Cleveland Browns' Fans Enjoy Relief of Bye Week

I was born in Parma, Ohio, only a stone’s throw away from Cleveland and have lived in Ohio all but approximately two years of my life. I have watched the Cleveland Browns play ever since the late eighties and have cheered for them every game along the way. I even remember my favorite three Browns back then, Webster Slaughter, Clay Matthews and Bob Golic.

Fast forward 20 years and I’m still a diehard fan and as any Browns fan can tell you, it has come with many tests along the way. No matter how bad it got, I still would look forward to the game every Sunday. I am even one of those fans that can judge all other teams realistically, but when it comes to my own, find ways to think this will be the season we turn it around. Most people would call that a bad thing, but I like being that way. I don’t want to be realistic about my team. I want to find a reason to hope at the start of every season and not admit failure until they are mathematically eliminated from the playoff race. Unfortunately for the Browns, this time usually comes a little earlier in the year than for most other teams.

This year seems much worse than any other that I can remember. It is getting even hard to hope that the Browns will score even a single touchdown in a game. We started the off-season by trading my favorite player. Yes, Kellen Winslow Jr., was my favorite Cleveland Brown. Sure he was hurt too often and could be quite a moron sometimes but you could count him for three things; he brought a cocky fire to the team, he was tough and he caught the football. I think everybody knows how the story goes from there. We trade everything to the Jets that they are willing to take including Braylon Edwards and we still don’t have anybody we can call a starting quarterback. I’ve finally seen enough of Derek Anderson to laugh at the thought that he once was considered a starter let alone a pro bowl quarterback. The problem is I never thought Brady Quinn would become our savior and I think even less of him now.

In all the years of bad football that I’ve seen the Browns play, I’ve never seen a season that was so dismal. Every year I dread when the bye week would come and I wouldn’t get to see them play that week. Well, they had a bye week this past Sunday and I regrettably admit I wasn’t outraged to see it come. In good news, it only took nine months for Lerner to realize the large amount of obvious hints that George Kokinis was not suited to be a GM. Mike Holmgren is rumored to be one of the top candidates the Browns will pursue for the opening. Hang in there, Browns fans; our time will still come again. This is our true test as fans.