The Browns Get No Love Even When They Win

Yesterday, the Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Bengals put on a display of airpower usually reserved for when the U.S. military invades a country. There were bunker busters, Hellfires and Bulldogs flying all over Cleveland Browns Stadium. Though, that last one probably pertains more to the fans in the "Dawg Pound".

If you thought Cleveland had no chance at beating Cincy in shootout, then you were very, very wrong. Derek Anderson threw for 328 yards, 5TD's and 1INT as the Browns beat the Bengals 51-45. This, less than one week after Cleveland had traded away former starting quarterback Charlie Frye.

Cincy did put up good numbers, Carson Palmer passed for 401yds, 6TD's and 2INT's, and Chad Johnson finished with 11 receptions, 209 yards and 2TD's. However, Cleveland came into the game as a 7.5 point underdog at home, and pulled out the win. Yet, Yahoo! Sports decided to put up a picture of Chad Johnson stiff-arming Leigh Bodden on their frontpage.

Seriously? They couldn't find a picture of one of Braylon Edwards' 8 catches or his 2 touchdowns? What about Kellen Winslow and his 6 catches and 1 touchdown? Or even Jamal Lewis as he rushed for 215 yards and 1 touchdown?

I understand that Carson Palmer and Chad Johnson are bigger "stars" than Derek Anderson and Braylon Edwards, but the Browns played a helluva game yesterday and pulled out a pretty crazy victory. It only seems fitting that they should get more recognition than a picture of their cornerback getting a hand to the grill by Ocho Cinco.

Bengals Fans Just Aren't Having A Good Year

This past weekend, another Cincinnati Bengals player was arrested, the 10th this offseason, and this morning, the decision to dismiss a lawsuit pertaining to the financing of Paul Brown Stadium was upheld.

Back in 1996, "voters approved a half-cent sales tax hike for the $450 million Paul Brown Stadium". However, an anti-trust suit was filed in 2003 claiming that taxpayers and officials had been forced into approving the funding with the threat of the Bengals leaving Cincinnati if a new stadium wasn't built.

The problem is that there is a four year statue of limitations attached to cases like that, and the suit was filed three years too late. It was dismissed without county officials' being able to state their case that they were "victimized by monopoly power".

In his ruling, Judge Jeffrey Sutton said:

"The only thing worse than having a losing team is having no team-- no team for the community and its political leaders to support and no reason to say: 'There's always next year.'"

What about a team that's had close to 1/5 of its players arrested? I'm sure that some Bengals fans wish they didn't have a team this offseason, and if the arrests keep up they might not have a team to field "next year". Unless the fans feel like making a visit to the county lockup. With any luck, Judge Sutton will have some of those Bengals players make appearances in his court so he can tell them how great they are no matter if they're winning, losing, driving under the influence, puking out of car windows or being drunk and disorderly.