So I read two books recently that take place in the world of sports and both are about Cleveland teams and both make use of Cleveland's endless bad luck and ability to lose even when the game is in hand!
The Entitled is about an Indians player and an Indians manager and how they deal with the player being charged with rape. It's pretty good, but some of the plot points are aggravating. Like, the Indians were poised to win the ALCS against the Yankees and head into the World Series, when the manager takes out the star player because he isn't 100% and then the Indians lose. Was that really necessary for the book?
Playing for Pizza starts off with a quarterback for the Browns single-handedly losing a 21-point lead in about 8 minutes due to his incompetence. And it wasn't just any game, it was the AFC Championship so thanks to him the Browns don't make it to the Super Bowl. So now our awful quarterback hero is seeking work and avoiding extremely angry Cleveland fans who want to kill him and so ends up in Italy, playing American football over there. This story was not that enjoyable, even taking out the Browns aspect. John Grisham might write a good legal thriller but his other stories are really fluffy and not that good. See: Skipping Christmas.
It's bad enough that the real teams make us fans suffer. I don't really need it fictionalized too! It might not be so bad if these were longtime fans using Cleveland sports misery as a backdrop to tell a story but they aren't.
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