The Cleveland sports curse was a sports superstition involving the city of Cleveland, Ohio, and its major league professional sports teams, centered on the failure to win a championship in any major league sport for 52 years, from 1964 to 2016. Three major league teams based in Cleveland contributed to belief in the curse: the Browns of the National Football League (NFL); the Cavaliers of the National Basketball Association (NBA); and the then-Indians of Major League Baseball (MLB).
The championship drought began after the Browns defeated the Baltimore Colts in the 1964 NFL Championship Game, two seasons before the first Super Bowl. The city's professional sports teams, including the short-lived Barons franchise of the National Hockey League, then went an unprecedented 147 combined seasons without a championship. The drought ended when the Cavaliers beat the Golden State Warriors in Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Finals by overcoming a 3–1 series deficit, an event widely interpreted as having broken the curse.
Cleveland Browns
Much of the discussion of the curse is centered on the NFL's Cleveland Browns, who have not won a championship since 1964 and have suffered a series of questionable coaching decisions, disappointing losses and draft busts.
Before Art Modell became majority owner of the team, the Browns had dominated the NFL and the earlier All-America Football Conference (AAFC), winning seven championships in 17 years. After three non-playoff seasons, the 1964 Browns' team finished 10–3–1 and appeared in the 1964 NFL Championship Game against a heavily favored Baltimore Colts team coached by Don Shula with Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Johnny Unitas as its signal caller. The Browns beat the Colts 27–0 at Cleveland Stadium. This particular Browns team consisted of many players initially drafted and acquired by Paul Brown, the Browns' former long-time head coach and architect of the team's earlier successes, who had been fired by Modell early in 1963. During the next 30 years in Cleveland, not a single Modell team won the league or conference title, although they did appear in seven NFL/American Football Conference (AFC) championship games.
The Browns returned to the NFL Championship Game in 1965, where they lost to the Green Bay Packers. In the spring of 1966, star running back Jim Brown was cast in the film The Dirty Dozen. Brown went to England to take part in filming, which suffered production delays due to stormy weather. The production delays caused Brown to miss the first part of training camp, resulting in Modell fining him for every day he missed. Not one to take threats, Brown–who had won three MVPs, had made the Pro Bowl all nine years of his career, and was the NFL's all-time leading rusher at that point–chose to retire rather than pay the fines. The Browns missed the playoffs in 1966 and were knocked out by the Cowboys 52–14 in 1967. The Browns made the NFL Championship Game in 1968, but lost to the Colts 34–0. The Browns returned in 1969, losing to the Vikings 27–7. After the AFL-NFL merger, the Browns were placed in the AFC. There, the Browns made two playoff trips in 1971 and 1972, but suffered early exits both times.
The Browns did not return to the playoffs until 1980. Trailing by two points to the Oakland Raiders and in field goal range with less than one minute remaining in the AFC divisional playoff game, the Browns executed a passing play that was intercepted in the end zone. The play, called by Browns head coach Sam Rutigliano, has become known as "Red Right 88". The Raiders later went on to win that seasons's Super Bowl. In 1986, the Browns were one game away from playing in what would have been the franchise's first Super Bowl when they fell short in one of the most memorable games in NFL history. The Browns were leading the Denver Broncos 20–13 in the fourth quarter when Broncos quarterback John Elway led a 98-yard game-tying drive in just over 5 minutes. The game went to overtime, and the Broncos kicked a field goal to seal the victory. Elway's fourth quarter march and the game itself became known as "The Drive", a title that both signifies Elway's brilliance in the clutch and the Browns' inability to close out important games. The Browns and Broncos both returned to the AFC Championship Game the next year. With the Browns down 38–31 late in the fourth quarter, Browns' running back Earnest Byner was handed the ball near the goal line. Byner, who was in the midst of a great performance, was stripped of the ball and the Broncos recovered on their 2-yard line. The Broncos surrendered an intentional safety and went on to win 38–33, while Byner's blunder became known as "The Fumble". The Browns returned to the AFC Championship game in 1989, again losing to the Broncos. As of the 2024 NFL season, the Browns have not returned to the AFC Championship Game since and remain one of four teams to never play in a Super Bowl, along with the Detroit Lions, Houston Texans, and Jacksonville Jaguars.
The Browns were at the center of a relocation controversy in 1995. The decision by then-Browns owner Art Modell to move the Browns, which had been an 11–5 team the previous season, to Baltimore infuriated and confused Browns fans. After negotiations with the NFL and the city of Cleveland, Modell was allowed to move the team's personnel to Baltimore, where it became a new franchise known as the Baltimore Ravens. The Ravens won a Super Bowl in only their fifth year of existence, doing so with former Browns tight end Ozzie Newsome as their general manager. In addition to Newsome's success, coach Bill Belichick, who was fired as Browns' head coach soon after the 1995 season, became head coach of the New England Patriots five years later. With the Patriots, Belichick coached only four losing seasons and won nine AFC Championships and six Super Bowls. The struggles of the Browns since rejoining the NFL, as well as the success of both Newsome and Belichick, were chronicled in the NFL Films feature A Football Life: 1995 Cleveland Browns.
The Browns returned to the NFL in 1999, after a three-year period of deactivation. In the 1999 NFL draft, the Browns selected Tim Couch, hoping he would be a franchise quarterback. Ty Detmer was brought in to usher in the planned "Couch era", but after a string of dismal performances by Detmer, Couch was rushed into the starting position. Couch struggled to perform without a talented roster around him, which led to his eventual departure from the Browns after 2003. The Browns could have selected Kurt Warner in the 1999 NFL expansion draft, as the St. Louis Rams left him unprotected. However the Browns chose not to do so. Warner would go on to win the NFL Most Valuable Player Award in the 1999 and 2001 seasons and also helped the Rams win Super Bowl XXXIV. The Browns suffered through losing seasons in their first three seasons after their return, but returned to the playoffs in 2002, losing to the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Wild Card round despite having a 24–7 lead in the 3rd quarter of that game. The Browns would not have another winning season until 2007, when they went 10–6. The Browns missed the playoffs because they lost the divisional tiebreaker to the Steelers on account of a head-to-head sweep and the wild card tiebreaker to the Titans based on head-to-head record against common opponents.
The Browns never finished better than 7–9 in the 2010s. In the 2011 NFL draft, the Browns held the sixth overall pick, but traded back with the Atlanta Falcons. The Falcons would use that pick to select Julio Jones while the Browns used the third overall pick in 2012 to select Trent Richardson. Jones would go on to be considered one of the best wide receivers of the 2010s with Atlanta, while Richardson only appeared in 17 games before being traded to the Colts in 2013 for a 2014 first-round pick. The Browns used the first-round pick they received from the Colts to select Johnny Manziel, whose career was overshadowed by numerous off-field issues and played his last game in 2015. On November 30, 2015, the Browns played the Baltimore Ravens in their first Monday Night Football game in six years. After trailing 17–3 in the second quarter, the Browns rallied behind quarterbacks Josh McCown and Austin Davis to tie the game at 27 with 1:47 left. Browns cornerback Tramon Williams intercepted a pass at mid-field with 50 seconds left. The Browns attempted a 51-yard field goal with three seconds left to win the game, only to see the attempt blocked and returned by Ravens safety Will Hill for a touchdown, handing the Browns their most painful loss in recent history. The event was called "The Block" by some disgruntled fans on Twitter only moments after the end of the game.
The Browns’ struggles continued after the Curse ended in 2016. After going 1–15 in 2016, the Browns arguably hit rock-bottom in the 2017 season, where, under head coach Hue Jackson, the Browns went a league-worst and franchise record-worst 0–16, becoming just the second team in NFL history since the implementation of the 16-game season (joining the 2008 Detroit Lions) to lose every game in a season. The Browns eventually posted a winning record and returned to the playoffs in 2020 and 2023.
Cleveland Cavaliers The Cleveland Cavaliers are a professional basketball team who have played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) since 1970.
Over the franchise's first 16 years, the team produced just three winning seasons, the highlight being the 1975–76 "Miracle at Richfield" team, whose improbable playoff run was doomed by an injury to Jim Chones. The early-mid 1980s saw the franchise ruined by owner Ted Stepien's decision to trade away every first-round pick the Cavaliers held for inferior talent, while those picks turned into players such as James Worthy and Derek Harper. Despite this, the Cavaliers gained respectability towards the end of the decade and the early 1990s, making the playoffs with players such as Mark Price, Brad Daugherty, Larry Nance, Hot Rod Williams and Craig Ehlo on their roster.
In 1989, the Cavaliers faced the Chicago Bulls in the first round of the playoffs. In the decisive fifth game, Craig Ehlo had given the Cavaliers the lead with three seconds to play. However, the Bulls' Michael Jordan jumped over Ehlo to make the game-winning shot, known as The Shot, and the Bulls won the game, 101–100, to clinch the series. Despite six trips to the playoffs between 1988 and 1994, including a 1992 Eastern Conference Finals appearance, the Cavaliers never made it to the NBA Finals, as Jordan's Bulls defeated them in the playoffs five times during the Daugherty–Nance–Price era.
In 2007, Ohio native LeBron James led the Cavaliers to their first NBA Finals appearance. However, they were swept by the San Antonio Spurs. Two years later, the Cavaliers, despite posting a conference-best 66–16 record, lost the 2009 Eastern Conference Finals to the Orlando Magic, 4–2. In the following season's playoffs, though his team always possessed home-court advantage, the reigning two-time MVP James and the 2009–10 Cavaliers (61–21) were defeated by the visiting Boston Celtics in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals, 120–88. The Cavaliers went on to lose the series, 4–2.