Forget whoopty hell, how about what the hell? Where to start. Let’s start at 1-19-1. One of these days the Browns will be ready to play football week one. Discipline can’t be learned overnight and during the second scrimmage with the Colts, the rest of league learned you can get under this teams skin. So Freddie and his coaching staff have to empathize discipline and playing under control. The only good news out this effort is future teams might (and it’s a small might) now take the Browns lightly. I guarantee Greg Williams and his Jets defense won’t. So now that I’ve had time to digest Sunday, lets get to the game.
First the play calling. Freddie can’t be the coach and the offensive coordinator. It doesn’t work in professional football and barely works in college football. Todd Monken, when offensive coordinator of Tampa, made Fitzpatrick and Winston look good in the deep passing game. Someone needs to remind Freddie he has Nick Chubb on the team. The running game disappeared way to early. Mayfield played well for three quarters and because of game circumstances ended poorly trying to rally his team. The kid has no quit in him.
Offensive line. We were all worried about the right guard position and we should have been worried about right tackle. Chris Hubbard got abused. Greg Robinson was slightly better until he turned into the karate kid. Eric Kush was decent, but as I just stated the tackles are the problem. This pressure made Mayfield very uncomfortable whether there was pressure or not. He step into pressure and held on to the ball too long. Add to the problem, back up tackle Kendall Lamm got hurt and like I said last week, Justin McCray is a better guard then tackle. I don’t know what John Dorsey can do about this, good players don’t fall from the sky. As for Washington’s OL Trent Williams, if he’s not available for trade, you can’t trade for him. Play calling can ease this situation not solve it. Let’s hope Freddie can come up with something.
Penalties. 18 freaking penalties. The vast majority of them were the correct calls. But a few were just plain bad. Yes the most popular professional sport in the United States has the worst officials. Three come to mind. The defense push off on Beckham, the wrestling take down and hold on Garrett on Henry’s 75 yard touchdown catch and Devaroe Lawrence penalty. First, the Beckham call, sure he pushed off, the titan CB was holding him. The Garrett call, hit him from behind and laid on top of him. And the Lawrence call, cursed at an official, well maybe the official shouldn’t have told him to “get the f— out of his way.” The penalties are on the coaching staff and this has to be cleaned up before Monday night.
The defense. The vaunted defense line was a non factor. Olivier Vernon was in on 91% of the defensive snaps and had no defensive stats. How is that possible. Even on the above mentioned penalty on Garrett, Henry went untouched for 75 yards. Denzel Ward had the worst game, not only in his short Browns career, but also in his Ohio State career. And lastly, why was Genard Avery inactive. Even if the line is getting no push, Avery could have added something extra on the edge. Something is going on with Avery and the Browns. I don’t know what it is, but there has to be some reason he wasn’t playing.
Now the good news. The Browns, despite the poor play, were still in this game late in the third quarter. Jarvis Landry had a good day. Chubb, when he played, averaged 4.4 yards a carry. Hilliard was very good on returns. The Scottish Hammer did a good job on his punts and the coverage team was also good. Also on the injury front, Mayfield’s hand seems to be okay. Rashard Higgins is practicing today and says he’ll be ready for Monday’s game and Beckham’s watch is made of plastic so he’s going to keep wearing it. I don’t know why that’s good news, but hey, you got to hold onto something.
Now for sad the news reported today. Cav’s announcer Fred McLeod passed away today of a heart attack at the age of 67. When my wife and I would leave our coffee shop here in Nashville late, I would also tune to the Cav’s game to see what was going on. I really enjoyed listening to the broadcast on my way home. His love of Cleveland sports always came through the radio. Rest in Peace. On to New York. Go Browns.