Hope for Cleveland

Let’s get two things straight before we go farther.

1. This is the last time I will blatantly blog about the Cleveland Cavaliers 2010 season.

2. This is for me, not for you. So if you’re not a Cleveland sports fan, or you don’t care to help me heal, you don’t need to read any more.

It’s about 3 a.m. Cleveland time as I write this. But I can’t sleep. For those of you who strictly come to this site for Indians news, I’m sleepless over the Cavs losing to the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Semifinals, four games to two.

It’s not that the Cavs lost, it’s how they lost. Brian Windhorst, the fantastic beat writer for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, posted quite honestly one of the finest blogs I’ve ever read (no really, read it. It’s that good) and it’s got me thinking. All the time, Cleveland fans complain of being snake-bitten, no luck losers who never win championships. “God Hates Cleveland” is a frequent Facebook status update among my Cleveland friends.

With this Cavs team, I thought it was different. 61 regular season wins had me thinking that this Cavs team was legit. They ran into a bad matchup last year with the Orlando Magic. It would be different this year.

It was different. Because they were worse.

Cleveland, God doesn’t hate you. God has nothing to do with whether Cleveland sports win or lose. Cleveland sports lose, 95% of the time, because they simply aren’t as good. The other 5% is dumb luck, which wasn’t the case with this year’s Cavs.

But you know what? It wasn’t the case with last year’s Cavs either. Or the 2007 Indians. And you know what? As much as it hurts to admit it, and as close as they got to a World Series Championship, the 1997 Indians were only an 86 win team. The title wasn’t their birthright.

Cleveland, as much as this hurts, there’s light at the end of the tunnel. We still have professional sports teams (for now). There’s always a chance. There’s always a hope, which is a powerful thing, because sometimes that’s all we’ve got.

We’ve got hope, and the fact that there’s always next year.