Just as there is competition between sports at a college, trying not to be the only one in the bunch that doesn’t play well, there is competition between various sports teams in a city for the same reason.

We’ll begin our tour of the AFC North in Pittsburgh, where the Steelers have done well for decades and so have the Penguins, while the Pirates have struggled for most of the last 35 years. As such, then, the Pens have been the ones needing to up their game.

In Baltimore, the Ravens have done pretty well since arriving in 1996. The Orioles were good then, too, but then fell way off, recovering only in the last two seasons.

In Cincinnati, the Bengals had struggled more often than not until recently, while the Reds have had a good deal of success.

And finally, in Cleveland over the last 30 seasons, the Guardians have been competitive much more often that not, the Cavaliers have done much of the same, including winning the city’s first pro sports championship since 2016, and the Browns have mostly struggled. With that, then, they have been the outcasts.

Going back much further, the Guarduans went four decades without making the playoffs — letting the Browns rule the town and causing baseball season to, in essence, end when training camp began — before finally doing so in 1995, getting all the way to the World Series. They went again two years later, in 1997. They took the city by storm, just as the original Browns franchise was bolting to Baltimore, leaving the city without pro football from 1996-98. It was the perfect storm. The Guardians took full advantage of the situation, becoming one of the best teams in Major League Baseball and building a large and loyal fanbase.

You’ll recall that, in the early 1990s, then Browns owner Art Modell was furious that the Guardians and Cavs both had brand-new facilities Downtown while his team, which had carried the city sports-wise for all those years, did without. And when Baltimore dangled a guarantee of a new stadium under his nose, he jumped at it.

Yes, indeed, there is completion between a city’s sports teams, in Cleveland and elsewhere, and it is carried out on and off the field.

Steve King