I think it's finally about to end. All the clamoring and hand-wringing of the last, oh say, 50 years or so will cease very soon on the north coast. A team from Cleveland will win a championship in the next calendar year (and a half).

Think about it. When was the last time all 3 Cleveland sports teams went into their respective seasons with a legitimate shot of winning it all? Dare I say never? The odds simply stack up against the drought continuing. As a Boston fan, who truly believed I'd never see the day that one of my teams would win it all as recently as 2002, it really can happen. Eventually you break through.

First, the Cavs. Now admittedly, I don't follow the NBA very closely, but I have picked up on a few things recently. First, the no-doubt best basketball player on the planet right now is LeBron James. He's a beast. I don't even think it really matters who else is on the team (new look Cavs, who cares?) the only things capable of stopping LeBron are his own bad decisions. I know all the "good" teams are in the West, but if they all slug it out for two months against each other, while the Cavs tune up against Toronto or Philadelphia (see Detroit 2004), I'd say advantage Cleveland.

The Cavs will likely need to beat either Boston or Detroit (or both) to get back to the Conference Finals, and I see no reason why they shouldn't be able to do that. LeBron was unstoppable last year in the playoffs against the Pistons and I don't think the Celtics are good enough to win it all. I certainly don't get Sam Cassell.

Anyway, in a year where there's no clear-cut favorite, the team with the best player becomes a factor immediately. It would not surprise me at all to see them hoist the trophy this year, and I kind of hope they do it against the Lakers, who currently have my least favorite athlete - Kobe Bryant.

Next you have the Tribe, the team that came within one win of wining it all last year (they would have demolished the Rockies). I truly believe that by running him out for his final 3 or 4 meaningless starts last year, they turned CC into BB and wrecked any shot they had of getting the effective outings they needed from him when it counted. He sucked in the playoffs, and I know because I've been watching the DVDs of those games for about the last 3 weeks. Needless to say, if the Tribe has a spot wrapped up in the final week, they won't make the mistake of not getting key guys rest again. Heck, even the Rockies ran out of gas eventually. This is not the NFL. Plus, CyCy, or BB, CC, or ChokeChoke (whatever you want to call him) is in a contract year, which in baseball always means big numbers. If he adds a World Series ring to his resume, he'll be in line to be the highest paid pitcher in Yankees history when they open the new yard.

Besides CC, I like the moves the Tribe has made to bolster their bullpen. The one change I would have made if I were them, would have been to bring in a legit leadoff hitter. Not that Grady isn't just fine in that slot, but I think he'd be the MVP if he hit 3rd in that lineup. Can you imagine Grady, Victor, Hafner hitting 3,4,5 in that lineup? Scary. It's like when the Red Sox used to bat Boggs leadoff, or the Yankees used to have Jeter do it. They were the best guy the team had at the job, but really served them better in a different order spot. Oh, and Casey Blake has to go, as I've been saying for the better part of three years.

Yes the Tigers are better, but they have too many question marks. I'm not bullish on the Red Sox or the Angels, and I don't think the Yankees will make the playoffs at all. If they get the monster year I'd expect out of Carsten and anything at all like what they got last year out of O'Carmona, it really could be the Indians year. Seriously.

Then there's the Browns. Maybe the least likely of the three, the Browns are getting all sorts of run right now as a possible Super Bowl contender next season. Well, stranger things have certainly happened. The Brady Quinn fiasco will eventually catch up to them, as they have no first, second, or third round pick in this year's draft to stock up for the future, and they know it. Plus, Romeo bought himself a reprieve by having a breakout season last year, so to Cleveland fan's delight, they're going for broke now.

They brought in a bunch of veteran free agents to go with their mix of young talent and look to make deep playoff run next year. Could happen.

I don't know which it will be, but I think one of the three will do it. And if not, the Cavs could conceivably do it next year, too. But then in the coming seasons CC, LeBron, and most of the Browns will begin packing their bags. The window is wide open for the Pax Cuyahoga right now.

When I watched the "championship" parade that Boston threw for Ray Bourque in 2000 when he won the Stanley Cup - in Denver! - I remember thinking how pathetic it all seemed. A title-starved town with a storied past, but no recent successes looked more and more like a bunch of whining losers. The baseball team was known for its celebrated collapses, and at one point went through a stretch (from 1986 to 2003) where they lost 24 of 29 playoff games - and that included a series that they won against Cleveland in '99. The football franchise was legendary for its folly, and though they had broken through to get to a couple of Super Bowls, they had been beaten badly in them and had returned to mediocrity. The basketball and hockey teams (who I never really cared all that much about) had become completely irrelevant, and I was positive that it would never, ever happen in my lifetime - much as I hear my Cleveland fan friends (well, McGregor) say pretty routinely nowadays.

Well, 28 out of 41 playoff wins - including two World Series sweeps, later, the Red Sox are lovable losers no more. Three Super Bowl rings and the Patriots are the dynasty (albeit probably dying) that everybody loves to hate, the Celtics are back in it, and even the Bruins are hot. Fortunes turned in a very short period of time and it didn't take long to change the outlook of an entire region.

Now it's Cleveland's turn.

- ghost