ESPN The Magazine NFL writer David Fleming goes undercover, watching Sunday's Browns-Ravens game at a Browns Backers club out there in Strip Mall, North Carolina. Here is his report.

Five minutes to kickoff: Still not sure if I'm in the right place. Then, hurrying into the sports bar I see a grandmotherly-type woman wearing a shiny new authentic Tim Couch No. 2 Cleveland Browns jersey that hangs down to her knees like a housecoat. She also has a necklace made out of dog bones and a case of Alpo under her arm.

As she passes I offer a gentle smile. In return, she barks at me like a pit bull. Not wanting to be impolite, I grit my teeth and growl back at her.

Two minutes to kickoff: Yes, indeed, I'm in the right place. The Charlotte chapter of the Browns Backers club. The largest sports fan club in the world, the Browns Backers boast 265 clubs in 10 different countries and 38 states, including this one, in a sports bar not too far from my house in North Carolina (hey, it beats mowing the grass).

One minute to kickoff: The bar is crowded with more than 100 fans who have lived through The Drive and The Fumble, The Move and The Palmer. The joint is overflowing with equal parts orange and brown, beer and bones, belching and barking.

First quarter, 7:57: With the Brownies already ahead 7-0, I meet CBB club prez David Bates, a 35-year-old sales rep with a goatee who is wearing what I can best describe as a cotton yarmulke painted like a Browns helmet. "You wanna beer?" he asks.

5:26: "Catch the f-ing ball and run with it, ya moron!" yells a woman in face paint and a four-foot orange hat, to Cleveland wideout Kevin Johnson.

5:00: Bates says he moved here from Vermont, where on game days he used to drive to the top of the highest hill in town to tune in to the game broadcasts on AM radio from Cleveland. "When Art Modell moved the team I sat in my car and cried for about 30 minutes," he tells me. "There is just a love for this team these people have that I can't describe."

Bates says when the Browns beat the Steelers in 1999 the club went down the street into a bar frequented by Pittsburgh fans and did the cha-cha line until a massive brew-ha-ha broke out between female patrons.

End of quarter: That's nothing, I tell him. Once, while covering a game from the old Dawg Pound in Cleveland Municipal Stadium, I watched a Browns fan pull out a severed deer leg, complete with exposed tendons, in order to taunt the (former) Houston Oilers. Whenever he could get a player's attention the man waved the deer hoof at them by yanking on the tendons.

Second quarter, 13:24: Intentional grounding on Couch. "PILE ON THE REFS!" comes the call from a man wearing a Bernie Kosar jersey who has somehow fashioned drink straws into a makeshift facemask. I see that Bates sets out team rosters for club members, but they sit unused. These people have it committed to memory. Ya know, in a sports world overrun with free-agent fans -- is there no cure for Ramwagonitis? -- this loyalty and passion and knowledge is quite refreshing ...

13:22: "Getcha a beer or somethin?" asks VP Claude Riley.

13:20: ...and when Modell tried to choke the life out of the franchise these folks kept it on life support with their very own breath and blood. And as ticket costs skyrocket (it now costs $442.54 to take a family of four to a Redskins game) and the average Joe Fan continues to get priced out of corporatized stadiums, clubs like this, which drew more than 300 fans to a recent tailgate party, will eventually become the modern-day version of the old bleacher seats we used to enjoy.

2:19: Explosive applause as defensive back Anthony Henry picks off Ravens QB Elvis Grbac and the Browns convert to make it 10-6. The new Browns have never beaten Modell's Ravens. I quietly bark my approval.

Halftime: Bates announces over the bar's PA system that ESPN is in the (dawg) house! My cover is blown. It's odd, but nice, to be barked at by 100 people.

"For the longest time in the '50s the Browns were football, that's how all this started," explains former Cleveland defensive end Jack Gregory, 57, who is sitting at the bar, a lite beer hidden by his meaty hands. "God love these fans, whether they're freezing their asses off in that stadium or a thousand miles away cheering in front of a TV -- they are the most loyal fans in the world."

Bates announces that last game the club raised $400 for the Hospice of Charlotte. This week they are collecting donations for the humane society -- thus the cases of Alpo.

"Let me buy ya a beer or a shot or somethin?" says Gregory. "And we'll toast that son-of-a-bitch we're beating the hell out of right now ... wait, you can't write that down."

Third quarter, 5:38: Linebacker Jamir Miller plants Grbac in the turf like a lawn dart and the Browns recover the fumble. On the next play Couch connects with wideout Quincy Morgan for a 36-yard TD to go up 24-6. It is the best the Browns have looked in six long years. Wondering now if the roof will hold. They can probably hear us in Cleveland.

5:24: Large man approaching. Looks angry. Puts hand on my shoulder and looks me right in the eye. "Hey! Whatcha drinkin' big fella ... Wooooooo!"

5:20: Grbac has checked out of the game, but not a single fan has left this bar. "Help me coach!" yells a CBB member as Grbac gimps off the field, "I've hurt my ovaries!"

:23: Randall Cunningham is sacked to stall a drive. Chants of "Modell Sucks!" and "Baltimore Sucks!" begin to ring out. They will not end. They may still be going as far as I know. There is hugging and high-fives (most of it done while standing on top of bar stools, I might add -- this oughta be an Olympic event) and barking and random chest-bumping. Ouch.

Fourth quarter, 7:55: A personal foul on linebacker Brant Boyer keeps a drive alive and Ravens score to make it 24-14. Gulp. Place goes deathly silent except for one woman, nursing a beer with her hat on backwards who screams, "Yeah sat wazza pershonal foul ... on yeeer mother!!!!!"

6:10: Ravens ball. A couple in the corner tries to call some friends who are in the stands at the game. They can hear us fine at the stadium. But it's too loud here for us to hear them.

"Cunningham scares me a bit," Riley whispers, still haunted, I suppose, by the ghost of John Elway. At the Super Bowl a few years ago I asked my dad, who is a native Clevelander and fellow Browns Backer, if he wanted to meet Elway. "Naw," he said. "I don't want to be near that sonofabitch."

4:40: Cunningham is crushed by defensive end Keith McKenzie. Is it me or do the Browns have a never-ending roster of scrappy, young defenders? At the bar a rubber chicken with a fork in it is being passed around. "IT'S A SKINNED RAVEN!" someone yells. "HEY, GET THAT EPNZ GUY A BEER!"

:03 ... :02 ... :01 ... : Game over. Browns improve to 4-2. Davis pumps his fist at the crowd as he heads off the field. More hugs. More high-fives. More spilled beer and crushed dog bones. I thank my gracious hosts and head back out into the blinding sun and sad local reality (in other words, the Hornets and Panthers). I sigh. I consider going back inside.

Then, through the wall of the bar, I hear the faint echo of barking.

David Fleming is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at flemfile@aol.com.