After a year of no OTA’s or mini camp, it’s good to see the Browns back on the field in Berea. What’s causing problems with some Browns fans is that not all Browns players are on the field in Berea. And for some strange reason they’re blaming union president J.C. Tretter. Please stop it. First of all OTA’s are voluntary, repeat voluntary. Second, most of the players at voluntary OTA’s are defensive players. Considering there could be as many as nine new starters on defense, this is a good thing. Third, they’re only doing positional drills, i.e., running around in helmets and shorts. This week, QB Baker Mayfield is having his second passing camp with skill players in Texas. He’s already done this in Florida earlier. Hey ESPN, Baker Mayfield is leader just like Tom Brady. Reports are that Jarvis Landry, Odell Beckham and Donovan Peoples-Jones are all in attendance. Great news. It’s also been reported that the starting offensive line has been practicing together for four or five days a week this off-season. Again great news. LT Jedrick Wills is in Berea working on his run blocking. So everyone come back from the ledge.
Last year the Browns won eleven games with no OTA’s, mini camp or pre-season games with a brand new coaching staff. I think they’re going to be okay. The attendance for the zoom meetings have been great and the Browns are very good at zoom meetings. There were a few games last year where the only practices they had were through zoom meetings. Mayfield will not have an incompletion against Kansas City because he wasn’t at OTA’s throwing to WR Anthony Schwartz. If you can prove this to be true, I’ll dedicate a blog and an article to your forecasting genius.
The true test will be when mandatory mini camp starts on June 15. I expect full participation from all players except those who are rehabbing. I’ll wait till next week to get bent out of shape if the attendance is poor. In other news, CB Greedy Williams was on the field last week practicing, which is fantastic news. Safety Grant Delpit put out a video of him doing individual drills in Berea, which is also fantastic news. With John Johnson and Troy Hill showing up this week, the Browns secondary is looking scary. First round draft pick Greg Newsome fired his agent this week, so something is going on with that situation. Hopefully the Browns can get him under contract prior to next week.
Finally the times and dates for pre-season games have been set. After last year without pre-season games and how it effected the way the Browns played the first part of the season, I look forward to watching these games. I never thought I would hear myself say that, but you could really tell how much the special teams play suffered without them. The Browns face Jacksonville and sunshine in their first game Saturday August 17 at 6:00 pm CST, then the Giants for a rare noon CST game on Sunday August 22 against the Giants. The last game will be a prime time NBC game against the Falcons at 7:00 pm CST on August 29. It’s almost time Browns fans. Everyone stay safe, get vaccinated and Go Browns.