This is not the column I was anticipating writing today, but some times things just happen.
As usual, I called home today and talked to my mom and dad. As usual, my conversation with my dad eventually turned to sports. As usual, I ended up reacting more strongly than I expected to some news my dad had to tell me about the local perception of some issue.
This time the issue was, to my surprise, Jim Brown and the Ring of Honor.
My dad has already posted his own feelings about the friction between Brown and the organization. I don’t have a personal connection to Brown since I never saw him play live. In fact, like most people in my generation, I know him more as an actor and activist than a football player. Honestly, it seems like Brown would prefer it that way.
People are always arguing about whether professional athletes should be role models or not. I don’t normally engage in that debate, but if I was ever going to hold up an athlete as someone worth mimicking, Jim Brown would be that guy. Since the 1960s, he’s been taking public stands on tough issues; since retiring and forming his anti-gang Ameri-I-Can program, he’s spent an enormous amount of time trying to better the lives of unfortunate kids sucked into a deadly way of life; and most importantly, since he was probably able to speak, he hasn’t taken any shit from anybody—but he also hasn’t made a big demonstration out of that attitude, either.
In short, he was awesome at his craft, tried to use his stardom to make a difference in the lives of real people and real issues, never backed down from controversy if it was in the name of a just cause, and remained forever his own man. What’s not to admire?
Apparently if you consider yourself a Browns fan, a lot.
Because of his probable no-show at the Ring of Honor induction ceremony, I’m hearing and seeing “the fans,” (c) Terry Pluto, are turning on Jim Brown en masse. What right does he have to skip the illustrious inauguration? The Browns gave him an opportunity he should be thankful for when they drafted him and paid him for nine years, and now he won’t even acknowledge them when they try to reward him? He’s not the only great player in their history, so why does he think he’s better than the others who are being inducted? Who the hell does he think he is, showing up the franchise and the fans like this?
First off, let’s get this straight: Brown is already in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1971, a mere 6 years after he retired. He was, as far as I can tell, indisputably the biggest reason that Cleveland won its last pro sports championship in 1964. He was a 3-time MVP (in only 9 career seasons), 8-time First Team All-Pro, 9-time Pro Bowler, led the league in rushing 8 times, and once held the records for most single-season rushing yards, career rushing yards, and most touchdowns. The Sporting News voted him the greatest NFL player of all time.
In short, this is a guy who’s received a ton of legitimate accolades. Should he really be bowled over by the opportunity to stand around at the induction ceremony for, essentially, the Cleveland Browns hall of fame? I don’t think so. Not when the franchise stripped him of his Executive Advisor position and abruptly stopped funding Amer-I-Can, which appears to be Brown’s life’s work.
More important than his justification, though, is Brown’s method. He is making his stand in the most respectful, unobtrusive way possible. He’s demanding the Browns exclude him from the Ring of Honor as a whole. He’s not blasting “Lost in Space” or “Holler Back” Mike Holmgren in the press. His only public comments were these, on a Syracuse radio station:
“I’m a very sensitive person. I do like to be respected. I’m very loyal. I like it to be a two-way street.
“I’ve been very quiet about the situation in Cleveland. Sometimes when you comment on things, all you do is create problems. The last thing I want to do is create problems for anyone or disrupt the team or ownership or the plans of other people.
“On the other hand, as an individual I have plans of my own. I have a dignity and character of my own that I also protect. I don’t really need to comment on where I go, why I go, why I don’t go. All the people involved are doing all the commenting. They’re the ones with the power. I’m just an individual who played football and worked for the Browns for a while … .
Really? This is what Brown is getting killed for in the court of public opinion? After everyone’s spent all summer talking about how they just wish pro athletes would stop blaring their egos on every media outlet available?
Incidentally, I got the issue of GQ with J.R. Moehringer’s LeBron interview yesterday. I read it today. And in conjunction with this conversation about Jim Brown, I realized that on the surface, some of the same things are happening in the minds of fans in regard to these two men and their situations. Both are seen as, in one way or another, spurning the love and dedication of the wonderful Cleveland fans by doing something selfish and petty. The response has been the same in both cases as well: near-universal stone-throwing (in LeBron’s case, literally).
However, if we really look beneath the surface, Brown’s actions and LeBron’s couldn’t really be much more different. Brown’s resistance is quiet and dignified, but clear. He’s not demanding anything of the organization in the press, not openly bashing them for any of their slaps in the face. LeBron, on the other hand, concluded three years of coy media-baiting and speculation-fostering by ripping the franchise’s heart out on national TV like the villain in INDIANA JONES & THE TEMPLE OF DOOM.
LeBron likes to talk about becoming an icon. Jim Brown really is one—not just in sports, but in the wider culture, in politics, in civil rights, in social work. If the fan base is really going to turn on this guy for something as minor and justified as skipping a second-rate induction ceremony after being brazenly insulted by the Browns, then it’s time for the fan base to take a long, hard look in the mirror.
LeBron suggested in that GQ article that “maybe the [fans] burning my jersey were never LeBron fans anyway.” I thought it was kind of a dumb comment at the time. Now I’m wondering if he doesn’t have a point, even if it’s not exactly the one he was trying to make.
Look, Philadelphia is widely regarded as the most intense, bloodthirsty, hard-hearted sports city in the country. When you think of Eagles fans in particular, one of three famous incidents probably pops into your mind: one, fans regularly chucking batteries from the stands at opponents and under-performing home town players; two, an entire stadium booing Santa Claus; and three, an entire stadium cheering as Michael Irvine lay on the field with what was feared at the time could have been a career-ending injury. These are absurd things to do. Cold, vindictive, brutal things.
But at least sports fans in Philly acknowledge that they happened and admit that that’s their identity.
Cleveland fans, I’ve noticed, like to think of themselves in a different light. In their minds, they give their teams and their athletes everything they have. They care about them, they nurture them, they defend them. Especially if they’re home-grown.
Never mind that half of Cleveland (myself included) wanted Ohio boy Brady Quinn run out of town for not being able to throw a spiral farther than 6 yards. Never mind that local product Joe Jurevicious said that after Browns losses, people would come up to him and curse at him in the grocery store. Never mind that Akron product LeBron James is now the Antichrist.
Never mind because that’s not who we are, right?
Apparently, wrong. Because if the fan base can’t overwhelmingly respect Jim Brown’s quiet and justified defiance, then by and large that is exactly who “the fans” are. Brown implied this himself only a few months ago, when he called the fan reaction to LeBron after the Celtics series “an atrocity.” In fairness, considering that I still believe that James quit in that series, I can’t totally agree with Brown in that particular instance. But more and more, I think his general premise is pretty true.
Cleveland fans are, by and large, beaten down and starved for success. But as a result, we’ve also by and large allowed ourselves to become some of the most cut-throat fans in the country. The championship drought has made things worse, because we now feel entitled (ironic choice of words, in a way) to success. We think we deserve it. It’s only right. And if any of “our” players can’t get the job done on even the most minor stage, can’t justify spending their entire careers here, or God forbid, can’t avoid doing even the slightest thing that could be perceived as a blow to our pride, then look out.
The word “perceived” is really important to that last sentence. Because if Brown indeed skips the Ring of Honor ceremony, it’s not an insult to the fans. It’s a justified counter-punch to the organization. “The fans” should recognize and respect that. If they want to blast someone, they should blast Holmgren and Lerner for mishandling one of the great men ever affiliated with the franchise and the city.
If they don’t…well, maybe they were never really Jim Brown fans anyway. And maybe, just maybe, “The Decision” really was what many of us deserved.
-T
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