The End of Optimism in Cleveland

I have given Terry Pluto a bit of a hard time over the last few years. I have read Terry from way back in the mid 80’s when he covered my Cavs.

You see Terry is, or was, blindly optimistic about the Browns. As I had a problem with here. And a little bit here I guess.  

But, low and behold, has Terry had enough of the Browns?

Cleveland Browns: Was it worth them coming back? -- Terry Pluto

Whoa!

Well if Terry is done with optimism for the Browns, then I am too. So goes Terry so goes I.

But let us not end there. Let us implore some others to beat back their "beloved" Browns optimism with sticks and baseball bats and lead batons and maces and other items that are really heavy that can get the job done. Because some folks just don’t know when to quit.

Take Mary Kay Cabot for instance – eternal optimist when it comes to the Browns. Mary is upset with me because I call her out about this but maybe I am a little snarky about it but she doesn’t realize that optimism is dangerous and doesn’t help the Browns. The Browns need reality, not optimism.

Along comes Kyle Kelly with this nonsense:

Really Kyle? One win in two seasons and you are going to talk about wild card. You shouldn’t be talking about playing cards.

So I

And Mary got upset.

Her right. Totes.

But my point for all, especially those who write about the Browns, is that objectivity is your friend, your very good friend who curbs your wishes and dreams and hopes of this and that and instead fills you with facts and stats that in and of themselves are all the context a Browns fan needs. After all we have endured 1 win in 32 games.

As my father used to say: put wishes in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up faster.

Reality Radar

The optimism of Terry Pluto just can’t be corralled. You could put a shit burger in front of Terry and he’d say “Aww, you toasted the bun. How nice.” I’m not against optimism, it just rubs my reality radar the wrong way is all and in Terry’s Case, his blind optimism for the Browns borders on some sort of dissociative fugue state dating all the way back to his beat reporter days. Terry is optimistic after the Browns began the season 0-3 losing in overtime to the winless/hapless/less-and-less Dolphins in which the Browns missed three field goals. Yep, time to make lemonade from those lemons because the Browns are going places. In this case, this place is last in the AFC North but you already knew that. Oh wait did I mention that they will be in last place next year too? You see, the Browns are stockpiling draft picks and have a bunch of Kurt Gödel’s running stats into a Texas Instruments calculator while the current players run up not only the loss column but also the hospital bills because the team sucks so bad. 

Here’s the thing and you don’t have to memorize lines from The Natural to know this: 

“Losing is a disease…as contagious as syphilis.”

 And the Browns lose. A lot. The most actually and the next two years isn’t going to change the losing but the Terry Pluto’s of the world think that because there is a plan in place to get younger that somehow the Browns will get “winnier.” Yep, the stats and the Ramanujan’s tell us to get younger and build through stockpiling draft picks. 

Just one question: Who is going to change the culture of losing that permeates and saturates the ethos that has become the Browns? 

I lied. Just two questions: How is the culture of losing that permeates and saturates the Browns going to get changed?

…especially after two seasons of unprecedented losing with (got to follow the plan!) young players?

Young players are vulnerable. Psychologically. To losing. The disease of losing may be curable but we shouldn’t rely on the ones in the hospital beds, figuratively and literally, to do the curing should we? It's hard to play football let alone win at football when you are in traction.

Coach Hue Jackson will be the salesman of the millennium if he can get his young players to believe the team will win IN THE FUTURE even as the losses pile higher than the number of slings and crutches in the locker room. 

And I don’t want to sound like a walking tautology but isn’t the only way to not lose, to win? The ethos and the losing culture won’t change until wins happen.

The Pluto’s of the world are banking on the future and the “plan.” 

Be optimistic, wear rose colored glasses if you want, get season tickets for 2019 if you want; just know that getting into the playoffs is based on win-loss record. If you don’t believe me, ask the Steelers, Ravens, and Bengals. 

Hell, ask Butch Davis if you want.

Moving On

2016 is in, full, swing. Could a year be in partial swing? Regardless, I am back to work, on my back, as I’ve decided to become a prostitute. No, seriously, my back has been weak since about a week back. So there’s that. The Golden Globes were last Sunday and Ricky Gervais introduced Mel Gibson and didn’t say anything about Mel looking like an old catcher’s mitt, which I thought was nice of Ricky. Crazy year already huh? The Browns hired a new coach, Hue Jackson. Cleveland Plain Dealer columnist Terry Pluto says there is cause for hope. Terry, Terry, Terry, as long as one can inhale and excrete bodily fluids, there is cause for hope. Call me when there is cause for optimism. In fact text me when the Browns reach 500, I’ll take you out for some objectivity, my treat. The Browns are like an infected scrotum, in dire need of help but too painful to touch. Moving on. Donald Trump remains a headline maker but what slays me is how orange he is and how white his eyes are. It’s like he’s some sort of agent orange even though he skipped Nam. How does the tanning light not hit around his eyes? Some things are better left unknown, like Donald Trump. Moving on. I got an iwatch for xmas. It tells me to stand every hour, which is really annoying in the middle of work; I told you about my new line of work right? Seriously, it does track my runs and exercise and I have lost some weight since the holidays, mostly from my wallet but hey, gotta keep the economy moving right…can’t spend it in hell right…