Went to the baseball game on the same night the Cavaliers clinched their conference title.  It was quite a night in downtown Cleveland.  Alive.  To say the least.

However, the baseball game was not pleasing, a disappointment.

I remember as a kid going to the Polo Grounds, Yankee Stadium and most of all, Ebbets Field as a young Dodger fan during the Boys of Summer period.  You were afforded the opportunity to see a baseball game.

Now, I’m not sure a youngster can claim to enjoy a ballgame in the same way I remember.

Jacobs Field – I wonder why we still honor the name of the creep, who doesn't pay the $950,000 a year or so required for the honor – doesn’t offer easy enjoyment.  (The Plain Dealer last week said former team owner Dick Jacobs had paid $20 million to Gateway for the naming rights for the stadium.  Actually, he paid some $7 million, less than half of what the deal called for originally.)

Oh, the baseball field itself is fine.  It’s made for real baseball.  Green grass, well manicured.

Yet, the fan is bombarded with almost constant commercialism of the most repulsive, juvenile sort.  It never ends.

The giant TV in the outfield blares out snippets of old games between innings.  The team, of course, is scoring in the replays and the loudspeaker is spiked up.  Loud, louder... loudest.

At other times, the giant screen has someone ditzy giving away this or that, somewhere in the stadium with tasteless quickie interviews and giggles.

You have to pay good money to be royally irritated in an atmosphere of purposeful distraction.

They tell me Cavs games are worse by far.  Rampant commercialism and constant noise-attacks when the game isn’t actually being played.

No one seems to be allowed to contemplate the action or talk to the person in the next seat about what both had just seen.

I have learned one lesson.  Do not go to a MLB baseball game ever again.

Do people really go to a ballgame for more than the ambience of the field and the play of the game?

It’s far better to watch the game, if you can, on television with the sound turned off.

Meanwhile, in the “news” media, we're being treated to a full menu of sports – CAVS over and over again.  Isn’t it the most important thing in your dull life?

The front page of the Pee Dee has become the sports page.  War?  What war?

We’re back to 1996, when the Pee Dee was filled with Indians, Browns and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  All on the front page.  Of course, the Pee Dee continues to call for LEADERSHIP.  They know how to spell it but can’t perform it for shit.

So now, see how much that past false excitement meant to progress in Cleveland.  It has been downhill economically since the 1990s.

Hail Our Leaders!

I won’t deal with television because I don’t believe in torture.

Watching what passes for television news is simply torturous.  I did unfortunately catch of glimpse of Ted Henry opening his nightly “news” program the other night.  I thought I was watching Henry VIII preparing for an orgy.  False gusto by the mouthful.  I have to move faster with the remote.

I’m not going to detail the bombardment of Cavs on the front page of the morning mouth.  You can see it for yourself and decide for yourself.

What I see is The Pandering Dealer.  I know it’s a little hard to fill the front page with sports trivia every day.  It takes resourcefulness, which apparently is in short supply.

The best effort of making something out of nothing goes to John Campanelli, the PD’s super editor of Trite.  His “How the Two Cities (ours and San Antonio) Stack Up” is worth mocking.

The most inventive Campanelli could do was match Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzalez with Rep. Dennis Kucinich...  “Home town politician who won’t go away.”  Ha, ha, another Kucinich joke for the mirthless Plain Dealer.

I also thought that the new PD editor, Susan Goldberg, had great interest in newspaper design.  If the front pages are any example, I am really worried about what isn’t her journalistic interest.  However, maybe she hasn’t imposed her will yet. Let’s hope so.

I looked at four days last week – one on a game day, none reporting a game played – and found Page One space devoted to the Cavs.

- One day the space awarded the Cavs on Page 1 took five-and-a-half columns and 12 inches in depth.  A total of 66 inches on the front page.

-  Another day a 3-column display, 19 inches in depth for 57 column inches of the front page devoted to the Cavs.

- A third day another five-and-one-half column display and again 12 inches in depth for 66 column inches dominated the front page of the newspaper.

- A fourth day a 3-1/2 column display with 15 inches in depth for 52.5 column inches of scarce space on Page One.

That adds up to 241.5 column inches of Page One misused space over four days.

The sad part is that not one of these Page One “displays” is a news story!

That sets a record for pandering.  Maybe the paper can get the tests of high school seniors to go heavy on sports trivia.  It would help the Cleveland schools.

On the day after the Cavs’ first game loss the entire front page was devoted to the Cavs, the second time in a week or so that the PD lead page was fully devoted to a basketball game.  On both occasions, however, the real Page One was on page three.

You would think the paper would take a break.  No, the next day it is right back to Page One basketball hype.

The PD followed the full-page front page with another 5-1/2 column, 13.5-inch display again dominated the front page with another 67.5 column inches to the Cavs.

Other important news gets short shrift.

Inside the paper, the PD devoted 123 words in less than 3 inches of space to a Cleveland City Plan Commission vote.  It involved the bitter battle over the Breuer Building, a historic downtown structure and the only skyscraper by architect Marcel Breuer.  The 4-3 losing vote was to preserve the building Cuyahoga County Commissioners Tim Hagan and Jimmy Dimora want torn down.

The Pee Dee might call this “fair and balanced.”

I call it killing community attention to a civic crime.

There’s a place for some civic boosterism, I’ll admit.  Even a place for selling t-shirts.

It doesn’t mean, however, that newspapers become constant cheerleaders, trying to heat up community spirit to sell a few more newspapers.

Let the good times come naturally, will ya.