How'd you become a fan?

I was born a Browns fan in ‘91. I never actually had understood, nor kept track of them till ’05 because I had of come of age to actually appreciate it. I still didn’t really understand it either till 2007 when we had that 10 – 6 season and also when I tried out for my HS FB team for the first time ever my Jr. year with no absolute clue of how football and its terminology worked. Going in completely empty minded and eventually starting my senior year allowed me to understand the Browns far more than I would have if I never had played football.

So, there you go.

I was born a browns fan about a year earlier. My dad had season tickets and season tickets have been in my family since the mid 50’s. my dad was there for the good times (the ’64 championship) and the bad times (red right 88, the drive). he has witnessed it all…
That is just a background of my family.

I remember going to games at the old municipal stadium. very few ppl my age remember it but I somehow have memories of it. My dad would go all the time. the first game I remember clearly was in 1995. I was about 5. I thought the browns were the best team in the world…when you are young you always think that. the browns were playing the packers and they lost. I thought “how could the browns lose, they are the best team ever”…this also started my love of favre (his debacles the last few years have started my hatred for him, but now this is a different subject). I remember being sad that the browns were leaving. my dad also taught me that art modell sucks even though I didn’t understand it. I went around saying it all the time. I also called him an assface (my dad didn’t teach me that one). I guess I was just a smart Kid. I have always been a browns fan although that went away when they left. when they came back, i was starting to get really interested in sports. I remember going to games and I would follow them. I learned so much about the sport those first few years and would love to pour over stat sheets. I have been a diehard fan ever since and never have regretted this decision. being a browns fan is in my blood and in my genetics almost. I am a 3rd generation browns fan and hope one day to be a 3rd generation ticket holder. I love the history of the browns and If I had one wish it would to be born in about 1945ish. At that age, I would have been able to witness the great otto graham and those great browns teams and watch jim brown…I would also have been alive to see jimi hendrix…always a cool Idea…and to see janis joplin.

I was a Bengals fan in the mid 80’s .But in the 86 season I started to watch the Browns with my dad more and more.As the year wen’t the more I found myself watching the Browns.The game vs the Jets in the Playofs just finished it off .From there on out I have always and will always be a Browns fan.

Was born and raised in Ohio. That’s all the reason I needed.

We’re probably the 2’nd the craziest fanbase in the league.

Fixed.

I remember watching games in my basement with my father on a black and white as he told me that Brian Sipe and the boys were a second half team.

He took me to my first game in the pound. Together we have watched all the high’s (the few we’ve had) and the soul crushing lows (there have been many).

I became a Browns fan because of my father, and I couldn’t think of a better reason.

I was born into a Browns family.

My oldest bro was a fan before me, and I, being the bratty little brother that copied everything the older brother did, became a Browns fan too. It started in 2003 where I casually watched the Browns every now and then. 2004 was a little better, I think I knew who some of the starters were, and I think that’s the year when I defended the Kellen Winslow pick as if I knew anything about the game (I’ve since realized Kellen Winslow is kinda a douche). Then Charlie Frye’s name started getting thrown around in 2005, and I had grown up watching him play ball in high school, so I started following REAL close. I’ve been die-hard ever since.

Growing up in Asia I had minimal football coverage. Then the Internet happened and suddenly watching NFL was possible. Then I befriended an American in school who convinced me to watch some clips of Ladainian Tomlinson on youtube. I thought the game was pretty cool.

I chose the Browns because it was mentioned in ‘A Million Little Piece’ by James Frey. Average book. But that was the only team name I knew when I was choosing clubs. That was pretty much it.

Pretty much hooked now. I will visit Cleveland some day. Hoping it’s this year.

One side Cleveland fans (dad) the other Pittsburgh fans (mom). I have not once ever questioned whether or not I made the right choice. I only started really paying attention when he-who-shall-not-be-named began showing interest in moving the club. It was a happy day when they came back, cause I didn’t watch anyone during the barren years.

Cleveland sports has been something I have been able to discuss with my family, we are multi-generational in our fandom. And Cleveland fans, all the same.

Moved to Cleveland in 1996. No team existed. Casually followed the Chiefs until the Browns return in 1999. Became a full-fledged Browns fan immediately upon their return to the NFL.

NB: I justify the switching of team loyalties because a. I would have been a Browns fan if the team were there right when I moved (still young at that point.) b. I was a huge Indians and Cavs fan immediately.

Went to college in 2001 – all my dorm-mates were big into the NFL. Since I was born in raised in Cleveland I started following the Browns. More hooked every year, which in light of their constant failure surprises even me.

i’ve posted on this a few times before:
my fandom was passed down from my grandfather and father. i’ve been following since the mid 80’s, when i remember watching bernie and the boys. my grandfather was such a nervous fan that he couldn’t watch suspenseful games. he made me walk around the neighborhood with him in the snow during the AFC Championship because he couldn’t stand the pressure and i missed “the Drive” (maybe a good thing). i remember cheering so loudly when bernie threw a bomb that ended up being about a 90 yard TD in a monday night game against, i think, the bears, that i woke my mother up. my other grandfather was a steelers fan and bought me a few articles of steelers clothing to try and convert me, but it never worked. i could go on and on with my browns memories, but i won’t; the memories were all good in their own way, even when they were bad. i’m 36 years old, but every browns game turns me back into a kid and makes me miss my grandfather. i’m sure we all have stories like this and its why we all have a strong bond even without really knowing one another. to me, being a browns fan is something special and different than anything else.

I started liking you guys when you starting sucking last year. I have a place in my heart for struggling teams, which is probably because my home team (the Eagles) are one of the winningest of the era, but have yet to go all the way. When I see a bunch of guys out there without the talent, but struggling for life every week, it makes me all nostalgic of the Eagles of past…

so, that’s why I like the Raiders and Browns…well, that, and tradition. These teams have some of the best heritage in football. And, the uniforms are sweet.

This may be the best FanPost ever. It’s great hearing about all these stories, mainly because so many of them are alike. I’ve been grandfathered into being a Browns fan, it’s been in my family for decades, making me a 3rd generation fan. Sound familiar?

Here’s to hoping that I do a good enough job as a dad to get my children to be Browns fans instead of them siding with my fiancee and the Broncos.

What are we guessing that the average age of people that participated in this discussion?

There are just a lot of the, “I’ve only been watching for a few years”, “a couple of years ago in high school I”, type comments. Not so many of the NFL championship flag-bearers (completely aware that that is another generation that isn’t into the whole blog scene, but I digress).

I saw the 2010 draft thread and thought, “Hey, this looks like fun!”

The 22nd pick of the 2007 draft.

I personally have been a Browns fan as long as I can remember, as to who caused it, my guess would be my older cousin Tyler. I idolized him as a kid, but then again I was born at Metro General and spent the 1st 13 years of my life on the North Coast, between the West Side and the swamps (North Ridgeville), I was then transplanted into “Stiller” territory, the northernmost tip of WV, which I uneffectionately call the middle finger,(take a look at the shape of WV on a map sometime and you’ll understand) which only made more of a diehard fan. I now live right outside of Shittsburgh, and will do everything in my power to keep my daughters from cheering for the team I hate the most out of any team in any sport.

you say were the #2 craziest fan base, who’s #1?

Here it goes, a corny but true story. ( Growing up in central Pennsylvania)
 1965 Championship game, I am 7 years old, just getting the idea of sports. My Uncle comes over a big Packer fan. My Dad tells me to root for the Browns and razz him. So I listen to my father and do the like. For Christmas that year our parents, excuse me, Santa brought me a safe with 5 dollars in it. So my Uncle says “lets bet that 5 dollars on the game” Of course I did, I was seven. Browns lose 23-12, Jim Browns last game. I do recall the bad weather, and the Packers running the ball on almost every play. My Uncle, God love him, took my money. I was crushed. So as he is leaving, he says " go check that safe" Inside was a 10 dollar bill, this was big time, 1965 ten dollars.
 From that point on it has been the Browns. When they left to go to Baltimore, my wife said " Just try rooting for them " ( The Ravens), It was the worst taste in my mouth I ever experienced ( And I ate stuff in the Phillipines)
 There is no other pro team, it is the Browns.

Some people might find this funny because of all the talk about being grandfathered in to being a Browns fan. I was actually grandmothered into being a browns fan. I dont really know how it happened but i always remembered that my mamaw had a huge browns shirt that she wore as her nightgown so i think that always made me watch them. But i will admit that i was also a big Dophins fan since my uncle played at PITT with Marino and i got a autographed picture from Dan Marino from when i was born. But from being from Southeastern Ohio i feel that i am very lucky being a browns fan. Because at least our fans are LOYAL. I have many friends (somehow) that are Browns fans. But have many friends that are bandwagon bungal fans because they seemed to all root for the Cowboys until the bungals started having a couple good seasons. I also somehow became a browns when my mothers family is almost all Browns fans and my fathers family is all bungals fans but it makes for good banter during the season

Actually my father was from Detroit so he was a Lions fan…however he liked football alot, my uncle played pro ball for a little bit, and my grandmother was from near Green Bay (Iron Mountain, UP Michigan) so she was raised on Lombardi and the Packers. So basically, you’re around football alot you start getting interested in it.

 I guess my love for the Browns started in the kindergarten or first grade…the Steelers were winning super bowls, and one of the girls in the class was always bragging about them and wearing her knit cap and scarf….everyone hated her so I guess you can say I became a Browns fan because i hated the Steelers so much.

Anyways, I remember them playing the 12 days of a Cleveland Browns Xmas on the 45 in school and it just stuck with me. I don’t remember too much of the Kardiac kids…the moment I really remember starting to follow them consistently was in 85 or so…when the Browns finally broke the Three River’s Jinx. I seem to recall riding in the back seat of my dad’s car listening to Gerald McNeill run back a punt or a kick…I think it was Casey Coleman announcing. After that we would go to a few games every so often down at Municipal…I loved the old stadium, the chilly air, and the smell of the hot dogs. I liked everything about it. I’ll always remember the 3WE Browns sign painted on the building wall with Kosar throwing a pass for some reason too. Downtown on game day when the browns were good and it was sunny crisp, and cold was great. Plus, the players all had identities…Clay, Eric Turner, Bernie, Minnifield, Dixon, Fike, Cody Rison, Slaughter, Metcalf, The Ice Cube, The Tongan Tank Tim Manoa, Mack, Byner, Eddie the Assassin, Baab, Big Daddy Hairston, Brennan, Ozzie, Bahr…They all seemed like good, hardworking, down to earth guys who you really could care about. They truly represented this city….

Plus, back then you really hated those other AFC Central teams…Glanville and the Oilers, Boomer, Wyche and the Bengals, the Steelers…HATED ’em. and LOVED hating them. I remember all the songs they used to play on WMMS,: Bernie Bernie, Sam Wyche got run over by a rain deer, Bad, bad Cleveland Browns, Raised on the Cleveland Browns….lol

Thus, as you can tell, I became a die hard fan., something which as we all know isn’t easy. I’m the ultimate ‘miserable son-of-a-bitch’ to watch the game with. I gripe and piss and moan the whole time…alot of the time when it gets close or is a big game I have to be standing half in/half out of the room. Gameday is definitely painful. Of course, I’ll throw out a ’That’s IT! I’m done with them for the year,’ several times a game…only to gradually creep back in.

Growing up in an Akron suburb, I always took being surrounded by fellow Browns fans for granted (this was before the yellow bellied NE Ohio Steeler fans were around in such hideous numbers as they are now). Then Modell happened and I moved to San Francisco where I tried-TRIED- to follow the Raiders but it didn’t take. In fact, it actually caused my love for the Brown and Orange to increase exponentially. Now, living in NYC, when I see somebody else with a Browns jersey/hat/etc, there is fraternal feeling that is shared with often just a nod of the head . . .

I was raised in the Cleveland area till I was like 11, then was moved with my family to a farm in the middle of Illinois (ever heard of Matttoon?… try 16miles from it)..
 I hated moving and being there and looked for anything to keep my love for Cleveland alive.
  Everyone I knew there were front runners and would cheer for The Cowboys (late 70’s )
So I rooted for my Home town team.. The Browns.. I didn’t know much about football. My dad never really cared for it.. But after the Cardiac Kid season both my dad and I grew to love football.
   I finally moved back in the late 80’s to see Kosar and the boys play some Awesome football. My first NFL game was Browns/Steelers and we beat them pretty good.. But was awestruck of how the fans were so loud and proud..
  Then the move.. I cried my eyes out.. I have to admit. I got to goto the last game.. but couldnt handle staying for the whole thing.. it was too painful to watch..

  I was one of the first to by a PSL and proud to say still have my seats.. just 2 up in top section..
  But now I got a son.. he’s 3 and allready tells me the Steelers are yucky and gets excited when he sees football.. He mimicks me when he sees cribbs running by Shouting GO CRIBBS!!
  That’s my story.. Stil proud!! Still a Brown!

Fisrt game I ever watched was the ‘84 superbowl- 49ers-Dolphins. Some mates had gotten into NFL and invited me to the late night party. I cheered the niners and loved the game, and decided I’d better sort myself out a team to follow for the whole season.

Even then I knew I’d go for as gritty running/ defensive team- probably from the cold north- as opposed to a flashy pass happy southern sunshine team. So I went for the Bears.

Much as I enjoyed the bear’s 1985 superbowl season there’s something very un-british about getting into something and immediately picking a winner, and my eye wandered- to the Browns who nearly beat Miami in the playoffs, had Mack & Byner both going over 1,000 yards, and a general atmosphere of krazy excitement- they were saying the kardiac kids were back.

In ‘96 I kind of realised my loyalties wouldn’t shift to the new browns (can’t say what would have happened if they had become the Baltimore Browns- from this side of the Atlantic is shouldn’t matter) and somehow didn’t get to hear about the new browns. I vaguely followed the Jaguars but drifted out of following NFL.

I only really discovered the browns were back in 2003 when in canada, watching the browns-steelers playoff game that we so nearly won- Holcombe at QB? I was on the edge of my seat for that one, bouncing all round the living room, and that was it. Hooked again!

So here I am. Best fans in the world!

Born in Ohio.

Though I cheered for the Raiders against the Browns one time when I was like 4 years old. I really wanted to throw the football around with my dad. He said after the game. I didn’t like that answer. So I asked him who he wanted to win the game. He said the Browns, of course. I said, fine. I want the other team. Who are they? He said the Raiders. I said, fine, I want the Raiders to win. Now let’s go outside and play catch!

I believe it was this game. http://www.pro-football-reference.com/boxscores/198712200rai.htm

My Raiders fan-hood was short-lived though. I remember throwing a fit during “the Fumble” a couple weeks later. I was inconsolable.

I was born in Detroit but grew up in Canton OH, and fortunately none of those michigan teams imprinted on me. My family has always been Cleveland Browns fans, and I was just getting old enough to understand really when the browns moved to Baltimore. I was eleven when the new browns came back and my Dad has had season tickets ever since 99. I saw the first hof game when they beat Dallas, and I was hooked. I can still remember the last thing the announcer said after that game, “The Browns are Back! and Packed with a win!” So we are all still waiting, but when it happens, its going to make all of this waiting even better.

I actually came upon a Cleveland Browns felt banner when I was 7 and didn’t know what it was, until…

It was 1999 and I was 8 years old. My dad was a Cowboys fan ever since he got into the NFL, however he already raised me to be a Chicago Cubs fan (I have pictures of me as a baby with Cubs pajamas, I had no choice in the matter) but he never really tried to make me a Cowboys fan. Well, my dad flips on ESPN and what do I see? The addition of the Cleveland Browns to the National Football League. Now you must understand, I was 8. I had no knowledge of that the past Cleveland Browns were the now Baltimore Ravens, and my father told me that I could actually be a fan of a team from the beginning. Never did I think about the banner I found a year earlier. I just put it on my bedroom door, and from then on I have been a Browns fan because my father tricked me. I watched all the games I could (being in Nebraska they weren’t on too often). I even remember yelling “Holcomb! Holcomb! Holcomb!” during the Steelers Browns playoff game (fuck the Steelers on an unrelated side note).

Now though, I go to college in Cleveland (CWRU Spartans all the way). Watch every Browns game, and go to ones when I don’t get shit on by academia.

I have no connection to the city of Cleveland whatsoever, but I challenge you to find a more devoted Browns fan. My story begins sometime in the early 80’s when I was very young and just starting to be interested in sports.
 The Browns were playing on TV in the cavernous old Municipal stadium. I think it was the stadium itself that caught my eye at first. It was a unique stadium with the pillers coming down. And it was huge. Of course it was a sell out, so the atmosphere it that stadium seemed amazing on TV. I wish I could have gone to see a game in that stadium. To this day I still have not been to a Browns game. The new Cleveland Browns stadium will have to do.
Not only did I find the stadium to be unique, but the uniforms were unique. Specifically the logoless helmets. I remember thinking—this team doesn’t waste time making pretty designs on their helmets. This is a football team. This is a team that I could root for. I love the helmets.
Also on that day in the early 80’s, I remember watching a player by the name of Dino Hall. He didn’t have a long career, but he was the Josh Cribbs of his day. He was the smallest player on the field, but he was an exciting kick returner.
Its been great reading these stories…

Well, my story is stranger than most. For one thing, I’m not from the US, never BEEN to the US and if you asked me about American Football about 10 years ago, I’d have told you it was a long, pointless game. Rugby with armour.

I’m originally from Belfast, Northern Ireland, although I currently live in London, where I moved after accepting a job offer. About seven years ago, back in Belfast, I was working security in a student bar and I was very, very bored. I was working the Sunday, which is traditionally a quiet time. The Monday and Thursday nights in this place were always very busy with oversized young people drinking far much more than they could handle, but the Sundays were quiet. It was around 7pm and I was walking around the bar area, which was practically deserted except for one guy who was sat down one end, watching the American Football on TV.

After a while, I’d done many, many laps of the bar with my walkie talkie and the boredom wasn’t gettting any easier. The place was still empty. I can’t quite remember how I got chatting to this guy, but I did. He was from the US and, yes, you’re absolutely right to think it, he was a Browns fan. The Browns game wasn’t on, but updates were coming through as we started to chat. And we ended up talking for a couple of hours, from topics as varied as suicide rates amongst students in Ivy league universities, through to the dire state of the Browns quarterbacks and the progression of Arsenal’s “invincibles.”

He told me he was from Pittsburgh, but supported the Browns and always had. I asked a LOT of questions about that. Well, after a long time talking, I had to get back to work watching the crowd as the bar filled up. The game ended and he left and I began to do a bit of background research into the Cleveland Browns in the coming months, coming to learn about this storied franchise and a lot more about the game.

I’ve been a fan ever since and will be until I die, all of which I owe to a chance meeting in a bar with an absolute stranger. I can’t even remember his name, but he was a real cool guy.

granddad lived in WV, close to Ohio, was a browns fan. passed it to my dad. passed it to me.

i’ve never even been to Ohio.

Many of the LGT regs might have read my story ….

But I was born in Berea and lived in Cleveland (just next to Lakewood) until early 1978 when I was 10, moving to Los Angeles). As an under 10 youth, I was a diehard Tribe, Browns and Buckeye fan. I also rooted for the Cavs, but as a youngun, was more focused on the Tribe and Browns.

Although my dad was a Cleveland fan, my uncle was more of a diehard, I remember talking with him every time we got together on how the Tribe was doing that summer (sucky as usual), and how the Browns and Buckeyes were doing in the fall.

i remember the heartbreak of Red Right 88 vividly. I was shocked at the pick. And the losses to Denver were heartbreaking as well. I was in college at that time. Although the third loss to Denver, I don’t remember well at all (12 pack in by halftime).

While the loss of the Browns in the late 90s hurt terribly, I can imagine how much worse it would have been if I was younger. I actually rooted for the Buccaneers for the 3 years the Browns were gone, they are my pseudo 2nd team now.

My father is a lifelong Giants fan, and he’s from New York, my older brother is a lifelong Steelers fan, so NATURALLY I became a Browns Fan. I was in 3rd grade, and I finally discovered football. I got to hit something and my dad would cheer me on for doing it. I always loved that part of the game! This was right about the birth time of the Kardiac Kids, and I loved watching the games. My dad begrudgingly agreed the Browns were worthy (They were bruisers) and encouraged the rivalry between my brother and I.

Note – Even my brother says the Super Bowl with the Seahwaks and Steelers was not worthy of the name. He even agrees the refs stole the game away from the Seahawks, and thats huge coming from that turd. You people do not know how hard it is to be a loud, proud, Browns fan in North Texas. I will continue the fight.

BTW, my 2nd favorite team is, and will always be the Houston Oilers, Stabler, Campbell, Whiteshoes Johnson, what I had to have something from Texas, and it couldn’t be those fags in Dallas.