However, there is cautious optimism, but that stems mostly from the fact that the team simply has a new owner in Jimmy Haslam. A young offense with some playmakers helps, especially with Rob Chudzinski and Norv Turner now guiding it. And the defense, under the tutelage of Ray Horton, could be special.

But none of this conjecture matters until the Browns prove they can win on the field. But to reach Super Bowl quality? It seems like worlds away, though the instant success of the San Francisco 49ers certainly offers some sort of hope.

So when will it be? When will Browns fans get to revel in their team playing for the Lombardi Trophy?

And, every year, fans are stuck asking themselves: When will the Browns finally make it to the Super Bowl?

The one thing the NFL holds over every other professional sports league is its parity. No other league is able to say that every team has a legitimate chance to win it all without a trail of cynicism behind it.

So why, then, are the Browns no closer to a Super Bowl than they were in 1999?

You can chalk it up to any number of things: bad management, a lack of talent, disappointing drafts, etc., but many other teams in the NFL have experienced these types of stretches and still managed to fall into an impressive season or two.

The Browns have managed to make the playoffs once (2003) and put together one 10-win season in 2007, but there hasn’t been any sustained success or even the clear evidence of a plan to reach the next level. And, after numerous disappointments, president Mike Holmgren was brought in to turn that all around.

However, after another disappointing season in which the Browns finished a dismal 4-12 and were “rewarded” with the fourth overall pick in the 2012 NFL Draft, it’s worth pondering whether the team will ever actually reach a Super Bowl.

Obviously, building a team takes time, and the roster that Holmgren and general manager Tom Heckert inherited contained a glaring lack of superior talent. Knowing that, there has to be at least a five-year grace period before determining the entire operation to be a disaster. And two years into it, there are certainly signs of progress.

But there is so much riding on this next season. The Browns need another great draft that will produce multiple starters and it’s essential that they make moves in free agency, even if that means re-signing some of their own players.

But what if Colt McCoy is not the answer at quarterback? If the Browns decide to draft, say, Robert Griffin III, and bank on him for the future, a Super Bowl wouldn’t be a realistic aspiration for at least three to five additional years.

The point is, the Browns have a small window this offseason to set the stage for a real Super Bowl run in the next few seasons. What they do now will not only dictate the immediate direction of the team, but it could affect the extended future as well. If the current front office implodes and is unable to bring the Browns any closer to contender status, where does that leave the franchise?

It’s hard to gauge a time frame, but it’s even harder to imagine a scenario where a Super Bowl berth for the Browns actually happens. Without an established franchise quarterback (but that’s not saying McCoy can’t be that guy) and needs at almost every position, the Super Bowl will continue to be the game from another universe, pitting two other-worldly teams against each other.

The Browns may get there someday. It’s the when that makes it almost too daunting to consider.

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If there’s one thing a Cleveland Browns fan knows, it’s spite. We fans carry spite in all kinds of ways towards all kinds of groups, people, and locations. As such, watching the Baltimore Ravens in the playoffs tends to bring up some unpleasant emotions from Browns fans.

But not from me.

On the one hand, it does sting my pride a little bit to know that the team Cleveland used to have has become a perennial contender less than a decade after skipping town on Art Modell’s tab. But the fact of the matter is that the Ravens aren’t the Browns. They just aren’t.

Even when they won the Super Bowl in 2000, the only holdover was Matt Stover, but everyone still acted like the Ravens were our stolen football team, winning a championship that Browns fans “deserved.” Now we get to watch them make the playoffs every year as we prepare ourselves for who the Browns will choose/mentally destroy in the upcoming draft.

So where do we draw the line? Do we get mad at the Cincinnati Bengals for picking Rey Maualuga after the Browns let him slip by in favor of Brian Robiskie? The Bengals had a pretty good defense this season, so there’s obviously a connection there, right? Do we get mad at the Pittsburgh Steelers for miraculously being the Rust Belt city to maintain a good professional football team? I mean, that clearly should have been the Browns.

These are stupid arguments. We’re not stupid people. We’re emotionally charged fans, we’re people who love football, and we’re people who do our best to maintain loyalty to a program that doesn’t do a lot for us in return.

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