Garytoons!

…. and now, a sports rant.  Just because I can. 

The main reason I drew these strips is because I’m frustrated by my home teams’ (i.e., the Cleveland Cavs, Browns, and Indians’) inability to win a championship in my lifetime, and I tried to find a (hopefully) amusing way to voice that frustration through my comic strip.

The Browns have barely sniffed the playoffs since returning as an expansion team in ’99.  The Indians got very close in ’07, only to then trade away two Cy Young award-winning pitchers in TWO consecutive years!!  To even HAVE two Cy Young pitchers in two years is insanely, wildly fortunate, and to consequently trade them, well, no one but Cleveland’s ever done that, as far as I know.  And the Cavs… well, we all know what happened with them.

It’s frustrating to me when I feel like my teams don’t have a legitimate chance to contend for a title.  Either the owners can’t or won’t pay to keep great players (the Indians), the team is plagued by years of mediocrity amongst the players and the front office (the Browns), or, we finally manage to get a superstar (homegrown, to boot), and it turns out that he just plain doesn’t care about the city, the team, or its fans (the ex-Cavalier-who-shall-not-be-named) and rubs their faces in the dirt on his way out the door.

It was heartbreaking to lose the way the Browns did in the ’80s and the Indians did in the ’90s, but I could stomach that better than what we have now because at least we contended!  We felt like we had legitimate shots at winning titles back then.

And yes, I do refer to the teams as “we,” because, well, that’s part of the sickness… 😉

The Indians are playing great so far this year.  I hope it continues.  I still root for all of my teams.  But if something doesn’t change and at least one of our teams doesn’t give me a reason to believe they can seriously contend for a championship sometime very soon, I don’t know if I can be a passionate fan all that much longer.

And before anyone suggests that I switch teams or just stop watching them, see the strip above.  Once you’re a genuine fan of a team, you don’t have a choice in the matter anymore.  Not watching them or trying to convince myself that I don’t care what happens to them would be like saying I don’t have a right pinkie toe.  I could pretend, but… in the end, my right pinkie toe and I both know better. 

‘kay…. rant’s over.