The Indians are in first place, but that's not good enough in Cleveland
Opinion by Tim Shirer
On Sunday (August 14) the Cleveland Indians drew 18,879 fans for their game at Progressive Field against the Anaheim Angels, which was the fourth game of the series that the Indians had won the first three games. Entering the game the Indians were five games ahead of the Detroit Tigers, the Indians have been in first place in the AL Central since June 4th, 61 days.
Apparently first place and the best record in the American League is not good enough for sports fans in Cleveland. Keep making excuses for the low attendance at Indians games. Why do other cities draw? Most of them have the same economic issues as Cleveland. FACTS FROM SUNDAY, other first place team's attendance numbers Toronto Blue Jays 47,261, Texas Rangers 35,458, Washington Nationals 29,107, San Francisco Giants 41,456, Cubs play at 8:00 Game is sold out 41,278. How about we take this a little further, here is another attendance number: Minnesota Twins 30,147, the Twins are in dead last place and have been terrible the entire season, but outdrew the first place Indians today by more than 11,000 fans. NO EXCUSES PEOPLE, STOP BLAMING THE DOLANS AND SLIDING TICKET SCALES, EVERY TEAM DOES THAT NOW.
It’s time to just admit there is a very small core of real baseball fans in Cleveland. The rest, they can kiss my backside and enjoy losing every week and drinking in the Muni Lot. Don't give me crap about ripping Browns fans, you people are ass backwards, root for the loser and treat the team that is currently winning like a piece of garbage. If you don't want to attend games, I guess there isn't much somebody like myself can do about that, you can't help stupid. But please do me a favor, save your criticism of the Indians and take a look in your Browns and Orange colored mirror at the ugly, ugly disfigured piece of garbage in Berea. Realize how ass backwards you are, criticizing the good team, but supporting the constant pile of crap called the Browns. Don't tell me that you support all Cleveland teams equally, because that is completely false, you do not support the three Cleveland sports teams equally and it’s pathetic. I cannot force you to like baseball, but don't rip the Indians when you have no clue about baseball or the economic system of baseball.
Part of the problem in Cleveland is the sports talk radio and what it has become. Cleveland sports talk radio caters to the most ignorant of Cleveland sports fans. They push the Browns agenda like the Earth would stop moving if they didn’t dissect every aspect of possibly the worst organization in sports currently. Yet, they devote such little time to the Cavaliers and Indians. Why spend time on the air talking about the two teams that actually compete in their respective leagues. What fun is that? Yea the radio stations were forced to talk about the Cavs for a few days after they won the NBA Championship, but you could tell that they were itching to get back to talking about the fourth string right tackle on the Browns.
They will tell you that people don’t call in about the Indians and Cavaliers as much as they call in about the Browns. That is probably true. There is a reason for that. The people who actually care about the Indians and Cavaliers and have a brain to understand how the economics of sports works, want nothing to do with Cleveland sports talk radio in its present form.
I once had a co-worker tell me a couple years back that he listened to one of the local sports talk stations on the way to work that day for just a couple minutes, but had to change it, because the conversation was so mindless that it made him want to drive his car into the side of a bridge.
The day of reckoning is coming people and you are only going to have yourselves to blame. At some point another city will approach the Dolan Family or whoever owns the team at the time with an offer to move to a city starving for baseball. A city that will actually support team that wins. Don’t think it can’t happen. Remember when your precious Browns moved, you never thought that could happen either. It might be a good idea to start showing some support and stop thinking you’re a smart sports fan because you call the Dolan’s “Cheap”. It actually makes you look really stupid.
POSTED 08/14/2015 21:14
Lake County Sentinel
