.buckeyepayroll.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/img_3374alan2.jpg Chili Dog

    Seems to me y’all in Cleveland ought to be used to this by now.

  • SMP

    i saw that Yahoo post yesterday. I find it funny that he picked on Lerner for owning a soccer team. How often do we hear anything from the NE Ohio media about Lerners other interests. You could tell from the get go that this list was beyond retarded because Al Davis wasn’t ranked as last on the list. (freakin hate him).

  • http://www.filteringcraig.com FilteringCraig

    I went to college in Boston and I just stopped bothering to try and defend Cleveland to east coasters. They would all talk superlatives like, “NYC has the best steakhouse in the freaking world!” I would quietly grumble that maybe there is a steakhouse in Texas right next to the ranch where the cows were that might just have a better steak than someplace on an island off the coast of the Atlantic.

    The fact is that most people who rip on Cleveland probably haven’t left their holy coast to see that people actually do live in Cleveland and they like it here. Same goes for Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Des Moines, Huntsville, Topeka and other places that most east and west coasters consider fly-over country. I say stay over there in California, Mike. And before you decide to be a “national” writer maybe you should understand that there are a lot of different types of people and places in this nation of ours.

    We all have the freedom to go wherever we want and we chose to be really far away from you, Mike.

  • Ricky

    Craig hit it right on the head, its not just Cleveland, but its the entire Midwest that has to suffer from the east and west coast media bias (although Cleveland and Detroit take the brunt of this Midwest bashing). People there just think anything different from their superficial lives is just weak in comparison and that if you don’t own the newest edition of the i-phone, you are out of touch. Stupid yuppie, arrogant New Englanders

  • joe

    the irony is this guy is from LA. LA has lost not one, but two NFL teams in recent years and the league has not been in any hurry to get a new one in the market. cleveland lost its team and the NFL couldnt get a team back in the market quickly enough. “hey commish – can we get a team back in LA?” “what for? you know, it’s, you know, LA. the fans suck and are indifferent and the whole city sits in a could of smog.”

  • joe

    “cloud” of smog. this site needs an edit function.

  • Ricky

    And kudos to whomever pointed out that Aston Villa is in Birmingham, not London. Just goes to show what that guy knows…absolutely nothing. Were Tampa Bay’s owners dropped down a few pegs because they own Manchester United? No, the Glazers were actually praised for owning the United.

    Come to think of it, Lerner has done the same things that the Glazers have done. Beautiful new stadium? Check. Top of the line training facility? Check. Allow GM and Coach to go after the players they need to win no matter the cost? Check. He says that they let Gruden go after any QB imaginable, well first off thats not necessarily a good thing and second, big deal, the QB”s he has gotten were outcast from where they were before TB. The Glazers are good owners in my opinion, but Lerner has done the same exact things

    And was anyone surprised that Bob Kraft was #1 and Jerry Jones was #2? Sure they are great, but lets try to be objective. And look at that guys picture, you can tell he lives in NYC, he has that smile

  • Ricky

    LA, not NYC, o well close enough

  • Lauren

    This article was so well written, thank you for that. Silver’s article however, instantly put me in a bad mood and forced me to send him an email.
    I’m so over the national media ripping us apart. I’m tired of our people ripping us apart to whoever will listen. So thank you for this:
    “Believe it or not sir, there are many who live in Northern Ohio because WE CHOOSE TO. We are not trapped, under some spell, or otherwise unable to relocate. We could find jobs in other parts of the country, as I have done before, but would much rather live here than anywhere else.”
    You summed it up perfectly.

  • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com Cleveland Frowns

    Would much rather have an owner who’s a Clevelophile than an Anglophile, but you hit the nail on the head re: Silver’s ignorant commentary. To Craig’s point, wonder if Silver is even from the coast. Often find that these “big city” jerks who rip Cleveland, etc., are from the “flyover states” themselves, and have run away from something there to hide in the big city where they find comfort in convincing themselves that where they came from is a miserable dump that caused all of their problems. It’s repression and self-deception of the worst kind, and leads to tripe like Silver’s comment about Cleveland. Thanks for calling him out, Rick.

  • SenhorTambor

    Welcome to jornalism on the internets. Research? Mehh… Work ethic? Fehhh… when you fear nobody is reading anymore, whip out something cheap and easy, see how much indignation to can stir up. I’m SO BORED WITH IT.

    How’s that for irony? Some of us remember when writers worked hard, did their homework, and earned a following earned by respect. Today, when everyone tires of your lack of creativity (arbitrarily ranking ownership, making snarky comments, how original) and actual writing skill, just troll ‘em and reap the angry attention.

    It’s pathetic, really.

  • CJG

    Ugh *rolls eyes*

    This is possibly the most worthless issue sports writers insinuate. I’ve traveled far and wide, and I have yet to run into a city, state, or country that I would insinuate as being beneath something, such as Mr. Silver in his article. America has fantastic cities, period, that no one should ever be talked down to about. Not Cleveland, not anyone, period. This is why the whole ESPN “Titletown” is worthless. Are Ohio towns on there? Yes…..but guess what, it doesn’t matter. I love competition as much as the sports fan, but this isn’t a sport, these are peoples communities, lives, families, memories, etc.

    On a sports related note, Go Browns!

  • Derek

    Come on, lighten up. Despite what most of us clevelanders would like to think, the city is pretty much a joke to the rest of the country, as the weathers not great, its dull for a city, and most of us arent so great looking. Hes making a crack thats based somewhat on truth, somewhat on stereotypes of cleveland. Relax, every city has stereotypes, every city gets made fun of.

    Decent article by silver overall, but not great

  • Eric Carter

    Sing it now!

    Cleveland Sucks! Cleveland Sucks! Cleveland Sucks!

  • http://www.waitingfornextyear.com RockKing

    Funny, Derek, how someone from Boston is saying “us Clevelanders”. Nice try.

  • joe

    “23 Derek Says:
    July 24th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
    Come on, lighten up. Despite what most of us clevelanders would like to think, the city is pretty much a joke to the rest of the country, as the weathers not great, its dull for a city, and most of us arent so great looking. Hes making a crack thats based somewhat on truth, somewhat on stereotypes of cleveland. Relax, every city has stereotypes, every city gets made fun of.”

    so what you are saying is cleveland is the only city in the country with sketchy weather? is it the only city that is “dull”? and apparently it is the only city with “unattractive” people? interesting. i will keep that in mind next time I am in a boring bar in NYC in the middle of Feb battling 6 inches of snow and being hit on by a chubby girl with halitosis.

  • mendy

    joe: haha, agreed
    derek: your comments were as ignorant as silvers.
    rick: great find, yada yada yada, and all that good stuff.

    on a separate note i love that picture of the stadium with the city in the background! i need to find a larger one for my background

  • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com Cleveland Frowns

    “i will keep that in mind next time I am in a boring bar in NYC in the middle of Feb battling 6 inches of snow and being hit on by a chubby girl with halitosis.”

    Take a bow, Joe.

  • http://mvn.com/nba-cavaliers Amar Panchmatia

    I agree…if I ever saw this Silver shmuck in a parking lot I’ll bust his jaw. Even I haven’t lived in Cleveland for the last three years and change, but I still hold the city in high regard and have a special place for it in my heart. What does that jackass mean, “Oh it’s Cleveland?” I’ll want to smash his face on concrete.

  • joe

    amar – where do you live? whats it like living in a place with perfect weather, beautiful people and non-stop party? (actually i have been there – its called Ibiza!)

  • http://clevelandchamps.blogspot.com Matt

    Preach on Brother Rick. I will also defend Cleveland until the day I die. It has been home for almost my entire 32 years – BY CHOICE. I’m sick of all these a-hole writers bashing us when they have likely never even been here. It’s the same rationale they give for LBJ leaving us in two years.

  • OSUJOE

    Take it from the source. Who goes to Yahoo Sports for their sports news? I have never seen ESPN put down Cleveland in such an inappropriate manner (though they have put down the teams I haven’t seen them put down the city). Going to Yahoo for sports is like getting insurance from Safe Auto, useless.

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