Cleveland Sports Titles History Part 1

Perhaps a review of past Cleveland sports titles, (there have been 7 including the current NBA champion Cavaliers), will brighten the scene in that city, whose 2016 Indians’ A.L. Central lead has shrunk to 2 games.

Some of the greatest players in their sports, Otto Graham, Tris Speaker and LeBron James (memo to Jim Brown is your number active?) to name three really four, were on Cleveland championship teams.

The Graham led Browns with the great coach Paul Brown and runner Marion Motley among the team’s Hall of Fame players, were easily the best Cleveland team and one of the best non dynasty/glory teams ever.

In fact those Browns, who also won all four All American Football Conference crowns from (1946-1949), are an all-time team, which won conference titles in their first 6 NFL seasons and NFL titles on half (3) those occasions.

The great Tris Speaker, pictured above, was the player manager of the 1920 Cleveland team, one of the two Cleveland World Series winning teams. The other, the 1948 team also had a player manager, Lou Boudreau.

In fact, the Chicago Cubs, the only team that has gone longer than the Indians sans a World Series victory, (40 years longer since 1908), has also never won a World Series sans having a player manager.

Frank Chance was the player manager on both Cubs’ World Series winners, in 1907 and 1908.