Leaky Faucets

Cleveland can’t finish. That’s it. The Cavaliers again proved the theory on Thursday. And also last Monday before that. When it comes down to the final moments of a crucial playoff game, Cleveland players just can’t cut it. I’ve seen this my whole life as a Cleveland sports fan. The Indians blowing it in Game 7 against the Marlins in 1997 when we were all ready to rush the streets of downtown Cleveland in celebration. The Browns against Elway. First there was the Drive. Then, more humiliatingly, the Fumble. The Cavaliers couldn’t get past Jordan and the Bulls when, at least in the initial meetings, they were the better team. Remember the famous Jordan game winner over Craig Ehlo, that is still shown incessantly even though Jordan is long retired. Going further back to the first heartbreaking playoff loss in my life as a sports fan was the Browns-who were heavily favored-loss to the Raiders in the frigid Cleveland Stadium of December 1980. Brian Sipe threw an interception in the end zone when a field goal would have done. But of course, place kicker Don Cockroft (pictured above) missed two extra points earlier in the game so he was not to get another chance. When Cockroft visited my elementary school a few years later-already retired-he received a smattering of boos from me and some other juvenile Browns fans who would not forget his failure.

My brother and his friend John recently acquired a bar in Cleveland. They are supposed to open up today. This has been a lifelong dream of Paul’s so I’m really happy he’s finally doing it and I hope it works out. I can’t wait to hang out there this summer. For any of you in Cleveland or passing through town check out Now That’s Class. Guaranteed to be a crazy good time.

Just read that Condoleeza Rice is a Cleveland Browns fan because Browns games were broadcast in Condi’s hometown of Birmingham, Alabama when she was growing up. I may have to start rooting for the Steelers now.

Before the show last night, Aya and I had dinner at Fine & Schapiro, a classic kosher Jewish delicatessen on the Upper West Side. We spent a few hours in midtown but had to get out of there and didn’t want to subject ourselves to the midtown deli tourist traps Stage or Carnegie. I knew that the better food was as far away from the store-window-gawkers as possible.

It was Aya’s idea to go to a deli. She wanted to have a Chanukah dinner. I just love the food. We had a great meal starting with homemade gefilte fish basically a ground cake of white fish, best eaten with horseradish sauce (which Aya likened to the Filipino dish embutido.) Then we had a large bowl of soup with a matzo ball and kreplach, a Jewish dumpling filled with ground beef. We also shared a hot corned beef on rye and potato latkes with apple sauce. The sandwich was a reasonable size and went for $9.50 as opposed to the monstrosities purveyed in midtown at monstrous prices. The atmosphere was pleasant. Only half full, they let us linger long after we were finished. The owner also gave us two free rugelach. The service was also pleasant and patient.

When I go into a place like this I suddenly feel Jewish, but certainly not in a religious way. When I step into a synagogue I don’t feel at all like a belong, but stick a corned beef sandwich and matzo ball soup in front of me, and I feel at home. I even gained the approval of a 60ish man a few tables away when I asked the waiter in advance for the dark green well done pickles only. “The real sour dills,” he said. “Those are the only good ones.” “Otherwise, you’re just eating a cucumber,” I retorted. We shared a brief laugh and a knowing glance from one Jew to another, even if my Jewishness is usually hidden at the deep recesses of my consciousness.

The deli is an integral part of the Jewish culture I grew up with and probably the only part that has stayed with me.  I’m glad Aya wants to share this, and I want our daughter to be a part of it too.  Whenever we visit Cleveland, we usually go to Corky & Lenny’s, the deli I was raised on.  In New York, Fine & Schapiro may top my list now, though this is only the second time I’ve eaten there.  The first was back when Aya was living on the UWS when we first starting dating seven or eight years ago.  I guess, inside the deli, were all Jews, even Aya a Filipino Catholic.

  

For some reason the Browns-Broncos game was televised in New York yesterday.  I’m sure they could’ve found a better game.  I don’t get to see the Browns much these days as they are rarely on national television and I don’t have any type of cable or satellite NFL package.  My only choice is to go to the Browns Backer bar on the Upper East Side, which is usually not worth it when the team can barely get a first down.

Anyway, the Browns suffered a pitiful defeat as expected.  What bothered me most, really, was the fact that every time the Browns play the Broncos, they have to again bring up the crushing losses in the AFC Championship Games in the late ‘80s.  You know “The Drive” and “The Fumble.”  Enough is enough already.  I was a vulnerable adolescent when Elway ripped out my heart and then Ernest Byner stomped on it the next year.   I’m still convinced to this day every time I see the highlight that Rich Karlis’ overtime kick was wide.  No matter how many times I see it, I don’t believe that it was good. 

As a Cleveland sports fan, you get used to this kind of disappointment, but these two losses were by far the worst for me-much worse than Jordan’s jumper over Craig Ehlo (that is also incessantly replayed) and the Indians’ meltdown in the 9^th inning of Game 7 against the Marlins.  I accept the fact that my teams are always at the losing end, but I don’t need to be reminded of it so much.

Sometime tomorrow, Paul will be loading up the U-Haul truck with his two cats and piles of records, and heading west on I-80 back to Cleveland.  After six years in
New York where he lived in three boroughs, he has decided once again to return home.  He went from Queens to Manhattan to Brooklyn, the latter seeming to suit him best, but in the end decided where he belonged most is where he began.  (You certainly can’t beat the price of real estate there.)  Part of him never left as he managed to retain an extensive network of friends after all this time.  Paul, who has been known to wander from city to city and from apartment to apartment within each city, may just stay this time.  I hope things work out for him there.

The crowd at ESPN Zone last night was quite amusing to watch. The cast of characters included the Mets fan with the orange Carlos Beltran #15 shirt perched at the bar with his friend, a Yankees fan, taunting him from behind as the Mets dipped and the Yankees soared on TV screens at opposite ends of the bar. There were the two corporate hacks, smartly dressed in suits, flirting with two young blond-haired students from Dallas, who were there to watch the Mavericks game.

Then there was the guy I assumed was from Cleveland because of his nasal accent when he excitedly told someone on the other end of a cell phone call that he was at ESPN Zone in Times Square and because of his enthusiastic response to the Cavaliers victory over Detroit. He was wearing a t-shirt with “666″ in large print on the back. The front had what looked like the name of a metal band, though I didn’t get a good look. He didn’t appear to be a Satanist-his shirt was tucked neatly into his shorts-but nonetheless, he seemed like the most interesting person in the place.

I went there after class. It was the closest place I could think of that I could catch the second half of the Cavs game. I sat on a stool behind the bar and enjoyed the game and the scene.