News

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http://baltobrownsbackers.blogspot.com/

February 12, 2010

Video of our club at the Monday Night Game against the Rats

January 16, 2010

2009 Cleveland Browns offseason is here.

3 updates.

(1) Offseason Banquet – Plans are still in the works for our club to join forces with The Central Maryland and Frederick Browns Backers. Our first choice for halls didn’t work out but we have several other options that we are looking into. The date we are looking at is April 24th, 2010. SAVE THE DATE!!! More info to come soon.

(2) CRIBBS CRIBBS CRIBBS!!!! I will be sending another letter to Mr Lerner about this subject. I will be doing it this Monday. If you have anything you would like say to Randy, send it to me. I would love to attach to my email a HUGE pdf of letters from the Baltimore Browns Backers. Obviously, keep it classy but speak your mind. This is about Cribbs only though.

(3) Looking for Season Ticket Partners - As many of you know I save 6 PSL’s for Cleveland Browns Stadium. I need a little help this year or I will not be able to get them and will have to forfeit my PSL’s. Being layed off 6 months in 2009 didn't help. I am looking for partners to share my season tickets. If you, someone in your family or friend back home would like to guarantee tickets for the 2010 season let me know. All partners will be eligible for Playoff Tickets if the new regime turns things around and gets us a home playoff game next year. The schedule isn’t released yet but we do know who we are playing. The teams travelling to Cleveland are as follows, Stoolers, ratbirds, bungals, Jets, Patriots, Falcons, Panthers, and one still to be determined. I have 4 tickets together in sec. 502 and 2 tickets together in 516. If you are interested let me know. The face value on all the seats is $40 each. First come first served. Below is a up to date availability chart.

January 5, 2010

2009 Season in review

WOW, what a finish! Who would have thought? A month ago we were sitting at 1-11 with the Stoolers who beat us 12 straight time up next. Not only do we KICK THEIR ASSES, we finish the season with 4 straight wins. The first time we did since 1994. Cribbs sets an NFL record by getting his 8th kickoff return for a TD, so far. Harrison sets a Browns record with 286 rushing yards in a single game surpassing a record that was held by a pretty good Cleveland Browns running back and only 12 yards shy of the NFL record.

As bad as it was it was still pretty good. We had another great year at Glory Days with alot of new faces. Just imagine, when the Browns get their crap together how HUGE our crowd will be. I am really looking forward to this offseason. Holmgren is gonna turn out to be the best move that we have made since '99. He knows how to draft and with 11 picks we need someone who will not screw this up. It's great to have someone on the payroll that's coached 2 different teams to Super Bowls and even won one.

BROWNS BACKER OFFSEASON PARTY PLANS (Please Read)

I am working with the Central Maryland, Frederick and DC Browns Backers Presidents to put together one big off season party. We were thinking about having a draft party but since Day One is on Thursday this year I figured it would be hard to get a good crowd. There will be a minimal cost, but it will cover things like food, hall rental, drinks and possibly past and/or present Browns Players. There will also be raffles, giveaways, games, cornhole tournament, TV with past Browns Games(good ones) and other surprises. We are thinking about a Saturday in April or May.

I really need to get a preliminary head count. Please email me if your are interested and how many will be with you ASAP.

Talk to you all soon and GO BROWNS!!!

December 24, 2009

Merry Christmas Baltimore Browns Backers

From me and The Browns!!

In other news...

The Cleveland Browns announced that Mike Holmgren has agreed to
become club President. The team also has announced that Mike Keenan will
transition to the role of Chief Financial Officer.

"We are pleased to announce that Mike Holmgren has agreed to join the
Cleveland Browns," said Owner Randy Lerner. "We will spend the rest of the
week finalizing the details of the agreement and will make a formal
announcement next week, at which time we will make him available to the
media."

This has been a crazy season but  we have a 2 game winning streak, record breakers last weekend with both of their jerseys going to the HALL OF FAME and an owner opening his checkbook and making things happen!!! Hope to see all of you, that are still in town, on Sunday.

DON'T FORGET TO VOTE FOR JEROME HARRISON AS FED EX GROUND PLAYER OF THE WEEK

http://www.nfl.com/partner?partnerType=players-air-and-ground

December 8, 2009

Cleveland Browns vs. The Inbreds

Not much to say here except.....

PITTSBURGH SUCKS!!!!

GO BROWNS!!

November 24, 2009

Next up.. The Battle of OHIO!!  Browns vs Bengals

We finally had a game worth watching last Sunday but unfortunately we came up with the short end of the stick, AGAIN!! Either way, all of us who were at Glory Days had a great time for the 1st time this year. We actually had an offense show up. Too bad the defense forgot to come. Oh well, at least I had many chances to use my siren. We all realize this year is a lost cause, but there is still alot of football to watch and hopefully the offense will at least continue to grow.

This week we have "The Battle of OHIO', when the Browns travel to the 1st place in the AFC North Bengals. WOW, did I just say that? This Bengal team has already swept the stooler and the rats, but barely got out of Cleveland with a win early this season. What does this mean? Probably nothing, but this season has been kinda crazy around the league and you never know. I feel that Brady got the success he needed last week to keep rolling. I believe this weeks game could be one of the most exciting of the year and you don't want to miss it. Come join us at Glory Days this Sunday and lets see how Brady does now that he has a new girl to impress..

Quinn is currently dating Olympic gymnastics sensation Alicia Sacramone.

Alicia Sacramone is in the middle here

Hope to see you all this Sunday!!

GO BROWNS!!!

November 17, 2009

It looks like Randy has seen enough. In the middle of the season from HELL, things could get brighter.

Jim Brown: Cleveland Browns owner Randy Lerner meeting with top football mind

By Tony Grossi

November 17, 2009, 3:02PM

Getty Images

Could Mike Holmgren be the "top football mind" that Browns owner Randy Lerner is talking to about running the club? CLEVELAND -- Browns owner Randy Lerner could be stepping up his efforts to land a new head of football operations.

 At a luncheon this afternoon, Jim Brown, who holds the title of executive advisor with the club, said that Lerner was interviewing somebody to turn around the Browns' fortunes.

 "At this moment, right now Randy Lerner is meeting with one of the great football minds in this country," Brown said in remarks prior to and during the luncheon. "And if things work out, that person will come in to run the football side of the Browns."

 Brown would not disclose who it was. When somebody asked if it was Mike Holmgren, Brown responded coyly, "You said it ... and I heard it."

 Brown made his remarks at a luncheon of Our Lady by the Wayside, who presented him with the organization's Starlight Guardian Humanitarian Award.

 Holmgren, the former Green Bay and Seattle coach, has been rumored to be No. 1 on Lerner's wish list to hire a "serious, credible leader" to reorganize his football operations.

 An NFL source close to Holmgren said he was unaware of a meeting with Lerner, but did not discount it could happen.

 The source said, however, that Holmgren intends to wait until the 2009 season is over "to see how the dust settles" before making a decision on his future.

 Holmgren was contacted by Lerner a year ago, but he said he would take the '09 season off. He coached in Seattle for nine years after five in Green Bay. He took both teams to the Super Bowl, winning one and losing one with the Packers, and losing one with the Seahawks.

 For the first five years in Seattle, Holmgren held titles such as president and general manager, along with coaching the team. He was stripped of much of his authority in 2005 when Tim Ruskell was hired as president and GM of the franchise.

 The NFL source said that Holmgren wants to wait until after the '09 season to determine whether he wants to coach, serve as a football czar a la Bill Parcells -- or do both.

 "He has a full palette of things to choose from," said the source. "I know he wants to come back."

http://www.cleveland.com/browns/index.ssf/2009/11/jim_brown_cleveland_browns_own.html

November 16, 2009

MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL

The Browns may suck, but our fans RULE!!

November 7, 2009

The 14th Anniversary of Art "Please Die Soon" Modell announcing the move to Baltimore

Someone on a different site found this article from 14 years ago and I thought I would share....

THE NFL / BILL PLASCHKE -

Tagliabue Has to Block This

By BILL PLASCHKE
November 07, 1995

The elderly man rose from his seat in the south end of Cleveland Stadium and walked slowly to the north end, to the 10th row, to a factory worker named Vince Erwin.

"I never seen this guy in my life," Erwin said. "I didn't know what was going on."

Thank you, said the stranger.

For what? asked Erwin.

For being there, said the stranger. For showing the world how much we love this football team.

It was then that Erwin noticed the man was crying.

Erwin looked away in embarrassment before realizing that darn near everybody in that infamously tough, rude, crude "Dawg Pound" section was crying.

"You wonder, we wonder, isn't there anybody out there who can step in and say, 'You cannot move the Cleveland Browns?' " said Irwin.

There is. He works at 410 Park Avenue in New York, far from the Dawg Pound, far from the passion that has made this league so great.

You wonder, we wonder, if NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue is listening.   If Tagliabue can stop suing everyone from team owners to bar owners long enough to realize that the integrity of his league is crumbling around him.

You wonder, we wonder, if anybody up there in the NFL office has the courage to stare into that sick grin of Brown owner Art Modell and say, "Enough."

If anybody will shove Modell into a corner and slap his hands on the wall above Modell's head and say, "We will not schedule the Baltimore Browns. You leave Cleveland, you leave the NFL."

When two poorly supported teams climbed over our back-yard fence this spring, the NFL lost a couple of pieces of jewelry. Pretty, fashionable, but not altogether necessary.

If a team leaves Cleveland, the league loses its heart.

It loses a stadium that has attracted an average of more than 69,000 fans to each home game in each of the last seven years. Only three times during those seven years has the team had a winning record.

It loses one of football's best rivalries, the Browns versus the Pittsburgh Steelers.

It loses football's best rooting section, the renowned Dawg Pound.

"The Cleveland fans have been through a lot of tough years, yet they've always been there," said Bernie Kosar, former Brown quarterback. "In the whole northeastern area [of Ohio], the Browns are like a way of life. This would be so bad."

It also loses a city where you figured pro football would survive if it was killed everywhere else.

One team left, they would put it in Cleveland, where snow and mud still look good on players, where losing teams are never allowed to simply walk away, where men like Vince Erwin built their lives around the Browns.

For the last decade, on Sundays when the Browns played at home, Erwin, 36, has shown up at the salt factory at 4 a.m.

He worked until 10, drove to the game, then returned afterward to finish his shift.

Erwin was one of, oh, about 10,000 fans who did pretty much the same thing.

"It's funny here, but during the first preseason game every year, it was like no fans would be watching the game," he said. "We would all be too busy catching up on each others' lives after not being together all summer. The fans here are like a family."

Even under the NFL's poorly written and ambiguous guidelines, the Rams and Raiders qualified to move.

The Browns do not, and will not, ever.

Art Modell, the man who brought the world Bill Belichick, the man who masterminded the recent benching of Vinny Testaverde for a kid who couldn't start for any of 25 other teams, says he needs more cash.

Because he blew a bunch of money on dog free agents like Andre Rison, that's why.

He says he needs more luxury boxes to sell, because those unshared revenues are the only way today's owners can get ahead.

Yet he had an opportunity to improve his situation when the two new facilities were built in Cleveland, and declined. He chose to sit on his hands and wait for the league's yearly revenue-sharing check.

Tagliabue must pause in his support of Modell's revenue position to think a second about elderly men who walk the length of a stadium just to say goodby.

He must use his phalanx of lawyers to convince a judge that his teams are no longer just businesses, but public trusts.

He must keep the Browns in Cleveland. Forget labor peace, forget record television dollars, Tagliabue's legacy as commissioner depends on it.

As does the future of football in Los Angeles.

Our civic leaders do not want carpetbaggers like Modell to fill our void. Yet if he is allowed to blatantly ignore the rules, then Ken Behring of the Seattle Seahawks will be in Anaheim by the end of the year.

Which would be nice, except this town will never support him, or his kind.

Expansion teams work. Expansion teams can win. Just ask the San Francisco 49ers.

Before the Browns' departure, this area was set to get one of them. Now, we may get somebody who smells like Art Modell, somebody whose luggage is loaded with heartbreak.

Perish the thought.

November 2, 2009

Kokinis escorted out of Berea today

Looks like my email in late September really started something. Before that Mr. Lerner was rarely ever heard from and now he is meeting with Dawg Pound Mike tomorrow morning. He will likely try to persuade Lerner to address the fans publicly, even though Lerner shuns the cameras. He also may make suggestions on how to improve the fans' experience at Cleveland Browns Stadium and improve fan relations wtih the team. I personally feel I should be part of this meeting since I did start the communications with Mr. Lerner. Anyways, the link about Kokinis' firing are below. I will pass on any new news as it comes. 

FOX SPORTS LINK:

http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/s...ut-of-Cleveland

PLAIN DEALER LINK: 

http://www.cleveland.com/brown...owns_gm_ge.html

CANTON REP LINK:

http://blogs.cantonrep.com/fre...kokinis-report/

WKYC TV SPORTS LINK:

http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_...?storyid=124611

AKRON BEACON JOURNAL LINK:

http://www.ohiomm.com/blogs/br...-kokinis-fired/

ESPN LINK;

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/...tory?id=4616312

September 28, 2009

Email to Randy Lerner

Subject: The Product You are Selling

Mr Lerner,   I am concerned. I am the President of the Baltimore Browns Backers and a life long Browns Fan. I live in Baltimore and still I have 6 PSL's in CBS. I hate to say it, but I am just about done. Because of my love for this team I will try to give it till the end of the season but if I don't see some dramatic change in the way this team, coaching staff and front office represent Cleveland and the fans, I am done. I will let my PSL's expire and no longer watch Browns Football. It makes me sick to say this, but it also makes me sick to watch the product that is Cleveland Browns football every week. I have not missed a game since 1988 but I can't do this anymore. Just about every Sunday I feel cheated. I feel like the team is laughing the faces of the fans. Do you even watch the games? They have zero heart. Anyways, thank you for your time and I hope to God I will be able to continue to say GO BROWNS!!!. Best Regards, Larry M. Elavsky Jr. President Baltimore Browns Backers

This is what he wrote back to me..

 Mr Elavsky,
Thank you for writing. When I got to the Browns there was essentially no front office or core culture to define scouting, player evaluation or the draft let alone what is was to care about Cleveland and football. What's more our pro personnel dept didn't exist. I am guilty of trying a variety of combinations- Davis, Garcia, Savage and Crennel in an attempt to discover anything with a set of positives on which to build. It is common knowledge of course that it took Tom Landry roughly seven seasons to build a winner in the 60s in Dallas. With the Steelers, it was probably 30 odd years from the time the team was acquired to when it stumbled on Chuck Knoll-- and it has never turned back. What I can say is that I'm heartbroken and as the father of four, I can also say so are my four little hearts also broken. I do know that Eric Mangini knows his football and is a straight-shooter and a deeply decent man. To say the least, I believe he can get this thing right. Fingers crossed. RL
--------------------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld

June 11, 2009

Facebook and Fantasy Football

For those interested, I started a Baltimore Browns Backers group on Facebook. http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=80899267150 

Also, let me know if you are interested in participating in club Fantasy Football this year. I am planning a 14 team league for members only. It will run through week 13 that way the playoffs won't be on week 17 when alot of good players may be sitting. Every team will play everyone once. It will be $50 a team. Payoffs are as follows...

1st- $400 & Trophy

2nd- $150

3rd- $100

4th - $50

Email me if you are interested.

May 27, 2009

Glory Days This Year

To my fellow Baltimore Browns Backers,

I met with one of the owners a Glory Days to discuss the 2009 season and he is very excited about continuing to having us call Glory Days our home.

For members with the 2009 membership card, the $1.00 off draft beers (16 and 22 oz. drafts) and $3.00 off pitchers will continue.

NEW FOR THIS YEAR!!!

They have offered us $5.00 appetizers during the game!! (see below)

and don't forget...

He has also contacted his Sam Adams, Heineken and other beer reps to have them come to our Monday Night game against the Rats, the Thursday Night game against the Stoolers and one other game to be decided later. They will bring their girls to give out beers and other giveaways and promotional items.

Our seats are still guaranteed for late games. The inside seats still can't be reserved because of their other customers, so when we out grow the patio some will need to arrive early to get inside seats. Our club has continued to grow. I am now up to over 160 email addresses.

We have a few nationally televised games this year. Our attendance at Glory Days is a must if we want these discounts to continue. Please continue to support the Baltimore Browns Backers and Glory Days. Last year attendance was GREAT!! We averaged around 50+ per game!! Thanks to all of you, we got the discounted appetizers and continued beer specials for the club this year.

Membership

Membership dues are also very important. They go to halftime raffle items, the buffet we had 2 seasons ago and getting a Browns Alumni like Greg Pruitt last year. Besides, with the discounts members get on food and beer, it pays for itself by week 4 and maybe sooner for some ;-) If you'd like to take care of your dues in advance, click on the "Membership Tab" above. You can do so with credit card through the paypal button or mail a check to the address at on that page.

I am planning on having another Browns Alumni this year for a game and doing the Members Buffet again. If anyone has any ideas for the club, please let me know.

We only have about 3 months till preseason. I don't know about everyone else, but I'm excited about this upcoming season, the new coaching staff and our draft. I truely believe we will surprise alot of people this year and can't wait. See everyone soon!!

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