A Little Bored Lately

I have been really bored with the Cleveland sports scene lately. Granted, the NFL season has yet to start up and the Cavs are still two months away, but I have been bored to tears recently.

There are no interesting rumors going around town about the Browns. Talk Radio shows are filled with the great Quinn/Anderson debate of 2009 which is so bland I often drift off behind the wheel of my car. Mangini's Mystery Machine is even racking up a lot of mileage lately as he does not discuss injuries and often gives uninformative answers. To entertain myself, I often wonder if he's doing this to throw off the scent of various Pittsburgh Steelers representatives that surely must be following each of his words with bated breath to get any type of edge on the Browns. Besides, as we've seen over the past ten years, the reason the Steelers have owned the Browns has been their ability to keep secrets, and that the discrepancies in talent take a back seat to an aura of mystery.

The Indians are losing me more and more each day. I keep reading about the Dolans crying poor to a fan base that certainly does not empathize with millionaires that mismanage their business and embrace change as quickly as I've seen some continents drift. My Indians insider even arose false hope in me the other day after the Thome trade to the Dodgers. My insider said he liked it because now Manny would have Thome's ear for two months about going back to Cleveland next year for one final tour of duty. While I realize Thome is on the way down in terms of talent, he could be a nice veteran and clubhouse presence and Manny would be the power bat in a corner position they've always needed since he left. While the Indians would never be able to afford this, I could only imagine a half witted marketing professional in any baseball front office could find a way to pitch this to the Dolans (In fact, I developed a pitch myself, but that's another story for another day).

And with the Indians, I do not care about the development of all this young talent. While it's certainly nice and exciting, the fact remains it's September and they've been out of the race for four months. I really could care less unless the development came during a meaningful part of the season.

Finally, that leaves me with the Cavs to entertain myself. While I am pleased with their off season acquisitions, there's nothing going on with them right now so they occupy the smallest amount of my attention as possible until the end of October.

Luckily, college football has come to my rescue to guide me through these next two slow months as the Indians die a slow death, and the Browns die a quick one. There's nothing like a feeling of waking up on a Saturday morning and watching east coast kickoffs at noon and wrapping up the day after the west coast games well after midnight. It's a relaxing, fun and exciting way to spend a Saturday. Having three teams to root for (2 alma maters, undergraduate & graduate, along with being a Notre Dame fan) means I'm going to see at least one team, most often two, and on a good weekend all three win. It's less stressful and fun than Mondays after a Browns game.

Have fun this weekend and enjoy the opening kickoff!