2008 in Review: Cleveland Sports

Did Cleveland have one of the worst sports years of all time? Consider:

1. No NFL team.

2. Indians were supposed to contend this year. Didn't pan out. Indians fans get to watch their favorite players play elsewhere next season. Also Kerry Wood is the savior.

3. Bubble burst for tOSU. Once USC hammered them, any lingering doubt tOSU fans had that winning the Big 10 was the same as winning a tallest midget contest faded. Fast. I've spoken with MANY people who are ready to throw Tressel back to Youngstown. Seriously. I feel bad for tOSU fans when I see the spark of faux-superiority missing from their eyes. But then I pay them for the pizza and tell them to get off my property.

4. The Cavs are having a nice season, but LeBron is...well, I'm still waiting for consecutive days without speculation that he's going to New York or New Jersey/The Bronx or Italy or wherever. Point is, even though the local NBA team has one of (if not) the best players in the league is soured by the nagging feeling that he's going to get the hell out of here as soon as he can. Best hope is that he stays long enough to win a championship, but it's a foregone conclusion that he'll wear more than one team's jersey in his career. I kind of hope it's for the Bronx Hovs or whatever Jay-Z is reimagining the Nets to be.

5. No NFL team. Just to re-iterate. I'm not sure as a fairly recent Cleveland area guy if the Browns are more important than tOSU. I think if the Browns were winning they would be. Once tOSU was exposed this season -- mercifully early this time -- fans turned to the Browns for football happiness. After all, the Browns were coming off a 10-6 season and a narrow playoff miss. Surely they would do even better this season. Right? Instead, they got these Browns. I realize the Lions were bad this year, but the Browns FAILED TO SCORE AN OFFENSIVE TOUCHDOWN IN THE FINAL SIX (6) GAMES OF THE SEASON. Honest to Pete. And people wonder if the offensive coordinator will be held over with the new coaching regime.

6. The Akron Zips football team didn't do much this year. We all wept. Also they've got a new stadium, which is great for the school in obvious ways, but its name (whatever it is) could never be as cool as The Rubber Bowl.

7. Cleveland fans looked out the window Sunday and realized that not only was the season over, but they live in Cleveland.

8. The Browns GM-to-be is allegedly...um...not interested in having Bernie Kosar and Jim Brown around too much -- not in the locker room and not talking to the media. This is, of course, fine in the real world. Unfortunately, Browns fans don't live there. This bums me out too because I've really come to enjoy Kosar's drunk, depressed phone interviews on Monday afternoons during football season. It's like a radio broadcast of a train wreck.

9. Cleveland State blew a late-game lead at Syracuse. (But then hit a miracle half-court shot at the buzzer. It was pretty sweet, actually.)

10. Many folks expect the Indians to contend next season. I'd wonder why they do this to themselves, but I grew up on the North Side of Chicago.

Summary: Did Cleveland have the worst sports year of all time? No. Actually Seattle had a worse year. Look it up.

I Voted

One of the greatest gifts my mother gave me was a solid foundation of appreciating the dignity and respect all people deserve. She grew up in Northwest Indiana in the 1950s and 1960s and the views she had of the fundamental equality among people were not likely held by many in her neighborhood or even in her family. I may not know how she developed such a keen sense of fellowship with people, but I am grateful that she did.

I cannot count how many times she would illustrate for me that people aren't better than one another, but different. And our differences deserve to be respected and even admired.

I'd like to think that she did a good job fostering those beliefs in me and I'd like to think that I will be able to raise my own children with these beliefs. That said, this country is poised to do for its children more than my mother could ever have done for me. More than I can do for my children. Not in every way, mind you, but in this specific way: America is about to demonstrate that all people, regardless of their differences, deserve an equal shot at the dream. All people can achieve their dreams.

With luck, my children will see an African-American family occupy the White House for the next eight years. Stop and think about how powerful that is. Now think about how powerful a symbol that will be for African-American children in this country.

I voted today for Barack Obama. I've never been more proud to cast a vote.

Windy Enough for You?

We had a pretty cool wind storm the other day. I took some photos, but one is likely to end up on the Barn Owl Review 2 cover, so I can't/won't share them just yet. Pretty cool though.

Team Fiction met the other night to discuss stories and whatnot. Made a bit of progress I think. We've gotten so many more manuscripts this time around than we did last year. And not just more bad ones. There are some I've read that would have fared pretty well last year but in the bigger pond we're fishing for BOR2, it's a different story.

Anyone got any good jokes?

Haven't heard one in a while...

I'm not sure she meant it this way...

"Rich people, God bless us. We deserve all the opportunities to make sure our country and our blessings continue until the next generation."--HillRod on "The Factor," 4-30-08

Or maybe she did...

Media and So On...

This is great.

All three major cable news networks are wasting valuable air time on Senator Obama's former pastor. Why? Is the story newsworthy? Sure. Is wall-to-wall Wright coverage more important than Iraq or gas prices or the climate crisis? No way. But Reverend Wright is a scary, shouting black man and scary shouting black men equal ratings-sweet-ratings.

It comes from this post at HuffingtonPost.com.

Nothing to add, so I'll move along...

My annual A.I. post:

This season has featured public butcherings of two of my favorite song catalogues -- The Beatles and Neil Diamond. The latter was last night. Holy crow.

There were definitely a few good ones -- Syesha's "Thank the Lord for the Nighttime" and D. Cook was good both times out. Brooke's "I Am I Said" came off well. The others though?

The problem with songs like the Beatles' or Diamond's are that they are centered on fairly simple melodies and written to be sung fairly straightforwardly. Is that a word? Anyway, the kids on the show can't help but oversing because they've been lead to believe that vocal runs and so forth are going to win votes. Great melodies be damned!

Honest to Pete, if Aurchuleta had butchered "Sweet Caroline" any more by singing everything BUT the melody, I would have been sure it was a put on. As it is, I have doubts. Seriously, between him and that dreadlock kid it would have been hard to identify the songs if not for the recognizeable lyrics.

Song choices that should have been:
1. D. Cook -- "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" (the solo guitar and voice version from the mid-70's live album)
2. Archuleta -- "Heartlight" -- Kid's to cheezy it would have come off well.

Yeah. It sucked.

The Hits Keep Coming

I would have thought this was an April Fool's joke...(still holding out hope actually):


The first ad was silly, but at least it was...not sure how to put it. At least the first time the issue was recognizeable in that we all imagine that the President could be woken in the middle of the night with a phone call regarding a national security issue.

But are we really meant to think that the housing market/economic slide would cause a dead-of-night call? Really? It can't wait 3 hours?

It's laughable.

Of course, she'll win PA as anticipated and she'll continue to trot out the Comeback Kid horsepoo. (Note to Hillary: If you are ahead in EVERY SINGLE POLL before a primary and then you win the primary, it's not a comeback. It's not an upset.)

Ralph Nader Can Go Fuck Himself

Just saw on CNN that he's running again.

What a collosal prick this guy is. Seriously. Of course, the reality is, he's not as bad as the jackasses who vote for him. Even if he didn't run and the tools who would vote for him stayed home, at least the good guys wouldn't have to waste resources fending off his attacks.

Memo to Nader: You've already screwed America out of the greenest President we would ever have had. Knock it off!

That's all.

Barack Obama for President

'Tis political endorsement season. I wanted to make sure to get this up here today so that subsequent rants have context. It's pretty simple, really. To me it's simple. Barack Obama should be the next President of the United States.

I loved Bill Clinton. I wish he was still President. I'll be devastated if his wife wins the nom. Nothing against women, but definitely something against that woman. She's a carpetbagging phony who is pleased as punch to hold office based on her husband's legacy. The latter, that she's cool with living and serving in Bill's shadow, is why she's a horrible woman for the presidency.

I can't wait to have a woman President. I think that it's extraordinarily important to the country that we elect a woman to the White House. However, I don't think that electing a woman based on her husband's legacy (or good vibes or whatever people miss about Bill) is the way to go in breaking barriers. I'd argue the opposite - it further entrenches the American patriarchy.

Barack Obama has exhibited the kind of leadership and judgement a President should posess. His Presidency would make me proud of my country in a way I haven't been since...

So that's that. As Super Tuesday unfolds, I really hope my fellow Dems are of similar mind.

Happy New Year!

Yay! 2008!