New Bills ownership could look to Mike Holmgren?
October 17, 2014Browns Week 6 Review: Four Thoughts on the Offense
October 17, 2014YOU CAN TAKE THE BROWNS FAN OUT OF CLEVELAND, BUT YOU CAN’T TAKE CLEVELAND OUT OF THE BROWNS FAN
Bzzzzzzz. Bzzzzzzz. Bzzzzzzz. The buzzing is that of my phone, forever on vibrate1, not of some flying insect come to either suck my blood or lay eggs on my head. Nevertheless, it provokes the same reaction from me, who only milliseconds ago was sound asleep. I instinctively fling my arm out to rid of the pest, knocking my insistent, still buzzing phone off the bed and onto the floor, the Bzzzzzzz Bzzzzzzz-ing now reverberating off the hard wood.
My senses and wits come back to me as my brain slowly boots up and answers my confused conscience’s questions. What time is it? It’s 9:15 a.m.. Do I have to wake up? Yes!!! Wait, why? Because it’s Sunday morning in Los Angeles, California, and the Browns kick off in forty-five minutes. Move quickly and find a television with the game, because the Browns are going to win today, damn it.
Such was my struggle on the morning of this mid-September day. The internal battle between the initial inclination to sleep and the biological need to watch the Browns (no, those aren’t accidentally flipped) wasn’t much unlike what many fellow Browns go through every home Sunday. Waking up near dawn to head to the parking lots outside FirstEnergy Stadium to start grilling and drinking (or continue one of those activities from the preceding night) is customary for diehard Browns fans. The key differences this morning were that: 1) I was roughly 2,300 miles from FirstEnergy Stadium; 2) I was operating with a serious self-inflicted sleep deficit; 3) In the Eastern Time Zone, which embraces the entire state of Ohio, the Browns will likely never play a single down before lunchtime.
If you’ve never experienced football Saturdays or Sundays in a different time zone, it can feel quite peculiar at first. Heading westward, the time difference means that kickoff will be earlier, each time zone pushing it up one hour earlier. In California, which is in the Pacific Time Zone, this means the Browns typically kick off at 10 a.m., or three hours earlier than in the Eastern Time.2 Trippy, I know. This isn’t “early” for most of the population—those who have children, have a civilized job, or don’t have the sleeping tendencies of a hibernating bear. Nevertheless, it’s initially bizarre to enjoy your morning cup of coffee with your asinine Sunday pre-game show of choice, and to spend what ought to be a peaceful Sunday morning cursing the existence of your least favorite defensive back.3
I gathered my friends as quickly as possible—all of whom were ailing from the same condition as myself—and headed to the local Browns bar: Saint Felix in Hollywood.4
Brownies go to Hollywood
If you’ve never been to Los Angeles, California, here’s a take by a traveler from Northeast Ohio who merely passes through occasionally. Los Angeles isn’t so much a city as it is a pile of cities thrown together in a haphazard mess. But they (whoever should be held responsible) didn’t build the city up as they did in much of eastern U.S. cities. No, they just built it out. If you didn’t already know that Los Angeles in its current iteration is a newborn compared to the old American metropolises, you would have thought it was a much taller city long ago, before the mountains dotting the LA horizon slithered out of the Pacific Ocean and moved eastward, flattening buildings like an egg beater, stretching the city thin for miles in every direction like a pizza made of cement, steel, and tacky three-story apartment buildings. The scattered skyscrapers and fancy houses in the hills feel like new additions after the flattening. Northeast Ohio shares the same feature of suburban sprawl from Lake Erie south to Canton, but in LA every sub-city has far too many people and strip malls.
Most cities have a few things that everyone dwells on, mostly because it creates easy conversation, but also because there’s something fraternal about having the same topics to complain about. In Minneapolis it’s how cold it is in winter; in most of the South it’s how humid it is; in Los Angeles it’s how bad the traffic is; in Detroit it’s everything. But the traffic isn’t as bad as people say it is in LA—it’s worse. For several hours every day, millions of people experience what it feels like to be in purgatory. It’s like the line at the BMV, but with less condescending civil servants and more cars I can’t afford. When I die, I think I’m destined to spend several years stuck on the 405, in the middle of five lanes of traffic, signaling to get into the carpool lane, listening to local sports radio hosts delude themselves into arguing that the Lakers are going to score Kevin Durant, Anthony Davis, and LeBron James in one three-month period.5]
So this was the backdrop for the game on Sunday, September 14, as we sat in mild traffic on Sunset Boulevard trying not to miss Browns kickoff. It was the middle of the “annual hottest weekend in Southern California,” when the famously mild and pleasant climate turns vengeful, and the sun reminds you that it could burn you to a crisp like a pizza bagel at any moment it wanted to. We found parking quickly and hurried to Saint Felix, sweat pouring out of us like unfortunate figurines on a baking cake of asphalt, smog, and sin. Los Angeles is the type of place where you turn to your friend and say, “Hey, can I bum a cigarette? I need some fresh air.”
The heat inside Saint Felix was tolerable, all things considered. What’s more, inside was a welcome sight: Browns fans galore, eyes glued to the TV like we were at a bar in Lakewood. We slunk to the back of the bar like the slackers we were to find seats. We settled on some patio chairs set up especially for the occasion in a makeshift viewing zone in front of Saint Felix’s giant projector. The dim projector bulb was in a losing battle with the sunlight flooding the back room (imagine complaining about too much sun!). We could only faintly make out the Browns and New Orleans Saints players, and the ball was practically invisible. It looked as if the players on both teams were playing mime football. Cleveland’s quarterback Brian Hoyer would throw a pretend ball, and receivers would evade defenders and dive to apparently avoid invisible sniper fire. There were frequent lines of questioning like this: “Was that Gabriel or Hawkins who caught that?”
“Man, I think it was Hawkins. I don’t know. It also might have been Joe Thomas.”
But we weren’t about to complain. Because it was Browns football a forty-hour drive from home, and that’s all that mattered.
Beyond the pure enjoyment of watching Browns games with other Browns fans, the allure of watching it somewhere like a Browns bar, surrounded by other fans, is the chance to study how Browns fans have married traits of their new home and/or temporary host to those which are distinctly “Ohio” in nature. Like how the typical Californian detached aloofness struggles to coexist with the passionate over-exuberance of Browns fans. It’s as if Californian Browns fan spends 80 percent of their week being casual, breezy, and having a “whatever, man” attitude toward everything. But they can only suppress the inherent un-coolness so much. The Browns are this one thing they can’t act like they don’t give a shit about.
You can take the Dawg out of Ohio, but you can’t take the Ohio out of the Dawg. For instance, take the gentleman behind us wearing cross-country shorts, Asics running shoes, and drinking water with lemon. He was all of a buck-forty, appeared to not have had a cheeseburger in ages, and probably didn’t drink beer because it didn’t jive with his gluten-free diet. But you bet your ass he had his Browns t-shirt on. Further to his his left sat another Browns fan, watching the game alone, sporting a Bernie Kosar jersey, a pair of jeans, and sunglasses. Mind you, it was over a hundred degrees and the back room was flooded with sun from the open doors and windows. Throw in the overly-gelled hair and the pair of earrings, and on any other day he would have looked like the aspiring lead in an upcoming Bono biopic. But on Sundays he trades in his leather jacket for a Kosar jersey, and he’s just a Browns fan.
About midway through the third quarter, we have an interesting exchange with a nearby kid in his twenties. Going with the standard conversation starter, we trade information of our hometowns. A friend and myself indicate that we’re from the Stark County area.
“Oh really, I’m from Fairlawn.6 What high school are you guys from? You might know my former boss …”
Looks were exchanged. Chins and are scratched pensively.
“Oh yeah, we knew him in high school! He was a tool!”
“He still is!”
Chuckles ensued. The bigger you realize the world is, the smaller it feels sometimes. Ultimately, the Browns escaped with a narrow 26-24 victory over the Saints, allowing the Cleveland fans in attendance to revel in a home opener for the first time in 10 years. The bar served as a good place to see Browns outside of their natural habitat, as long as you didn’t mind a $13 Bloody Mary “special.” Nearby, a girl with wholly unrealistic proportions and her boyfriend look like they’ve stumbled upon the wrong watering hole. Cue David Attenborough: And here we have the Cleveland Browns fan watching his team alongside the California Bruncher. They regard each other with caution at first, but then a mutual head nod demonstrates a sign of mutual respect…
A Short Trip Down the I-5
The next week, I got marooned watching the Browns-Ravens game with non-Browns friends in San Diego. San Diego is Los Angeles’ calmer, friendlier little brother. San Diego never got as good a job as Los Angeles, but San Diego never wanted to be like Los Angeles anyway. Like most with an inferiority complex, San Diego natives despise Los Angeles while Los Angeles residents don’t care about San Diego in the slightest. If LA regards San Diego at all, it’s mostly with amusement. Mostly because Los Angeles views itself as the center of the universe.7
The game ended up being one of the Browns-iest losses of all time. After free safety Tashaun Gipson’s interception of Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco at the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Browns had an 85 percent chance of winning, according to pro-football-reference.com. Then a comedy of errors ensued that included a missed field goal, an illegal forward pass several yards beyond the line of scrimmage, a blocked field goal, some ill-timed defensive secondary penalties, and a string of errant Hoyer passes when one completion may have sealed the game.
San Diego on Sunday afternoons is one of the great places to enjoy NFL Sunday football, especially in the coastal neighborhoods. Sure, it’s technically Chargers’ territory, and full of frat boys and thirty-year-old aspiring pro skateboarders rocking their bro-tanks and Billabong hats.8 But like a lot of California, it’s been overrun by transplants from all over the country. The result is a prevailing ambivalence and a festive atmosphere. Chargers fans are no more obnoxious than should be expected, and I’m too busy hating every other fan base to hold any animosity towards them.
After games like the week three Ravens loss, you wander around in a daze, utterly flummoxed at how your team let such a winnable game escape from its grasp. The effect of all the transplants in San Diego creates a unique bond with like-minded fans when you’re surrounded by supporters of every other team. After victories, these chance encounters are celebratory and familial, as if you’ve met your long-lost twin sibling that you were separated from at birth and never seen. After losses, the interactions more resemble those of a support group. One fan solemnly nods to the other, silently acknowledging the defeat, before both shake hands, pat each other on the back, and say, “Hang in there, man. Keep fighting. We’ll get a W next week.”
Instead of carrying a six-months sober chip, Clevelanders should carry twenty-year fan chips. “Hello, everyone, my name is Brian, and I’m a Cleveland sports addict.” “Hello, Brian.” Given the good luck that the Browns bar had brought the week before, and the superstition of my inner-Pedro Serrano, I wasn’t going to repeat my mistake for the Titans game.
Back on a Roll
Following the bye week, friends and I again ventured to a bar to be in the company of other Browns fans. After a short drive, we arrived at Elbowroom, which was packed wall-to-wall with Browns fans. An open patio window lent a light and breeze to an otherwise dimly lit bar filled with stagnant air. The seating area outside was completed by a handful of friendly, well-behaved dogs wearing Browns bandanas that doubled as the unofficial mascots when they weren’t harassing one another. This was completely normal. The sun and palm trees outside and the charmingly out-of-place chandeliers inside completed an amusing contrast with the Browns fans populating the bar.
Whenever you enter these gatherings in foreign territory, it always feels like stumbling into a secret underground meeting of some subversive political group. It shouldn’t, because we’re merely football fans, and our goals are hardly as noble as that of the French Resistance in WWII. But you can’t help but feel you should salute, handshake, or give a secret password at the door, having stumbled into a union of fellow fans in defiance of the local regime. In any event, you hold your drink close, because you can’t be too sure Federales won’t rappel in and round everyone up for subversion before the end of the game.
Instead of bitter disappointment, the Titans game brought thrilling victory, in one of the most decidedly un-Browns wins of all time. It was as if the entire Titans roster were in an elaborate audition for Saturday Night Live, collectively performing their best Cleveland Browns impression. It was damn good, too. I’m sure Lorne Michaels would have been thoroughly impressed. When K’Waun Williams, an undrafted rookie cornerback whom no one knew three weeks earlier, tackled the Titans’ Kendall Wright to seal the victory, the Elbowroom—which no one had left despite a 10-28 halftime deficit—exploded in high fives and hugs and “hell yeahs” in the way that only fellow football fans can after two hours of the nerve-racking football. The Browns followed that up with a dominating 31-10 performance of over the Steelers the next weekend. I doubt there will be many empty seats in the Elbowroom for the remainder of the season. But I couldn’t help but wonder why it was any better than watching a game at home by myself.
Why Bother?
To understand why its important for Browns fans to assemble with other Browns supporters and Ohio expatriates, I spoke with a Browns fan who has been living in California for years and visits the Elbowroom in San Diego religiously. Aubrey Bauer is a Mogadore native who moved to California in 2004 with nothing but her best friend and four suitcases to fulfill a pact the two of them had made in college. They stayed in a Motel 6 for a night before renting a one bedroom apartment together.
My first contact with Aubrey came last year, mere minutes after a bogus pass interference call largely cost the Browns a game against the New England Patriots. Before we so much as exchanged hellos or names, she unleashed a string of four-letter words followed by a profane suggestion of what Tom Brady should do with his mouth. Oh, hello fellow Browns fan.
She was a Browns supporter “out of the womb,” and her earliest memories are of watching the games with her family and her Bernie Kosar figure growing up. Her childhood home has a “shrine” devoted to Kosar in her basement complete with a Kosar painting. This is also, for some reason, completely normal. When asked if she would still make the pilgrimage to the local Browns bar even if she had a free subscription to Sunday NFL Ticket, she said, “I would still want to go to the Browns bar. It’s being in that atmosphere that’s so amazing … and [to] be around that energy.
“I think it’s about being around people I can relate to. You can sit at a bar and talk to other people, but they can’t relate.” Does the losing get old? Wouldn’t it be easier for her to stop and go do something at the beach when things go bad for the Browns, as they often do? Sure, but then she wouldn’t really be a Browns fan, which “wasn’t really a choice.” Her and her best friend still attempt to attend a game together in Cleveland every year.
In the end, one realizes that fans do these crazy, obsessive things not only because they’re bored or can’t adequately stream the games illegally, but to experience that sense of community that draws us to sports in the first place. Some of the best Browns fans I know have only spent an infinitesimal amount of their lives in Cleveland. But there’s something to be said for supporting the Browns and rooting for them week after shitty week when most people would quit. It’s less frustrating to stop following the Browns, but it’s not necessarily easier.
People stick with the Browns and Cleveland sports for reasons both self-serving and unselfish. As hard as it can be to follow the team from afar or tolerate the perpetual sucking, it’s easier to keep rooting for the Browns than it is to quit, abandoning everyone that stuck with it so long. It blows to keep digging, but it blows even more to put down the shovel and leave your buddies with the foxhole half-finished. All Browns fans have stories about how they follow the Browns because their dad did, or their grandparents, or their sister or brother, or their best friend. They’re drawn thousands of miles away from those people by a job, school, hopes and dreams, boyfriend or girlfriend, husband or wife—by life. The commitment among Browns fans to get together all over the country every weekend is more than a neat quirk of being a sports fan. It’s a way to say (without saying) that some part of you or who you identify as is from Ohio, and that even though you can’t be next to your friends or family right then, the guy or gal next to you at the bar can, and can give you a high five, and call your boss a tool, and buy you a beer and tell you “Go Browns.”
- You only need “Still D.R.E.” to go off during one Torts class before you make sure of that [↩]
- This season, the Browns will kick off soon after 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time in every game but two, October 26 versus the Raiders, and November 6 at Cincinnati, which is a Thursday night game. [↩]
- I usually prefer the 10 a.m. kickoff, actually. The game wraps up by 2 p.m., leaving the rest of the day for activities or chores, even though it’s usually spent just watching more football. Why wait for the Browns when you could have it as soon as you wake up? Those who spend their Sundays at their respective house of worship would probably find it much more inconvenient. [↩]
- In every case in this post, the gatherings and viewing locations were organized by members of the Browns Backers, particularly subchapters of the Southern California Browns Backers. They’re all over the world, and the Browns team website routinely publishes stories involving particular chapters. Both the LA and San Diego Browns backers did a great job at fostering a fun, family-friendly environment at every event I’ve attended. [↩]
- Yes, LeBron just signed with the Cavs. This will not stop Lakers fans from making this argument, not for a second. The imaginary trade will inevitably involve Carlos Boozer’s and Steve Nash’s expiring deal, Jordan Hill, and some other crap. The details of these trades aren’t important and their plausibility isn’t important, merely their existence. [↩]
- He wasn’t from Fairlawn, but you get the idea. Other than his location, the conversation is unchanged. [↩]
- This may seem like I hate Los Angeles. I don’t. I love to visit it, even if I would prefer not to live there. It is an easy target, and I enjoy poking fun at it. [↩]
- Exactly like these guys. [↩]
8 Comments
As a long time member of the Mile High Browns Backers in Denver, I loved reading this article. Nice work. As years go by at your Browns bar (The Retreat in my case), the more friends you make, you earn a regular seat, and you look forward to Sundays not just to watch the game together, but to talk about the Browns. It’s a cool camaraderie that even my girlfriend knows not to get in the way of (seriously, this is the one thing). Sundays away from Cleveland can be weird at first, but after you put some time in it becomes awesome. And I love games starting at 11 Sundays.
You seamlessly put so many good tangents in this article.
(1) PCT College Football Saturdays are the best. My late college falls in California were spent waking up and watching football from 9am-8pm, then going out for the night. Great fun.
(2) I absolutely agree about the “need” for community being an out-of-town Browns fan. Personally, I like to watch the games alone or in small groups (my Dad was in town this weekend, which was really great to watch the Steeler game with him). I enjoy the control of being able to rewind and watch different plays and figure out which players were involved on each play that isn’t really possible in a large group.
However, the community angle is why I am on WFNY. It’s such a great community of writers and fans in the comments that we get to talk about the Browns after and before each game. I like to think that I’d still be a fervent Browns fan w/o the community interaction, but I really am not sure.
(3) You summarized SoCal beautifully. Sure, a few potshots at LA, but, well deserved ones 🙂 You really caught the main differences between the 2 places along with 1 of the 2 main reasons that I don’t live there (traffic is a close 2nd to the housing prices).
(4) The secret underground meeting is how I feel when I run into anyone wearing Brown’s gear, which happens more often than I thought it would when I first moved away. I absolutely love that no matter how busy I am or the other person is, there HAS to be a communication. Whatever the most positive current take on the team is encapsulated in either a short word, gesture, or conversation (another fun part of being out-of-town is that it’s much more upbeat).
Over the last weekend, I ran into a guy wearing a Browns hat while coming off the baseball fields coaching (wearing my Browns socks). I happily smiled and pointed to his hat, then my socks. He waved me over and we had a good 5 minute conversation. What made it more interesting is that he was deaf and I don’t speak sign language. Somehow it didn’t matter and we managed to talk JFF, the upcoming Pitt game, and that he’s from Elyria.
Just another day being a Brown’s fan 🙂
Great article … I am curious what bar you watched the Ravens game at?!
I have yet to go to the local Browns Backers bar (Blitz Ladd) since I’d have to get up an hour early to try to catch the bus across town. Try getting me up before 10 on a Sunday!
Just moved out to LA shortly before the season started. After finding the Browns Backers group at Matt Denny’s Ale House I don’t think I would ever stay home for a game.
Rad article. I live in Hermosa Beach and luckily there atleast is a Brownsbacker bar close (Jersey’s in Redondo Beach) but I usually head down to Patrick’s in Orange County (Costa Mesa) with my dad. It gets crazy in there for sure.
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Kyle, I have the opposite problem with the time zones. I am a huge Browns fan from Chesterland in Geauga County who finds himself living in India. New Delhi in 9½ hours ahead of Cleveland, so 1PM kickoffs begin 10:30 PM here and the games usually end at 1:30 AM, just a mere five hours before the alarm goes off to get ready for work Monday mornings. Once daylight savings time ends in the US, the 1PM kickoff is 11:30 PM in India, making Mondays particularly miserable. That said, I never miss a Browns game and usually wear my Browns hat and t-shirt on game days. It is like a chronic disease for which there is no cure. GO BROWNIES!