Cleveland Syndrome

~"I hate the Cleveland Browns.  I know it is a sin to do so.  We ought not to hate anyone.  But I can't help it.  I hate them."  Wilhelm Heinrich Kohl, manager of front line logistics, Newport News Candy Factory

For the past several weeks, the world at large has witnessed the biggest waste of human intellect in history as the majority of the US male population put on our thinking caps and feverishly tried to work out the ins and outs of the NFL draft, and in particular the fate of one Johnny Manziel.

It was no different in my work group.  For months, after generally agreeing that Manziel may have the drive but not the body for the NFL, we have been constantly teasing our resident Cleveland Browns fan, Greg Butowski, with visions of Farmer using his fourth round pick to draft the fleet of foot Heisman winner;  up until draft day itself Greg wasted untold amounts of printer ink producing page after page of expert analysis on how the Browns would do anything but.  He was certain, CERTAIN, that the Browns were after Sammy Watkins, and would use their lower pick to get a QB (though not Manziel, maybe Blake Bordels).

It sounded plausible enough, but that was before Jesus took the guise of a homeless man and appeared to Browns owner Jimmy Haslam outside a restaurant and told him to draft Johnny Manziel.

Greg seemed to have a divine intervention of his own:  after months and months of pointing out Johnny Football's many faults he had made a complete 180 the morning after the draft and come down with a bad case of Manzielmania.  He went on, at length, about how Johnny Cleveland was going to step in and win not one, not two, but seven (SEVEN) Superbowl rings, and told us how he was going to get a Manziel jersey when he next goes to Ohio.  He even offered to buy me one, which I graciously declined.

It's that kind of insufferable, irrational enthusiasm that makes me root against the Browns every weekend.  If I had never met Greg, I'd probably actually pull for the Browns, if I could be induced to care at all.  If the Browns ever win the super bowl it will be a wonderful rag to riches story in the greatest tradition of American myth, real Disney-movie quality stuff, and I'd probably sit with my beer and my bratwursts and I would cheer the Browns on to victory!  But now if that happens I will have to face Greg, and watch as he writes a daily haiku on why the Browns are so great, and watch him rub his hands together in glee when he recalls the 4th quarter drive that sealed the deal over and over and over again.  There will be no living with him, there will be no dealing with him there will be no....no.  It simply cannot happen.

So that's why we all hate the Browns at my office.

This whole draft thing has got us all scared though, because we all realize how much we've talked about the Browns over the last few weeks.  Face the facts, I know more about the Cleveland Browns than any other NFL team, even my own Pittsburgh Steelers.  When I heard the news that WR Josh Gordon may be suspended for drug use and Nate Burleson had fractured his arm I thought about how that was going to be bad for the Brown's receiver corps.  I am worried that I may be starting to identify with Greg, that some sort of weird Stockholm Syndrome thing is happening.

Worse still is the amount of time I spend talking about or thinking about the Browns with Greg, with co-workers, or just at home. I actually took the trouble to run some numbers:

It's a best case scenario for the year, where I assume we spend 10 minutes a day at work talking about the Browns until they are mathematically eliminated from the Playoffs, which I think will be around Thanksgiving.

I was surprised to find it was a whole day.  A whole day!  I am going to waste one entire day of my life, this year, fussing over the Cleveland Browns.

I ask all of you, please, for me, spend one solid day this year doing something righteous and beautiful.  Read a book, paint a painting, write a poem, spend time with your children, go on a hike, knit a scarf, have a meal at a fine restaurant and tip your wait-staff well, make love to a beautiful stranger you met at the dentist while waiting for a root-canal.

Anything.  Just Enjoy your Life!  It is too late for me...