It isn't that I was able to leave the area to move to Atlanta, but it was my relationship with sports that makes me so fortunate. To some people that may sound a little crazy since the only 2002 Ohio State Buckeyes football team has won a title from the teams closest to my heart.
However, the perspective gained from being a Cleveland sports fan, when added to my background beneath the fans-only surface of sports, allows me to take a different view than many. I have seen what goes on behind the scenes and I have seen how players, coaches and front offices work.
I have also seen how fans react and how sometimes they don't have the big picture or a true handle on what is going on. Fans are fans for a reason. They are passionate and driven to support and love their teams. This is great, but it exposes many to emotions and feelings that sometimes get the best of them or become too much.
It is a fine line. Part of what makes sports so great is that passion and love, but for those with such a tough history with so much unfulfilled promise as Cleveland sports fans it actually can turn in to a type of illness that spreads through a community.
I am not "freaking out" today. I am not crying or reading everything I can find on the internet about what went wrong and where LeBron is headed next. The season is over and they didn't get it done.
There is not much more to add to that. It does no good to look back and nitpick about the coaching, lack of chemistry or the inconsistent and sometimes baffling play on the court. That is for Danny Ferry, Dan Gilbert and LeBron James to decide, not me.
In the coming weeks with LeBron's free-agency decision looming, much will be written and said. The two Dans need to figure out what they plan to do whether James returns or not. In either case, these are not my decisions. I have no impact on these men and whatever decisions they come to I will have to live with. They may not be the ones I would have made, but I refuse to let myself get caught up in the fray.
I think that is an important perspective for many angst-ridden Clevelanders. Let it play out, take a deep breath and it will be what it will be. Getting too caught up in it makes no sense.
For instance, let's take dying. We have no control over the fact one day all of us will have our time end on this planet. Worrying and fixating on this will do nothing but make cause sadness, anger, frustration and many other feelings across the board. So what do we do? We live our lives, knowing in the back of our head that looms but not letting it handicap our ability to live and be happy. These basketball decisions are not to the level of dying, unless you count the possible death of basketball in Cleveland, but the point is the same. We can't worry about it and what it will be, it will be.
LeBron won't be a free agent until July 1 and over the next six weeks the talk will be insufferable. Keep in mind, however, that nothing can happen until then. So, sit back and take a deep breath because the answers will come soon enough and there is no sense in yelling to the highest mountain (or loudest sports-talk radio mouth).
Am I bummed the Cavaliers season finished as it did? Absolutely, but these feelings aren't new. My sincere hope is all of these disappointments over the years will make that first title since 1964 mean that much more.
I just hope I'm around to live it.
My hope is one day a Cleveland title will mean even more after so many photos like this.
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