08-17-2015, 10:30 PM
(08-17-2015, 08:36 PM)BFritz21 Wrote: The history did not go with the team because of the lawsuit. It's a technicality.You keep outdoing your own ridiculousness. How could they possibly earn championships that were decided in the 1950's?
The entire franchise- players, personnel, owner, etc.- went to Baltimore, so how would an expansion team, the new Browns, have a history with championships?
Everything that the old Browns did formed who the Ravens are, but nothing the old Browns did formed the new Browns (other than the name, location, other technicalities that have nothing to do with actual football on the field).
You would be referring to them as the Browns if there hadn't been a lawsuit. Modell moved the entire franchise to Baltimore.
The old Browns (the new Ravens) EARNED those championships and that history, so you can't just start a new franchise and say that they get all the history just because they have the same name and location.
The ONLY thing that they did to allign themselves with any of it was to sign with the Browns franchise. Literally the stroke of a pen. And it was the stroke of a pen (Modell's settlement) that made them a different franchise.
No one is saying that all the former Browns players couldn't still claim to have been part of that franchise while they were still Browns; we're just saying that the Ravens franchise could not. And certainly none of the Ravens players who never played for the Browns can.
