Facts About Fanbases: Cleveland Browns

PackFan2005 We’ve done two teams already, and now we’re on to the third. We’re diving deeper, and looking harder. These are NFL Fanbases...

Today’s Team: Cleveland Browns

Wait, hold up. Do they even have fans? It would be hard to be loyal to a team who hasn’t had a winning season in over a decade. Well, believe it or not, they have diehard fans still, after everything they’ve been through. Unfortunately, the more deprived of winning they are, the more obnoxious they get.

Arrogance Origins

I guess you can say it may have started in the 1950’s. Fans were more civilized back then, but that doesn’t mean all of them were. They gloated about how great they were and how many championships they had won. Then, the 1980’s happened. Things started to go wrong. Losing season after losing season, it was quite a cycle. They did make it to the AFC Championship once, but lost, which probably made Browns fans angry, thus the start of the modern era for Cleveland. After more losing seasons, the Cleveland Browns team disintegrated in 1995. For years, no Browns fans. In that time, the leftovers from the previous Browns went to Baltimore and became the Ravens. After four years, the Browns returned in 1999. The late 90’s and early 2000’s Browns weren’t that bad. But, after 2002, their playoff drought began. It’s been a hard sixteen years for them since. And you can see it in their modern fans.

Getting to Know the Current Fans

Cleveland is a dreary place already, and you can see it in Browns fans. What’s made it worse is that now Cavaliers fans are bummed for getting blown out of the NBA Championship by Golden State. That’s besides the point. Anyway, you can see at Browns home games that the stands are quite empty, and the fans that are there either have brown paper bags over their heads or signs that say, “All I Want for Christmas is for the Browns to Win!” Sometimes I even see those signs in September, indicating Cleveland fans know how the season will turn out. It’s sad really. But, that anger they keep inside of them during the season is usually let out on fans of teams within the AFC North. The next paragraph gives a few examples of modern Browns fans (1999-present).

Evidence of Arrogance

While watching YouTube, I came across a video of a lone Baltimore Ravens fan among a bunch of Browns fans while at a Browns home game. The Ravens are at the goal line, and they run it in for the touchdown. The Ravens starts yelling, “Yeah! Yeah! Touchdown Ravens! Ravens win!” Then the madness starts. As he films and starts walking up the steps of the stands, Browns fans go wild at his yelling. The Ravens fan points the camera to one guy, who is yelling at the Raven fan, saying, “F*** you!” In the background, you can see a plethora of Browns fans giving him the middle finger, and they even throw stuff at him. While being hilarious, it also shows how Browns fans just can’t respect others these days. But if you think throwing small things is bad, just listen to what I have to say next.
I have to discuss ‘Bottlegate’. What is it you ask? Well, back in December 2001, the Cleveland Browns were playing a home game against the Jacksonville Jaguars. The score was 15-13 with 43 seconds left in the 4th quarter, Jaguars on top. The Browns make a play on fourth down, a receiver catches it, gets two feet down, but it hits the ground as he goes down. It was challenged, but it was ruled an incomplete pass, meaning the Jaguars would win the game. Well, Browns fans went insane. At first, a few beer bottles were thrown onto the field. But the number steadily increased to a downpour of angry fan’s bottles. The referees and players all bolted off the field to avoid being injured by flying glass bottles. It was chaos. That is why the NFL banned glass bottles at games. That’s probably the worst I’ve ever seen with football fans. It tops any fanbase’s worst act by a mile.

Conclusion

The Cleveland Browns fanbase is among the worst in the NFL for me. That’s not to say all Browns fans are awful. There are ones who stay loyal to their team no matter what, the ones that don’t cuss out or throw stuff at other fans, the ones that don’t throw beer bottles onto the field. Not all Browns fans are bad. Well, tune in next time as we move onto the Atlanta Falcons fanbase. I’ve compared them to Cowboys fans before, which shows what I think of a lot of them.

Comments

By the way, if you’re curious about Bottlegate, just search it up on YouTube. - PackFan2005 (7/26/2018)

Interesting - 2storm (7/29/2018)

I can see how they would go insane after being terrible for so long. But you gotta respect the fans that remain loyal year in and year out despite the pain. They’re kinda like the Cubs in a way - visitor (7/30/2018)