WHAT DO OTHER PEOPLE FROM OTHER AREAS THINK ABOUT THE BROWNS?

By STEVE KING

The worst way to get an objective view of something, or someone, is to get the same messages and opinions from the same sources.

Time and time and time again, you read, or hear, the same slanted views, and from that, you draw your own conclusions and build your own opinions.



But are they really your own conclusions and opinions? Aren’t they more – much, much more – the opinions of those sources that you are merely adopting?

And when you add to it that the people who are your sources all live in the same general area as you, those messages lose even more objectivity.

Instead, the best thing to do is to go outside your area – your comfort zone – and see what the people who don’t live near you and don’t have the same affinity as you do for the people and things about whom, and which, you care the most.

That certainly applies to sports, for which people have strong emotions, and football, for which fans – particularly in Cleveland with the Browns – have tremendously passionate emotions.

As such, then, with the Browns having enjoyed their first day off from training camp on Tuesday and thus not making any news, it’s a good time – it’s always a good time, no matter what the day – to see what the outsiders are saying about the team.

In Tuesday’s edition of USA Today were NFL power rankings from staff writer Nate Davis, his first since immediately following the NFL Draft three months ago.

He had the Browns ranked 28th of the 32 teams, which is exactly where he had them in April.

Here’s what he had to say about the Browns:

“Belichick curse? The Brown Way? Their remarkable consistency counters New England’s, with Cleveland finishing in last place (in the AFC Central) in 13 of the last 15 years.”

Ouch.

Anyway, the teams below the Browns are the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (No. 29), New York Jets (30), Indianapolis Colts (31) and Buffalo Bills (32).

The other Central teams are ranked this way: Pittsburgh Steelers (10th), Baltimore Ravens (18th) and Cincinnati Bengals (25th).

The top five teams are, in order: the Philadelphia Eagles, New England Patriots, Atlanta Falcons, Minnesota Vikings and Los Angeles Rams.

Right now, all that pretty much makes sense, doesn’t it?

I think so.