“What if every owner was free to discard fans’ opinions and move to the place where his or her franchise would be worth the most?” The Washington Post proposed. “The football fans in us hate such a thinking exercise. But the economics writers in us love it.”
In its model, the Cleveland Browns would flee to — of all places — Mexico City, a “huge market” that, like London, represents a “foothold in a global expansion strategy that could boost every NFL team’s value, not just the ones moving there. If a change in passports helps the teams shake off their histories of heartbreak, all the better.”
Only seven teams would relocate, according to the Washington Post experiment, most of them from America’s inland North region, the mid-century meccas of the Rust Belt and Great Lakes: Buffalo (to Brooklyn); Cleveland (to Mexico City); Detroit (to Toronto); and Cincinnati (to Las Vegas).
Jacksonville, San Diego and New Orleans were also pegged as teams who’d benefit from a move, to London (natch), to Orange County and to the “patch of highway between Austin and San Antonio,” respectively.
Go Browns.
This article appears in Sep 7-13, 2016.
The Mexico City Browns sounds like what happens after you drink the water
Jimmy Haslam would still want that new training facility in Columbus.
After a season predicted to be worse than last year, or maybe even worse than anything we’ve since 1999, would anyone miss them if fantasy became reality?
Every year I see more and more Pissburgh gear…it can’t all be yahoo transplants from West Virginny or North Missitucky. A lot of people already have too much pain in their daily lives, and have become totally disgusted and fed up with the Factory of Sadness.
A little while back, I finally reached the point where I could no longer listen or watch. Life is too short…and every year, those lovely fall Sundays are more precious. I’d rather hike or bike or even rake leaves.
Oh, I will still wear the orange and brown, but I’m already done. .
Chuckles the Clown