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Originally Posted by BuckinKaeding
I've got that sentiment from a lot of people, yet they have no good explanation...
Explain please...
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Let me try.
I grew up in Cleveland as a rabid Browns fan. I lived and died with "my" team. I suffered through the Raiders' interception in the end zone that killed Brian Sipe and the original Kardiac Kids.
I mourned through the weeks after The Drive and The Fumble. I knew for damned sure that "my" Cleveland Browns were better than the Broncos both years. As it turned out, Elway, Reeves and company tanked those Super Bowls in an embarrassing manner, and I had the cold satisfaction of knowing that the better team -- "my" Browns -- would have given the NFC a better contest.
A few years later, after the city of Cleveland declined to build a new stadium for Art Modell, "my" Browns moved to Baltimore and became the Ravens. Suddenly my mind was clear. The Browns were never mine, and they were never Cleveland's. They belonged to Modell and he could do anything he bloody well wanted with them.
Modell and the NFL left the colors, the name, the history and the records in Cleveland after the city sued the NFL (and after they agreed to build the stadium that would have kept Modell's Browns in town). As for me, I knew more about the Ravens that won the Super Bowl than I knew about the expansion Browns that came later.
If you think that you have a stake in "your" team simply because you're a fan, I'd encourage you to look more closely at the business of the NFL.
You don't own a team. Your city doesn't own a team. All that stuff is a marketing mechanism. (Who would pay big money to buy season tickets to the Bowlen Broncos? The Hunt Chiefs?)
Your loyalty may change because your loyalty means nothing to an owner whose loyalty may have more to do with profits than it has to do with your support.
I don't have a Browns tattoo, and I never had to think about removing one. I'm not going to get a Broncos tattoo.
Maybe I'll get one when I own a team.
Nah. There'd come a day when I sell the team anyway.