Cleveland Browns facing serious consequences for Farmer’s in-game texts to sidelines
February 4, 2015Cavs Streaking, Dancing Sharks, and Big Burritos: While We’re Waiting…
February 5, 2015Look man, I want to try and make some sense of all this, but… You know… I just… Well… I don’t know. How about bullet points?
Over the last few weeks alone, the following items have been connected to the Cleveland Browns:
- A “market-driven” price hike on season tickets
- Josh Gordon was suspended for at least a year
- The outgoing offensive coordinator created a long, detailed case as to why he wanted out of his contract
- Quarterback Johnny Manziel, a first-round draft selection, checked himself into rehab
- The team’s GM is accused of violating the integrity of the game by texting to the sidelines, thus exposing his franchise to stiff penalties, including the potential loss of a much-needed draft pick
- Did I mention that this team raised season ticket prices?
- A national reporter says that business guys are overly involved in personnel and making Mike Pettine’s life difficult
I’ve been an apologist for the Browns in the past. In hindsight I did that because this whole thing is supposed to be fun. These guys are supposed to have the same goals as the fans. The idea that a culture that presumably is all aimed to have the same goals could be so irrationally dysfunctional seemed ridiculous across multiple hirings of multiple leadership groups. I thought it was only logical that it just couldn’t be wrong forever, but here we are. I might have been wrong.
I can’t tell you all is OK I just can’t. Granted there’s no good news that the Browns can create right now to counteract the bad news. It’s not like they can sign three free agents and draft four potential Pro Bowlers in this period of the year.1 Still, to think that they can dominate the local news with such negativity is astonishing. To think that on a day when the Indians’ hotshot starting pitcher is being investigated for sexual assault at a local strip club, that the Browns are still dominating in the “bad news” department is, again, astonishing.
And to a large extent, whatever, I guess. The Cleveland Browns still have a lot of good players that I’m excited about. I still think they have a defense that’s on the precipice of being championship caliber under Mike Pettine. But with all that said, it’s so hard to look at all this noise that the Browns continue to create and think that Alex Mack won’t go running for a new team when he gets the chance, for example. It’s hard to imagine this culture being a place where young players who need to learn to be professionals like Johnny Manziel and Justin Gilbert can come in and become better. There’s no such thing as luck, really. You make your own luck. The Browns aren’t unlucky as much as they create an environment that promotes all their luck to be of the bad variety.
I’ll leave you with a comparison to video games. This is like one of those questionable games of Sim City. We’ve built our city and set up some infrastructure and things seemed like they were going alright, but then as time moves on things don’t go to plan and the citizenry is unhappy. Meanwhile we’re not sure if the guy pushing the mouse around the screen – Jimmy Haslam – has any idea how to play this game. He raised taxes on his unhappy people. It’s clear that he hasn’t played this game much, that’s for sure, but what else can we do, but wait and see? The first game was even worse and we’re on our second attempt with Haslam at the controls.
I guess there’s always this option…2
- Though, they can give an old “just kidding” on that ticket price thing. [↩]
- Hat tip to Glenn Moore on Twitter [↩]
103 Comments
it’s time the NFL actually forces the lowering of ticket prices across the board. They make more than enough money to go around from TV contracts
We have fiercely fought to defend, and propped up many a murderous dictator, an economic system that flies completely in the opposite direction.
The Brown’s signed Aaron Hernandez?