A belated Happy Birthday to us.
By us in this case, I mean this website, brownsdailydose.com.
We turned one year old on Saturday.
It was Aug. 6, 2015 that we launched.
And we’re still here a year – and two days – later, with no plans to go anywhere but up and on. We will continue to explore how we can improve and thus better serve you, our ever-growing number of loyal readers.
We very much appreciate your eyes and attention with your daily visits to the site. If we could thank every one of you separately, we would. But since that’s not possible, we’ll tell you all simultaneously that we owe you a debt of gratitude.
If you’re new to our site, or nearly-new, or if you’re just wondering what our site is all about, well, we’re glad you asked.
Here’s your answer:
The site is just as our name implies, in that it is a daily dose of something about the Browns.
And when we say a daily dose, we man a daily dose. We don’t take days off. We put up fresh stuff every day.
That includes New Year’s Day, Christmas Day, Mother’s Day, Dominion Day, Flag Day, Sweetest Day, National Doughnut Day, Sweetest Day, Groundhog Day, D-Day, Executive Assistants Day, Opening Day, the Day Before Yesterday, Today, The Day After Tomorrow, Day After Day, Doris Day, Jason Day, Day of the Jackal, The Day The Earth Stood Still, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, The Day of Reckoning, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Presidents Day, St. Patrick’s Day, All Saints Day and every other day during the calendar year. Count on it.
We’ve never tried to break news here on any day. That’s almost impossible to do nowadays with the instant media world in which we live. Something happens in practice at Browns Headquarters in Berea, and a split-second later, some sheep farmer in a Third World country knows about it when it pops up on his phone. So there you are.
But that’s not really what we want to do – what we want to be about – anyway, for breaking news is breaking for only a moment, then comes the much more important part of the story of trying to figure out what it means.
Yes, that’s right, what does it mean?
There are any number of places to read Browns news. All of them do a great job.
The media people will tell you this happened, that happened, this coach said this, that player said that, there have been four of this, there have been 37 of that, this has never happened, that has happened every day since the sport of football began, they play here tomorrow, they play there a week from Monday, and so on and so forth. They will tell you all the facts — what happened, and in what order they happened, and who was involved at every step along the way. You’ll know the whole story.
Except for why it happened in the way it did.
Except for what all the facts mean, not just now, but, more importantly, in going forward for the long haul. That’s the main takeaway from these stories. That’s what you need to remember – really, the only things you need to remember.
Browns fans who work a full-time job and spend their free time ferrying three kids back and forth from baseball practice, basketball practice and gymnastics class, don’t have time to sift through all the stories about all the news. What they do have time for – and want – are what it all means.
Indeed, when you take that stuff – all those facts and figures and people and happenings and this and that and the other – and throw it into a pot and cook it, what bubbles to the surface when all the superfluous boils away? It’s the good stuff. It’s the meat. It’s what you can chew on.
We want to try to read between the lines, to tell the stories that are not being told because they aren’t being spelled out in so many words. You’ve got to dig for them a little bit. You’ve got to connect the dots.
When coaches and players talk, don’t listen just to what they say, but also to how they’re saying it. Decipher that – read the body language – and it will tell you considerably more than any words ever could. That’s guaranteed.
The NFL is the ultimate marketing machine, with something newsworthy happening for 49 weeks out of the year. Only for the last week of June and the first two weeks of July, when everyone in the league goes on vacation to get ready for the start of training camp and the long season to follow, does the NFL go dark, or at least dims its lights a bit. For just about every day in those 49 weeks, something is going on and we will try to tell you about in ways you’re not seeing anywhere else.
And on days when there is absolutely nothing happening, or when the best story – the most interesting story, the most compelling story and simply the coolest story — is something far, far off the beaten path, we’ll tell it.
When you come here every day for your daily dose of the Browns, we want you to find something that piques your interest. If it’s an opinion you’re reading – and a lot of times it is indeed an opinion – you may agree or disagree with it, or perhaps you’re completely ambivalent about it. But when you walk away and begin to get about your day, in the very least we want you to say, “Hmmm. That was really interesting. I didn’t know that,” or, “I was not aware of that. It will give me something to think about today.”
Football is serious business in this town. Browns fans are passionate about their team. They care a whole lot.
But at the same time, let’s be honest with each other in saying that we’re not splitting the atom here, we’re not coming up with a cure for cancer and we’re not attempting to solve world peace. Not even close.
Rather, this is football. This is entertainment. It’s supposed to be fun. And we want to do our best to make it fun, to make it enjoyable and a positive experience that, in some ways or perhaps a lot of ways, brings you joy. We all need to have joy in our lives.
Save your angst – your concerns, your worries and your vim and vigor – for the real-life things that really matter.
Again, thanks for being with us, and we hope you stay with us and see what lies ahead because we’re just getting started. We’re excited, enthused and ready to go.
Now you’ll have to excuse us because we have a candle to burn out so we can officially get started on year No. 2 of brownsdailydose.com.
