While We’re Waiting… Sizemore signs (!) and to trash talk or not

Cleveland sports fans are waiting. Thus, while we’re all waiting, the WFNY editors thought you might enjoy reading. Because you never know how long we might be waiting. So here are assorted reading goodies for you to enjoy. Send more good links for tomorrow’s edition to tips@waitingfornextyear.com.

“Sports are simply more entertaining when filled with outlandish characters and not blood-and-bones factories that produce nothing but the same empty clichés that we’ve had spewed at us since Muhammad Ali hung up his fighting mittens. Judging by the traffic driven by Richard Sherman’s post-game column — over four million unique visitors as of yesterday — I’m not alone in that sentiment.

Arrogance and trash talk are crutches athletes need to survive at the highest level of sport. Whether folks like to admit it or not, it’s as ingrained into our sports culture as alcohol.

So why are people shocked when trash-talk bubbles over into the public sphere? We should welcome it. Death to clichés and empty platitudes masquerading under some archaic banner of “sportsmanship.” In the words of the immortal Dan Hawkins, “This ain’t intramurals, brother.”

Give me honesty, bravado and yes, trash talk. Yesterday, today, tomorrow and forever.” [Byrnes/Eleven Warriors]

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“So that makes things pretty clear. First of all, Deng isn’t going back to Chicago. And second, it’s going to take more than $10 million per year to keep Deng this offseason.

To sum up Deng’s feelings about the Bulls contract offer in the words of Austin Carr: GET THAT WEAK STUFF OUTTA HERE.” [Kaczmarek/Fear the Sword]

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“Clearly, Mewhort is going to interview well with NFL teams this week and next month in Indianapolis. He called serving as a captain for the 2013 Ohio State team — a big deal among many NFL decision-makers — one of his greatest accomplishments and something he’ll never forget, but also said he knows “anything I did, anybody did in college, that’s over now. We’re all starting from scratch.” [Jackson/FSO]

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“First off, Chuck Klosterman will be back again to chronicle the excitement that is the Berea War Room. (Lol, j/k.) But seriously, last year’s draft class obviously didn’t provide an impact for last year’s season; we view this as a miss; accountability has been assigned internally. That said, we’re confident that several players from last year’s draft will contribute to the team in the years to come. As pertains to this year, we’re excited to have extra picks coming into what is rated as a strong draft class. I’m confident in the team assembled in creating our draft evaluations, I hope when I write this letter next year the player eval team will have earned your confidence too.

In closing, our goal for 2014 is the playoffs. We will have built-in excuses due to the uncertain quarterback situation and a new coaching staff. We will not be using those excuses. One need only look at this year’s playoffs to see that a new coach and a new starting QB can get you to the playoffs. See Chip Kelly1 and Nick Foles; Andy Reid and Alex Smith.” [Kanicki]

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“Source confirms: Grady Sizemore to #RedSox on one-year, major-league deal. Guarantee less than $1M, bonuses can take it up to $6M.” [Rosenthal/Twitter]