OAKLAND, Calif.: I will cry for LeBron James, that “just a kid from Akron” accepted the daunting challenge of ending Cleveland’s 52-year championship drought and was able to deliver.
I will cry for Earnest Byner and Carl Hairston, for Brian Sipe and Bob Golic. For Omar Vizquel and Mike Hargrove and Charles Nagy and, gulp, even Jose Mesa. For Craig Ehlo and Jim Chones and Mark Price, even though none of them know me.
But most of all I’ll cry for the fans in Northeast Ohio, whose blind faith through decades of bad drafts and organizational ineptitude made them cynical, but never too bitter to stop buying tickets.