Are Cleveland Browns fans at last growing weary of their NFL 'factory of sadness'?Friday, November 11, 2011
By Bill Lubinger, The Plain Dealer
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- After the Browns' 30-12 loss last Sunday in Houston, Cleveland comedian Mike Polk Jr. captured fans' collective fury in a home-made video shot in front of Browns Stadium.
Pacing in his No. 64 "Pontbriand" Browns jersey, Polk rants about a team that can't even reach fans' low expectations.
"We don't even expect you to win the Super Bowl, we just expect you to look better than a Division III high school team," he wails.
Polk, whose family has had season tickets since the '80s, turns to the Stadium and screams, "You are a factory of sadness!" then bows his head, resigned to the reality of unrequited love. "I'll see you Sunday."
Forgive Browns fans if they feel like Charlie Brown, and Lucy has yanked the teed-up football again. It's been 11 1/2 seasons and a combined record of 67-133 since the city got its football team back.
At this season's midpoint, the Browns are an ugly 3-5 that feels worse in the shadows of turnaround stories in Cincinnati, Buffalo and Detroit. Fan frustration has provided fodder for sports talk show hosts to stir all week. Like Polk, some Browns fans are worn thin over what seems like 12 seasons on a hamster wheel.
"It's like 'Groundhog Day,'" said Gloria Kormos, of Solon.
Kormos, who still owns a Clay Matthews jersey from the '80s, has bought Browns season tickets for 47 years; her husband, Ray, for 50. For decades, they had never missed a game, and were devastated when the Browns moved to Baltimore. But now ...
She was asking $100 for her pair of $60 tickets to Sunday's game against 1-7 St. Louis.
"We just don't feel like going down there anymore," she said. "If they were winning we'd be going."
Kormos said she spent most of the Houston game clipping coupons instead of watching her Browns.
"Then I sat down Sunday night and watched the Steelers-Ravens game. That was a football game. We're nowhere near that," she said. "It tells me I've got a lot of years to wait. I don't see the playoffs for a long time, let alone a championship."
Browns spokesman Neal Gulkis said the frustration is understandable, given how passionate fans are about the team, and that the Browns are just as frustrated that wins aren't coming sooner. But, he added, fan feedback has been both positive and negative.
"I think there are a lot of people out there that understand and like what we're doing, what we're trying to build, and believe in what coach [Mike] Holmgren is trying to build here," he said.
The "new" Browns have been a story of consistent disappointment -- nine seasons of at least 10 losses, six coaching changes, a similar revolving door to the executive offices. But this season may carry a little more sting, Browns fans say, because of the optimism coming in.
Fans saw, finally, a united front office, with second-year President Mike Holmgren, General Manager Tom Heckert and their hand-picked new coach Pat Shurmur reading from the same NFL philosophy manual.
They saw rookie quarterback Colt McCoy thrust into a starting role to lead wins last season over potent New Orleans and New England and take the Super Bowl-contending New York Jets into overtime. And they saw ramrod halfback Peyton Hillis provide the team a blue-collar identity.
The Browns sold 1,000 more full-season ticket packages than last year, and more than 40,000 group tickets (for groups of 25 or more) -- the most ever.
"And that's despite the lockout," Gulkis said.
But injuries, an impotent offense and a lack of depth have some fans fed up. The Houston game was a low point.
"Every year we're rebuilding. Never been out of rebuild," complained Eric Cave, 40, of Garfield Heights. Cave is most frustrated that the team didn't beef up its corps of wide receivers in the draft or through free agency after it was clear last season the position was weak. A season ticket-holder since the Browns returned in '99 and once a habitual 8 a.m. tailgater, Cave hasn't attended a game since last season's opener. He either sells his tickets or lets the seats go empty.
"It's a brutal product," he said.
Some Browns fans insist they're through, but like Polk in his video, just can't write the team off.
The only time the Browns have cracked the top 10 nationally in merchandise sales since 1999 was that first season back, when they ranked third behind Dallas and Denver. But despite the string of losing seasons, Nate Cannell, manager of Cardboard Heroes, a sports apparel shop at Beachwood Place mall, said fans still keep the cash registers busy. Most are buying generic Browns jackets, T-shirts, sweatshirts and hats instead of gear with players' names on it.
"If we were in any other city, we would probably be in a little bit of trouble, but we're still chugging along," he said. "Look, they're 3-5. It could be a lot worse, they could be the Colts."
Since 1999, the ratings on WOIO Channel 19, which broadcasts most regular-season Browns games, have barely fluctuated. They've averaged a 50 share regardless of the team's record. That means half the people watching TV in this market on a Sunday afternoon are tuned in. Through the first half of this season, Browns games have a 52 share.
"One of the amazing things about the Browns in Cleveland," said Bill Applegate, Channel 19's vice president and general manager, "is that win, lose or draw, the audience shows up on television just as they do in the stadium."
Sunday's game against the Rams -- and a Thursday night showdown at rival Pittsburgh on Dec. 8 -- will be broadcast on WJW Channel 8, which has promoted the event nonstop. Greg Easterly, Fox 8's vice president and general manager, said Browns games are a boon to the station.
"They are consistently the most-watched program on the day they air," he said.
With the sluggish start and weak home schedule, some fans might be showing up for games simply because it's a buyer's market. Ticket brokers say they're buying PSLs -- the fee required to buy season tickets when the team returned in '99 -- for 50 cents on the dollar and sometimes cheaper. They're having to resell tickets for cost and even below.
"Never at the halfway point of the season have I seen prices so low," said Mark Klang of Amazing Tickets.
Dave Handa, 37, of Berea, was so excited about the team's return that he and some friends bought season tickets in 1999 on a payment plan while students at Kent State.
"We had big dreams of taking our kids," he said. "It's not going to happen."
This season, he's attended just one game, sold two games below face value and gave his seats away to another game when he couldn't find a buyer.
"There's no way I can even give these tickets away," he said. "Nobody even wants them."
Despite such complaints, Gulkis said the four remaining home games are either sold out or will be, and that there was no concern about a local television blackout. NFL games are banned from local broadcast if they're not sold out 72 hours before kickoff.
But a sellout, for blackout purposes, doesn't mean every seat must be sold. Luxury seats -- club seats and those in suites -- aren't included in the count.
Browns Stadium has about 73,000 seats, including 10,000 to 11,000 luxury seats. Season tickets account for about 55,000 seats. That number is down from the first 10 years of the post-'99 expansion era, when season tickets fluctuated in the low- to mid-60,000s.
Nate Schick, of Cortland, was trolling online for cheap or free tickets for Sunday's game. He's 32, born and raised a Browns fan and fondly remembers watching games with his dad during the Bernie Kosar-John Elway era. He has two young children, has them put on their Browns gear to watch with him and, although the outcome in Houston last week was decided by halftime, stuck it out to the bitter end.
Schick said he's had it with the Browns' lack of competitiveness, but just can't quit them.
"Unfortunately, I don't think I can," he said. "That's just the way I'm wired."
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