Art Modell died this week and I have mixed feelings about it. I believe he wasn’t a bad man but rather a weak man that had a vision of what pro football was going to become long before anyone else. It made him rich but it didn’t make him a great despite what anyone says on television. It doesn’t even make him a good businessman. When he moved my Browns in 1995, I made a promise to myself – some day I’m going to piss on that man’s grave. Now that the day has finally arrived, I have a decision to make.
When I was growing up the most imposing figure in my life was my maternal grandfather. He was pretty tall at 6’1” which to my child's eyes made him a giant. I especially remember his huge hands that he put to good use all his life. When his parents fell on hard times he quit school and got a job at 14. When WW2 started, he was 27 and like most men of his era he volunteered to serve. He first tried to get into submarines but shortly before deployment was declared 4F for having flat feet/fallen arch (a malady we share). He could have come home and avoided service but instead he spent his years at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center working in the auto pool. One of his jobs working in the auto pool was driving the bus. I always wondered how that made a proud man like my grandfather feel but it was his way to serve and I’m sure he did it without complaint. It wasn’t all bad as one of the perks of the job was driving the football team to their games. This may sound small but in in wartime America it was huge.
Great Lakes always had a football team but it was mostly around as a diversion. When war broke out everything changed. During the 1942 – 1944 college seasons, you see unfamiliar names like Iowa Pre-Flight, Fort Knox Armoraiders, and the Great Lakes Bluejackets. These teams were filled with men who had been drafted and the local commander stocked their teams with former college All-Americans instead of putting them through training and sending them off to war. This was common practice at the time as it was felt that by continuing the games, it allowed servicemen a brief respite from the war. It started slowly but by the end of the 1944 season the AP top 20 had 12 teams affiliated with the armed forces (plus 4 B1G teams which stashed many good players on their teams too).
My grandfather drove the team bus throughout his service at Great Lakes meeting many former and future football stars but the most lasting relationship was formed when Paul Brown took over the team in 1944. Paul Brown’s coaching philosophy was decades ahead of his peers and it didn’t take long for my grandfather to be one of his biggest fans. Fast forward a few years and now my grandfather is starting a trucking company while Paul Brown put together a team called the Cleveland Browns.
Paul Brown dominated the next decade of professional football using methods that most of his competitors eventually copied. His teams were in the championship game of the league for the next 10 years, winning 4 AAFC championships and 3 NFL championships. In 1956, the players that Brown had signed after World War 2 were starting to get old and the team had its first losing season. Brown and the Browns retooled and 2 years later were 3 points away from facing the Colts in the 1957 NFL championship. Today we mark this game as when America discovered the NFL on TV but not many at the time saw just how much the game was going to change. At the time, Art Modell was living in New York working as an advertising executive and he certainly noticed.
Throughout all of this my grandfather became an avid follower of the Browns. My mother always described football Sundays in the Bennett household as a very tense affair. Everyone knew the afternoon would be much happier if the Browns won. Luckily for her childhood, they usually won.
In 1961, Art Modell bought the Cleveland Browns and immediately clashed with Paul Brown. Brown was an autocrat while the 35 year old Modell was gregarious and became close to many players on the team. Modell was a nice guy but as any management book will tell you, treating employees as friends leads to trouble but initially it lead to Brown’s ouster. Paul Brown’s final record with Cleveland was 158-48-8 with 6 championships in 17 seasons.
My grandfather cursed Modell for his firing of Paul Brown but I don’t think he ever wavered in his loyalty to Cleveland. He had formed a bond with the team over the past 15 years and the Browns were Ohio’s team.
I often wonder about the loyalty we have to our sports teams. To an outsider it seems silly, spending so much of our time and energy on something that in the grand scheme is meaningless. Football generates no tangible product. The uniforms are just pieces of cloth. The players are essentially hired mercenaries who are paid to represent the team. Their wins and losses mean nothing other than bragging rights. Yet the intangible results mean so much to everyone involved. It links people and communities and if you see someone years after an event, reminiscing of a particular play links people to a place-time in ways that few other things can.
Modell’s Browns had immediate success using the team Paul Brown left him and won the NFL championship in 1964. Anyone that knows anything about Cleveland sports knows that this is the last time a Cleveland team has won a championship. This is also the last time the Browns made it to a championship game. The Browns continued to do well during the next decade going 102-48-4 but this success was no doubt helped by the fact that Modell volunteered to move to the weaker AFL in 1970. By 1974 nothing could stop the Browns slide to mediocrity and the team had their second losing season since their formation.
I was 7 years old in 1974 and just starting to learn about football. It would take a few more years before I actually could sit still for an entire game but some of my earliest memories are of family gatherings at my grandfather’s house waiting in the basement as my mother prayed upstairs for a Browns win. I never noticed anything wrong with my grandfather’s demeanor even though the Browns of that era were pretty bad. It didn’t help that they were in the same division as the Pittsburgh Steelers who were just starting a run of dominance that has mostly continued to this day. My grandfather had done well in business so he bought a big house and retired to a ‘farm’ outside of town but still only about 5 minutes from my parents house. I learned later that one of the reasons he bought the place was so he could spend more time with his grandchildren. The house sat on the top of a hill and behind it sat about 10 acres of mostly unspoiled land. My grandfather had the title to the land but the truth was it was his grandchildren’s domain. We fished in the pond he built, skipped rocks in the creek that went through the property, and tramped through the woods that formed the property’s boundary. We had our grandfather in our pocket but we never really understood it at the time. All we knew was we loved him and he was bigger than life.
My favorite example of this was the day he showed up at my school and got me out of class. When I got into his truck I saw he’d also gotten my cousin out and I’m sure we both had confused looks on our faces as my grandpa drove us out to his house. When we got there he took us out to the meadow where now stood a regulation field goal post made up of the remnant of three small trees he’d cut from the woods. I remember looking at my cousin and thinking to myself, “That’s really tall.” I’d never been under a field goal post in my life and the next few weeks were filled with many attempts at trying to kick the ball over the goal post. In hindsight I realize that building a goalpost for an 8 year old is a bit impractical. It would be at least another 5 years before I’d have the leg strength to actually kick the ball that high but that didn’t phase my grandfather. He wasn’t a very expressive man but the goalpost stood as mute testimony of his love until he sold the place.
As I got older I also started to obsessively follow the Browns. Part of it is when kids start the process of breaking away from their parents they find other things to cling. We moved into the city in the late 1970s and one of the ways I presented myself to the world was as a Cleveland Browns fan. It was an easy transition for me. My grandfather was a Browns fan and so was I. The bus I rode to school was filled with Bengals fans and Steelers fans. There was only one other Browns fan and we formed a bond such that he remains my best friend to this day.
It’s amazing how personal wins and losses can be for kids at that age. After a few seasons of continued ribbing my faith in the Browns paid off in 1980 with the Kardiac Kids. I vividly remember singing the “12 days of Browns Christmas” with my brother in the back of my dad's car as we drove to buy a Christmas tree that year. I was sure Cleveland was headed to the “Sipe’r-bowl which was a popular saying that fall that intermeshed the team’s quarterback, Brian Sipe, and the Super Bowl. Those hopes were dashed on a snowy December day in Cleveland by the Oakland Raiders and Red Right 88. I remember I cried in my pillow until I fell asleep.
The next few years weren’t much better. Modell was a forerunner of Jerry Jones only without Jerry’s cash. Modell had a good man in the front office named Ernie Accorsi but Modell always made the ultimate decisions and as the Browns continued to lose they went through a quite a few coaches. Patience was never his strong suit and he always clashed with strong willed coaches. To me it always seemed like he also didn’t understand the value of good line play. He was constantly working to improve our skill position players at the expense of the guys up front.
One thing I didn’t understand at the time was all of Modell’s money came from football. Unlike many other owners who had other companies making millions/billion in other areas, Modell was entirely dependent on the Browns for his livelihood. Team values skyrocketed from the $4 million Modell paid in 1961 to over $100 million by the late 80s. Players salaries also skyrocketed during this era as television money inflated everything. Modell had a tricky balancing act as he had no safety net if team revenues suddenly declined. Television money helped but ticket sales were the key. Cleveland Municipal Stadium was one of the largest in the NFL and despite the results on the field they were always among the league leaders in attendance. Cleveland loved the Browns as we all knew that next year would be better.
Behind the scenes, Modell had offered to take over management of aging Municipal Stadium in 1974 just as the Browns started their losing ways. The lease was for 25 years and Modell made improvements to the facility, mostly to allow for luxury boxes that could bring in more income. By the 1980s the stadium had become a league joke as the turf was nothing more than painted dirt due to the fact the Browns shared the stadium with the Cleveland Indians baseball team. When most teams went to Astroturf, the Browns stuck with what my college roommates called a ‘grass-like’ substance.
My relationship with my grandfather also changed a lot during this time. He was diagnosed with emphysema in the late 1970s and had to sell his beloved ‘farm’ to pay for the continual medical bills. He moved to a small trailer and we all pretended that nothing had changed. Of course it had and when I left home for college he was a shell of himself. By my sophomore year in 1986, I was coming home about every other weekend to spend as much time as I could before he was gone. Somewhere in my teenage years we had lost touch and it was now difficult to relate to one another. I was a headstrong 19 year old with my future ahead of me and knew all the world’s answers. He was a frail 72 year old who knew better but he only had months to live. We had become strangers so instead our conversations mostly revolved about the Browns.
In the mid 80s the Browns success started to turn around mostly due to the right arm of Bernie Kosar and a punishing defense led by ‘Top Dawg’ Hanford Dixon. After the team lost two of their first three games in 1986 I watched games with my grandfather as Bernie tried to bring the Browns back to respectability. At this point grandpa was in and out of consciousness but as I stood watch the Browns won the next two games by a field goal. The second game was the most significant as the Browns beat the Steelers in Pittsburgh for the first time since Three Rivers Stadium was built in the early 70s. It had been a thorn in every Brown fans side since the place was built and and someone made the joke that grandpa could rest in peace now that this had happened. Two weeks later, I came home and watched the Browns lose a close one with him before returning to school. Two days later my mom called to tell me he was gone.
There are certain moments in your life that you never forget and they are always human moments. It’s a little like the old story which asks, “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear did it really happen?’. The same things can be said about people. If something happens and no one is around to notice,does it matter as much? I’m pretty sure the answer is no. When my grandpa died, a large part of my childhood died and for the first time since the Browns lost in 1980 I cried unashamed tears of grief. My life was starting a new chapter as one of the biggest rocks of my childhood was gone.
Amazingly, after my grandfather passed, the Browns went on a tear. They won 8 of their last 9 games to finish with a record of 12-4 which was the best winning percentage they had since the early 60s (and since sadly). Cleveland was the top ranked team entering the playoffs and though I’m not a religious person, it felt like some outside force was helping the team that year. My hopes were dashed a few weeks later in the AFC championship game against John Elway’s Denver Broncos and ‘The Drive’. The next year Browns lost again to Denver after Ernest Byner & ‘The Fumble’. That year my similarly Browns obsessed roommates went to the bars looking for anyone to say anything negative after the loss but were saved from embarrassment when bouncers kicked us out of the bar. Two years later, I had graduated and had a good job but was laying on the couch in a fetal position as the Browns lost to the Broncos again in the championship game.
It’s a bit sad to realized that I now think back to that time as the ‘good ole days’.
Everything started to fall apart in 1990 when the team went 3-13, it’s worst record in history to that point. Browns fans continued to come to the games but what we didn’t realize was Modell’s finances had taken a turn for the worse. It was a combination of issues mostly made of 3 things: 1) the lease on a building that was getting increasingly old and difficult to maintain, 2) Modell’s habit of over spending on free agents that rarely panned out, and 3) the football strikes of 1982 and 1987.
Most people forget about the football strikes but when a stadium holds 80,000 and tickets cost $30, each missed date cost him about $2.4 million plus concessions and parking. There were 7 missed dates in 1982 and 3 played with scabs in 1987. The strikes took quite a bit of the money that Modell had saved over the last two decades. His $4 million investment had grown 30 times but that was on paper. He had nothing to fall back on if times got worse.
Modell’s other issue was his pride. He liked being a big shot in Cleveland and didn’t want anyone to know he was having issues. He remained quiet figuring he could increase prices in the stadium. The first sign of trouble was when the owner of the Indians was complaining about Modell’s penny pinching. The Indians complaints eventually led to the city agreeing to build a new baseball stadium. They offered to include Modell in the new stadium deal but Modell wasn’t interested unless he ran it. The city promised him that once the baseball and basketball facilities were completed they would renovate Municipal Stadium. What the city didn’t know was Modell was now really in trouble as he didn’t realize just how much he depended on the Indians lease payments. Instead of slashing costs he continued to spend and raise costs so when he started to make public statements that he wanted a new stadium he was met with hostility from an overtaxed public that had gotten tired of his overcharging of the past decade.
The team continued to flounder with losing records the next three seasons. Behind the scenes the Indians moved into Jacobs Field and Modell started hemorrhaging money. He continued to pour money into the football team hoping to change the results on the field but it didn’t pan out. His health was also starting to fail and he was concerned how he could pass ownership of the team to his sons when he died. In 1994 he started getting serious about the situation and went public that he’d have no choice but to move the team if the city didn’t get serious about fixing the stadium situation. The problem is that things like that don’t happen overnight and it caught many people offguard. He let everyone know that he had lost $21 million in the past two years due to the loss of the Indians as tenants. The people of Cleveland weren’t happy with this revelation as their taxes were already quite high due to financing the waterfront developments along with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Jacobs Field and Gund Arena. The politicians had come up with several solutions and after several tense months eventually decided on meeting Modell’s demand with a bond worth $175 million that would renovate Municipal Stadium and bring it up to modern standards. Modell had asked the city for this exact plan many times but in hindsight it was too late if he was going to keep the team. No one knew was he was almost bankrupt and Modell ominously told everyone before the 1995 season that he was going to wait until after the season to finalize talks.
Despite these issues the Browns had actually started playing well again. Modell had hired a young assistant from the Giants named Bill Belichick and while his manner was brusque, the improvement on the field was obvious. In 1994, the Browns went 11-5 and were poised for great things in 1995. Sports Illustrated even predicted they would make the Super Bowl. The season started great at 3-1 but the Browns lost the next 3 and it wasn’t long after that when rumors started flying that the Browns might be leaving town. The $175 million issue was on the ballot on November 7th so many people figured it was posturing to get the bond issue passed. That made it more stunning when Modell met with the media on November 6th to let them know he was moving the team to Baltimore. The circus surrounding the team killed the remainder of the season for the Browns and they lost 8 of their last 9 games and cost Bill Belichick his job (gaving Modell an unofficial record of firing two hall of fame coaches). From when I started watching in 1974 to when they left town in 1995, Modell’s teams went 161-174-1. I can honestly say in hindsight that I never lost faith with the team and always felt that next year would be the one. The thing was now there was no next year.
I remember my shock at hearing the news. I was living in Detroit at the time and it was only a few weeks earlier that I brought my brother and some college friends to see the Lions play Cleveland in the Silverdome. I don’t think any of us had any idea it would be the last time we’d see the Browns in person for years. I don’t even recall talking about a potential of the Browns leaving town as it was so preposterous. A month later they were gone.
I’ve heard many people say that it’s the owners team and it is his right to move the team. Legally they are correct. Morally, they couldn’t be more wrong. The Browns weren’t Modell’s team, they were Cleveland’s team. I could understand if the fans didn’t support the team but my grandfather’s story is typical of thousands of other fans. The team isn’t just players, equipment, and colors. It’s also memories and when Modell moved the team he broke a trust between himself and the fans who had willingly given him millions in hard earned money every year.
NFL football has never been the same for me since that day. I watch the games but most of the emotion is gone. I still have the memories with my grandfather but somehow it’s just not the same. Art Modell took that from me and I can’t forgive him for that. I’m sure most other Cleveland fans feel the same.
I do understand Art Modell looking out for his family as the deal Baltimore gave him was pretty amazing. They agreed to pay $200 million for a new stadium as well as giving Art Modell $75 million in cash for ‘moving’ expenses. In other words they paid him $75 million to turn his back on the Cleveland Browns and he took it. The annoying thing is after the move Modell’s health forced him to let others run the team. The first year in Baltimore they drafted Jonathon Ogden and Ray Lewis who will both be elected into the football Hall of Fame. In 2002, they led Baltimore to a Super Bowl which had been so tantalizingly close for the Cleveland teams of the 80s. I skipped the game as I couldn't watch Modell holding the Lombardi trophy.
In an alternate universe I like to think that Modell went another route in 1995 and instead of cowardly leaving town, he solved his money issues by selling a part of the team to his friend Al Lerner. The Browns, led by Ray Lewis, Jonathon Ogden, and Bill Belichick won 5 Super Bowls from 1996-2012 and were always in the playoffs. Art Modell entered the Hall of Fame in 2002 and was mourned by all of football when he passed this week but especially in his beloved Cleveland.
Alas, that never happened.
Modell left town but he had one issue he was trying to ignore. In 1974 he signed a 25 year lease for the stadium in exchange for $1 per year. One section of the lease said that the Browns had to play in the stadium or the damage that would be caused would be irreparable and a lease buyout was not an option. Based on that, the city got an injection in court that would have forced the Browns to play in Cleveland until 1998. That would have been disastrous as no one would have gone to the games and Modell would have certainly gone bankrupt. To make sure this didn’t happen the league let the city keep the history, tradition, and colors of the Browns and promised another team within 3 years if the city built a new stadium. The city accepted which prompted all the NFL cities with aging stadiums to create their own ballot issues for new stadiums as they didn’t want their team to move to Cleveland. In the end, the deal was certainly a win/win for the NFL.
Modell wasn’t so lucky. His ineptitude at running an NFL team continued in Baltimore where his debt problems continued despite the $75 million gift from the city of Baltimore. In 2000, he sold 49% of the team to Steve Bisciotti for $275 million. In 2004, his continued issues caused the NFL to force him to sell the other 50% for another $325 million. A little over 8 years after he broke Cleveland’s heart, Modell was no longer an NFL owner but it was small consolation.
In 1999, a new era in Browns history started and after 14 seasons the only word I can think that describes it is disastrous. Through 2012 the team’s record is 68-140 and it is safe to say they are still a few years away from being legitimate contenders. Even this can partly be blamed on Modell as his minority partner, Al Lerner, was in poor health and died a few years after purchasing the team. His son had little interest in the team and sat back as a series of GM’s made one bad move after another. Despite this Brown’s fans have continued to fill the stadium and watch the games. I know I haven’t missed many games since they came back.
A month ago, Lerner let everyone know that he was selling the team to a passionate new owner so I am hopeful that things will improve next year. That’s what Browns fans do and my grandfather would expect nothing less.
The only thing left is what to do about the promise I made to myself in 1995 about pissing on Modell’s grave. I like to think I’ve learned to accept the loss of my childhood team but it’s amazing how the passion I used to have about football comes racing back when I think about what he did. Maybe I will just avoid going to Baltimore so I never have to find out.
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