Anyone following Esquire columnist Scott Raab’s Twitter feed (@ScottRaab64) on or about July 8, 2010, knows that the native Clevelander carries a rather, um, robust disdain for one LeBron Raymone James.

Raab’s vitriolic tweets caned Northeast Ohio’s native son for the egomaniacal dog-and-pony show that was James’ summer 2010 free-agency bid. Those righteously angry missives even came with their own lurid hashtag, one seeming to echo the region’s cheated disgust at the knife-twisting gall of James’ nationally televised “Decision.”

“The Whore of Akron” is no longer just a social-media buzzword defaming a 6-foot-8-inch man-child — it’s also the title of Raab’s first book. “Whore” is an unapologetically crude and funny memoir detailing the life of a “350-pound Jewish Santa Claus” on a cathartic quest to find meaning in James’ treachery against a bedraggled city bereft of any sort of major professional sports title for almost half a century.

The book also seems to be Raab’s effort to find meaning in his own existence. The first-time author offers an unflinching, often discomfiting glimpse of his raging, drug-addled adolescence, where Cleveland sports served as an escape from the unkind realities of life. Raab describes in loving detail the wintry afternoon in 1964 that found him sitting in the lower bowl of Cleveland Municipal Stadium for the Browns’ NFL Championship win over the Colts, in what was to be his generation’s last taste of ultimate Cleveland victory.

“The vision — of Cleveland triumphant, of Cleveland fans in communal thrall to a joy beyond all words, of a Cleveland team lifting the town’s immortal heart to heaven — still fills my eyes,” he writes in the opening chapter.

A little melodramatic? Perhaps, but Raab’s visceral, feverish style lays bare the nerve endings of all the failures Cleveland fans have witnessed since. If his writing is a bit heavy-handed, it’s because local pro sports over the last 50 years have been akin to a Greek tragedy.

The meat of Raab’s story begins after the Cavs’ embarrassing 2010 playoff defeat against the Celtics, where Cleveland’s erstwhile star appeared to “quit” in crucial Game 5, culminating in “The Decision” that sent LeBron into the sunny, sexy embrace of Miami. Raab, who is not remiss in telling readers he left Cleveland himself for a career opportunity elsewhere, determined that he must chronicle James’ first season with the Heat, picked by many to win it all, thanks to the formation of the lamely named “Miami Thrice.”

Raab’s pursuit acts as a narrative thread that focuses the writing and keeps it from sinking into the “woe-is-us” narcissism the national media love to stamp Cleveland with via the “misery montages” broadcast every time an area franchise makes the postseason (See p. 42 for “Cleveland’s Best Sport Moments”).

Raab did not hide the fact from Heat public relations that he was searching for the “wee jewel box” that held LeBron’s soul, and hence was denied press credentials to American Airlines Arena. Undeterred, he simply bought tickets to games, horribly certain as the season progressed that James was going to win the ring that eluded him for seven years in wine-and-gold, adding yet another stone to the grave marker of Cleveland sports.

Then, a “miracle.” James, after a number of spectacular performances in the early rounds of the playoffs, inexplicably displayed a languid passivity — an almost carbon copy of his inexplicable Game 5 mental shutdown — that essentially doomed Miami in the Finals against Dallas.

Raab’s resultant schadenfreude was that and much more. His “shameful joy” served as both redemption for Cleveland and a harsh lesson for a superstar athlete coddled into believing that everything would come easy.

“Hard is the only thing that makes it mean anything, the only thing that makes losing or winning worth the pain of trying, the only thing that makes living and dying worth the suffering,” Raab concludes.

Cleveland has suffered in ways that are only exacerbated (and perhaps mirrored) by its never-ending athletic agonies, Raab maintains. It’s his belief that our love for city and sports is our hope: That “we’ll somehow last long enough to witness that parade down Euclid Avenue, and that this — finally, always — could be the year.”

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