Finally, those who deserve so much better than what this franchise has delivered – for decades.
The Man from Pluto has written many times on so many different occasions that Cleveland fans "deserve so much better,” let’s parse, starting with the dictionary definition of deserve:
do something or have or show qualities worthy of (reward or punishment).
What have Cleveland fans done to "deserve so much better?":
"Pay to watch the games in person."
"Invest their heart and emotions."
Cleveland fans are "doing something or having or showing qualities" that make them "worthy of reward," deserving of so much better than what this franchise has delivered--for decades." But fans of bite franchises, the Detroit "Lions", the Donald Sterling, ne Tokowitz, Los Angeles "Clippers," the New York "Jets" have paid the same price and invested just as much as have Cleveland fans and have gotten "punishment" instead of the "reward" that they "deserve." Cleveland fans don't deserve more or less than fans of other franchises deliver, whether the delivery is Super Bowl trophies, Larry O'Brien trophies or chronic disappointment.
A pro sports franchise is a business, it is operated as a business but the emotional attachment of the fans to the franchise makes it like an intense personal relationship, a marriage, say, also. There is interplay between fans and franchise, as there is between customer and widget manufacturer, as there is between husband and wife. Both sides get to play. The Man from Pluto says that for Cleveland fans it has been bad "investment" cum bad marriage "for decades." The franchise has played bad hands for decades; the fans keep paying the same price for the same bad dance, the wife won't leave the abusive husband.The Man from Pluto has written himself that he has heard from countless Cleveland fans over the years with each catastrophe du jour, who say endless variations of "I'm done. I'm giving up my season tickets."--But they aren't done and they don't give up their season tickets. They always go back. Cleveland fans do things like repeat the same behavior and expect different results that show that they have the quality of insanity, as repeating-and-expecting-different is a commonly cited definition of that state of mind. "Deserve" means you may do, show, have that which gets you punished; the definition is not limited to rewards.
So insanity is one diagnosis we may make reasonably of Cleveland fans. The fetish of masochism is another and masochism is closer to the truth for Cleveland fans, imo. Cleveland fans have made themselves professional victims. At a not too deep psychic level they enjoy their "pain" if that's what it is, they revel in bitching and having their bitching validated by The Man from Pluto. It's one or the other, insanity or fethishism and in the one case they should be involuntarily committed and force fed anti-psychotic meds and in the other, which I think marginally the more plausible, the "Browns" in this instance are giving them what they want and what they deserve, "Sticks and stones may break my bones but whips and chains excite me."
Whether it is one of those or the other Cleveland fans do not deserve reward for their continual dysfunctional behavior, they deserve punishment, which they may like, but in any event are not deserving of the common reward, a functional, winning franchise. And the Man from Pluto validates and encourages the continuation of this spinning cycle of action-no reaction, repeat, rinse.
Of course, I know why the Man from Pluto is quick to lay claim to "speak for the fans". This is his beat, Cleveland fans his readers, and they feel comforted and justified by his validation and enabling. It's cynical pandering. If the Man from Pluto truly wanted to do some good and break this cycle of decades he should tell Cleveland fans to get a life, to give up their "investments", to stop attending games and stop watching on TV, to leave the drunken ne'er-do-well husband who punches them black and blue every weekend. But he doesn't and he won't. He traffics in their angst, it keeps them reading him, and that's his bottom line, he has hit on what will keep his paychecks coming.
Whether you keep calm or you keep psychotic, carry on Cleveland, you are getting what you truly "deserve."
