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The Cleveland Browns set the standard by which all professional football teams were measured in the 1940s and '50s, but when they won the National Football League championship in 1964 it came as a surprise. Sports Illustrated called it "one of the biggest of all football upsets." Redemption in '64 tells the story of these 1964 NFL champion Browns, focusing on four individuals who were redeemed by the team's 27-0 win over the Baltimore Colts: owner Art Mod- ell, head coach Blanton Collier, superstar running back Jim Brown, and quarterback Frank Ryan. Following the 1962 season, Modell fired Paul Brown, the team's first and (then) only head coach and the man for whom the team was named. Modell was an outsider, a New York ad man, and the move elicited much criticism.