2018 Browns' Chronicles: Week 7

By: Kris Mead

As what has been well documented, for those of you who are Browns fans, and most likely assumed, for those of you who are not Browns fans, the Browns once again lost in overtime on a Sunday. This time the Browns succumbed to America’s number one evader of sexual assault – quarterback Jameis Winston and his fellow Buccaneers. This game went similarly to the Browns’ other non-wins – Browns defense played well, offense left a lot of chances on the table, the refs missed a blatant call which could have increased the Browns’ chances of winning, and the Browns turned the ball over which provided the Buccaneers with advantageous field position to kick the game winning field goal. The blog would end now if it wasn’t for Hue Jackson and his post-game press conference!

That’s right. Although Hue has driven me crazy over the past two plus years with his lifeless presence on the sideline, his constant look of a lonely fifth grader who just has had his lunch money stolen for the eighteenth time, and his indecision during every facet of a football game, I can confidently and graciously thank Hue for providing me with blog material to entertain my readers. Hue, in the post-game press conference, told the nation that he will be getting more involved with the offensive decision making and play calling.

I’m not gonna continue to watch something I know how to do keep being that way. That’s just the truth. That’s nothing against anybody in our building, that’s just what I do and I need to be a little bit more involved . . . Being a head coach and an offensive guy who has done this, I feel like I have every right to jump in there and see if I can help. And assist. And see if I can get this thing where it needs to be. We need to be better on offense, and if that’s my specialty, I need to be involved more and I will be.

I take Hue’s statement as an insult to every Cleveland Browns fan who has any sort of memory capacity. Hue’s comment makes it seem as though he hasn’t been calling the offensive plays in Cleveland for the past two years. In fact, his offensive play calling allowed the Browns to earn one win in thirty-two games. That’s how good it was! Hue’s an offensive guy and he has “done this” before, in that he has called offensive plays that produced the most lackluster two-year span for any team in the NFL, ever. Furthermore, and I have to believe that it was the new general manager, John Dorsey, who instructed Hue to hire an offensive coordinator for the 2018 season, Dorsey probably did this because he, like the rest of us reasonable people, saw how absolutely dismal Hue’s offensive play calling and management was in the previous two seasons. Actually, if I were Hue, I wouldn’t even be thinking of getting involved with the offense, as I would still be in shock for somehow keeping my job after sucking so terribly for so long. 

To better assess whether Hue’s “offensive expertise” would better help the Browns, I compared the last year’s offensive stats from week one thru week 7 against the same time period this year. In short, the Browns have improved in every offensive statistical category, albeit not astronomically. Now, there are several outside variables for why this improvement could have happened – better players, easier schedule (although we actually played a lot of the same teams in the same period), and weather – outside of change in the “offensive guru.”

 

Rushing Yards Per Game

2017 Average Rushing Yards Per Game: 92.3

2018 Average Rushing Yards Per Game: 135

Passing Yards Per Game

2017 Average Passing Yards Per Game: 212.6

2018 Average Passing Yards Per Game: 222.4

 

 

Turnovers Per Game

            2017 Average Turnover Per Game: 2.7

2018 Average Turnover Per Game: 1.4

 

 

 

Points Per Game

2017 Average Points Per Game: 14.7

2018 Average Points Per Game:  21.6

 

 

Hue made this passive aggressive comment mainly towards his offensive coordinator, Todd Haley, but also to his boss, Dorsey, because he is a man who is seeing the light. The one statistic that wasn’t listed but is markedly the most important statistic in every league sport, is the amount of wins a team has earned. Hue has mustered, so far, a remarkable record of three wins, 35 losses, and one tie. The only remarkable part of that record is the fact that somehow Hue has not been handed a pink slip. However, it appears that, finally, even lifeless Hue understands that his funeral is coming, and he is trying to make his last, futile, appeal.

 

Reading Hue’s quote shows all the signs of a man on death row, trying to fight the prison guards’ grips, as he is dragged toward the electric chair chamber.  Most notably, Hue never wanted to hire an offensive coordinator, but rather it was most likely part of his plea deal with John Dorsey. Hue would be able to keep his job as a head coach, as long as he stopped, essentially, “coaching.” So Dorsey allowed Hue to “hire” his “own” offensive coordinator, but it probably went more like Dorsey hiring Haley and Hue announcing, in the press conference, that he decided to hire an offensive coordinator. Hue gives this away when he states, “I’m not gonna continue to watch something I know how to do keep being that way. That’s just the truth. That’s nothing against anybody in our building . . ..” Hue probably has been told to leave the offense alone and let Haley do his thing.  Hue knows he has been told this because he quickly tries to protect himself by making sure that he isn’t pointing blame or frustration at “anybody in our building.” Hue, face it, you are pointing blame at, not only Todd Haley, but your own boss and soon to be executioner – John Dorsey.  Further, Hue takes another swipe at Dorsey by saying, “Being a head coach and an offensive guy who has done this, I feel like I have every right to jump in there and see if I can help.” Again it is conceivable to imagine that Dorsey, in the offseason, instructed Hue not to coach the offense. Hue took this as his power being depleted, and it was, and so this quote basically is claiming that because Hue is still the head coach, he has some sort of implicit powers that cannot be taken away – “I feel like I have every right to jump in there . . .”. Hue also suggests that he was hired specifically for his offensive prowess and because he has “done this” before. However, and as stated earlier, all Browns fans have seen Hue coach offense before, and as the stats show, it wasn’t pretty.

 

Hue’s rant won’t save him, and it probably just made matters worse within the organization because now the Browns have a man who isn’t playing by the rules. This statement has caused there to be a schism of power within the locker room. Will players choose the general manager’s man, Todd Haley, or will they get behind their wavering, if isolated, head coach – Hue Jackson?  Whichever way they go won’t save Hue, unless they somehow make the playoffs. Dorsey most likely did not want to fire Hue in the middle of the season, preferring to take a whole year to find “his guy.” In the meantime, he made Hue a lame duck coach and instilled Todd Haley, a somewhat competent if almost as dumb offensive coordinator, to make offensive decision making. Hue’s death sentence has not been dismissed, and if anything, his complaining may have just moved up his execution date.

 

 

Meyer's Managerial Mistakes

By Kris Mead

Ohio State University football, under Urban Meyer, has been able to recruit a top ten, and even sometimes a top five, recruiting class year in and year out. So, it can be confidently stated that Ohio State is more talented than all the teams on their schedule.  The question then becomes, “how does a team, with such talent and pedigree, manage to lose, and lose badly, to a Purdue team who started the year 0-3?” The answer should be squarely pointed at the people on the field receiving paychecks – the coaches.

Urban Meyer, a coach who has had and continues to have significant success at every university for which he’s coached, has recently settled for complacency in the form of cronyism. When Ohio State won the national championship in 2014, and Meyer’s years at Ohio State prior to the national championship, Meyer had a coaching staff of excellent assistants, who had no connections to Meyer. For instance, Ohio State was led by offensive coordinator, Tom Herman. Herman not only coached three excellent quarterbacks for Ohio State – Miller, Barrett, and Jones – but he had to coach two significantly different quarterbacks in the run to the national championship. Luke Fickell also had no personal connection with Urban Meyer prior to being named the defensive coordinator. He too created a defense that was able to be ferocious and was the backbone of the Ohio State team. Kerry Coombs, the father of “DBU” (Defensive Back University), developed the likes of Marshon Lattimore, Gareon Conley and countless others. Then there was Chris Ash, an intellectual who created dominant safeties such as Malik Hooker. Of course, because these assistant coaches were so good, they were poached by other teams to become collegiate head coaches or assistant coaches in the NFL.

After watching Ohio State last night (10/20/18) it was pretty easy to figure out where the team has its largest issues. Granted, there were issues at every position.  The first issue is the offensive line. It is well documented that Isaiah Prince has regressed back to his 2016 tendencies – off sides and holding penalties, due to his failure to sufficiently guard the edge rush. The other problem is the fact that Michael Jordan, who was moved from guard to center this year after All-American center, Billy Price, was drafted by the Bengals, has struggled mightily at not only snapping the ball with velocity, but was out maneuvered by Purdue’s interior defensive line, which has been terrible the whole season.

The offensive line coach for the Buckeyes is Greg Studrawa.  Meyer hired Studrawa to replace Ed Warriner.  Warriner was an excellent offensive line coach (2012-2016) for the Buckeyes and had no connections to Meyer prior to being hired. Warriner took an offensive line that allowed four sacks per game in 2011 and, by the end of 2013, cut that down to 1.5 sacks per game. He was promoted to offensive coordinator, a position that was not a good fit for him and which caused him to be pushed out. In turn, Michigan hired him as their offensive line coach this year. Now Michigan’s offensive line looks much better than Ohio State’s. Studrawa, on the other hand, coached under Meyer at Bowling Green. Studrawa then coached for LSU as the offensive line coach and was let go after seven years of mediocracy. After LSU, Studrawa became Maryland’s offensive line coach for two years. Mentioning Maryland and football should be enough for anyone to realize that he stunk there too. However, Meyer decided to hire his friend in 2016. The line has deteriorated ever since, but at least Meyer retains his friend – Greg Studarawa.

The linebackers for Ohio State, which are usually a staple component of not only the defense, but the entire team, have been, at the very least, dismal. The linebackers seemed lost on several plays, at times taking bad angles on tackles and at other times they don’t fill gaps. This may be due to the scheme that they are playing on defense. Lately, it appears that Greg Schiano has been moving his linebackers to the line of scrimmage which, although it provides a defensive rush, does not allow the linebackers to “see the play” and fill the holes. Being practically placed at the line of scrimmage from the onset, the linebackers are already engaged in their pursuit and therefore cannot see how the play develops. This essentially creates a two layer defense. The first layer is comprised of the defensive line and now because the linebackers are committed at the line of scrimmage, the linebackers too. The second layer of the defense are the defensive backs, predominantly the safeties. The safeties also do not fill gaps and, for some reason, make instinctual mistakes. The instinctual mistakes made by the safeties in the run game are incredibly bad. In some instances, a play may be going to the right and yet the safeties initially start running to the left. However, if the linebackers stayed back and did not automatically line up at the line, big runs could be mitigated.

The coach of the Ohio State linebackers is named Billy Davis. Davis has coached the majority of his career, other than a stint at Michigan State in 1991 as a graduate assistant, in the NFL. His NFL resume is long and it is unclear why he made a move to coach at the collegiate level, rather than trying to remain in the NFL. Nick Saban and Chip Kelley also moved from the NFL back to the college level, but that was only after they were either fired or “significantly persuaded” to leave their NFL positions. It seems obvious that Davis was hired less for his resume but more for the fact that he was a teammate of Meyer’s at the University of Cincinnati.  In addition, Davis was Meyer’s best man in Meyer’s wedding. Further Wikipedia (I know isn’t “credible”) has stated that, “[i]n 2018, Davis’s linebackers at Ohio State consistently guess what hole to attack before they even read the play, get blocked and are unable to shed the block resulting in huge plays.” That quote encapsulates all that is wrong with Bill Davis’s coaching. The man should be fired for his blatant inability to develop the linebackers, adjust to the opposing offense, and the numbskull formations he uses to position his linebackers.

The other friend Meyer hired is Greg Schiano. However, I hesitate to criticize this hiring too much because, for the most part, OSU’s defense has been Ohio State’s most consistent facet. However, lately I question the secondary and, as stated earlier, the failure to adjust properly to opposing team’s offensives. This happened routinely against Minnesota two weeks ago. Minnesota consistently ran “read-option inside slant routes.” The slot receiver would run out, run freely I might add, and then commit to an inside slant. The safety in charge of covering this slot receiver would be initially ten to twelve yards away from the receiver. By the time the safety commits to covering the slot receiver, he is caught flat footed and fails to cover the slot receiver as he makes his inside cut. In turn, there was no adjustment to this issue. No linebacker was moved over to cover up the slot receiver at the line of scrimmage, nor was a safety initially lined up five yards away. The failure to adjust was mind boggling. This same failure to adjust occurred in the Purdue debacle in which Purdue’s, not only best receiver, but best player in Rondale Moore, was given a ten yard cushion almost routinely.  It seemed as though Buckeyes had no answer to Moore’s crossing routes. The entire game it was obvious to everyone that Moore was Purdue’s quarterback’s first receiving option – everyone, except for Ohio State. In other words, I have never seen a more inferior and unintelligent Buckeye secondary than the one that played against Purdue. It was an utter embarrassment to even try to believe that these players were four or five star recruits out of high school.

The reason why this lack of secondary play may come for three reasons, two of the reasons are squarely due to failure to hire adequate coaches. The first reason is that there is a chance that Ohio State’s corners and safeties are not at the same level that Ohio State has previously been spoiled with in the likes of Marshon Lattimore and Denzel Ward. The other issue is that the dean of “Defensive Backs University” left for the Tennessee Titans just after last year, in Kerry Coombs. It should be noted that Coombs was hired by Meyer in 2012 and had no previous connections to Meyer. Coombs was simply the most skilled coach at his position. In turn, Meyer replaced Coombs with a Jim Tressel cornerbacks coach in Taver Johnson. Now Johnson was not a bad hire, but it becomes obvious that Meyer most likely did not do a thorough hiring search and hired Johnson out of convenience rather than based on skill. The second issue is the fact that Meyer previously hired Chris Ash to coach the safeties. Ash left to become the head coach of Rutgers (that’s going fabulously … not) and Schiano has taken over for coaching the safeties. This is concerning, especially this year, because the safeties are playing poorly for the reasons mentioned previously, and the defense, as a whole, is playing like a dumpster fire. Schiano needs to focus on the entire defense and Meyer should hire a specific position coach for the safeties.

There are five decent coaches. These coaches are Brian Hartline, Ryan Day, Alex Grinch, Kevin Wilson and Larry Johnson. Johnson is the best of these assistant coaches and only assistant coach from the 2014 National Championship staff. His defensive line may be the strongest unit on the defensive side of the ball, even without Nick Bosa. Ryan Day was excellent as an interim head coach, although TCU was the only competitive team for him to coach against in those three games. However, Day was a graduate assistant under Meyer at Florida. Brian Hartline, also a graduate assistant under Meyer this year, was recently promoted due to Meyer’s close friend, Zach Smith, having to be fired from Ohio State because he could not keep his hands off his wife.  Kevin Wilson and Alex Grinch were both best available hires and so Meyer should be given credit. The issue, though, for Wilson is the fact that his offense is always stalled because Studrawa’s line is so anemic and lacks any sort of motivation to be good. Grinch was a talented hire from Washington State, where he was the defensive coordinator, and this hire was smart because it was assumed that Schiano was going to be hired by the University of Tennessee, but that went awry. So Ohio State has settled with having co-coordinators at both the offense and defensive coordinator positions. I have to believe that Kevin Wilson has authority over Ryan Day at offensive play calling, and Schiano has authority over Grinch at defensive play calling. But frankly, with Meyer’s managerial skills, he probably chooses not to instruct who the “lead co-coordinator” is. It should be noted that in the past Meyer has routinely had co-coordinators at Ohio State. However, Chris Ash was hired to coach safeties and Wilson was hired after Warriner was quickly sent packing.

In a nutshell, the issue with Ohio State, and this goes for the entire university, is this constant climate of complacency. It starts with Meyer who has become complacent in choosing to hire folks he knows, rather than the best suited coaches available for the job. In the least case scenario, this complacency has caused Ohio State to be embarrassed on national television against a Purdue team that lacks any NFL talent. In the worst-case scenario, Meyer’s hiring complacency has caused him to nearly lose his job – failing to report his friend Zach Smith for beating his wife.  The other complacency that follows is the fact that Meyer is complacent in not holding his coaches accountable. If Meyer couldn’t fire Zach Smith until his domestic violence was aired to the world, why would any OSU fan assume he would even consider scolding his assistant coaches, who are also his friends, for coaching so poorly? The answer is, he won’t.

Meyer is losing control of this talented team. He has done this under his own making in a failure to hire responsibly. Meyer has chosen convenience over vetted candidates and has chosen friends over qualified candidates. These friends coach under no fear of losing their jobs because Meyer, most likely, is too scared to reprimand their inability to coach. Players have chosen complacency for the simple fact that their coaches have committed to complacency – complacency in strategy, matchups, and play calling. Ohio State lost the Purdue  game the moment their most talented player, quarterback Dwayne Haskins, gave Meyer “bunny ears” during Meyer’s national pregame sideline interview. That indicated that the coaches did not emphasize improvement to the players and continued to preach the mantra that, “we keep winning, therefore everything is fine. If everything is fine, we don’t need to change a thing.”

The Zach Smith episode was thought to be a benign cancer in Ohio State’s locker room. However, after last night’s embarrassment, coupled with Ohio State’s troubled victories against inferior opponents, has revealed that the cancer may be much worse. Meyer has evaded the sickness once, but he should remove the tumors now before the disease becomes malignant and the entire team infected.

2018 Browns' Chronicles: Week 6

By Kris Mead

 

In the film, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope there is a scene in which Han Solo and Luke Skywalker must venture into the Empire’s Death Star, posed as enemy storm troopers, in order to rescue Princess Leia. At the same time the Jedi, Obi-wan Kenobi, attempts to switch off the Death Star’s tractor beam. The mission is a success. Solo and Skywalker are able to secure possession of Leia, and Kenobi is able to switch off the tractor beam. Although Kenobi sacrifices himself for the group to escape, and the fact that Solo, Leia and Skywalker must fight their way out of the Death Star, the group is still able to successfully complete their mission with limited casualties.

The Browns, last week in their loss to the San Die ... ooops…Los Angeles’ Chargers, were “attempting” to do what Skywalker, Solo, and Kenobi were successful in doing – escaping, successfully, undetected in enemy territory. I put attempting in quotations, because the Browns’ attempt was about as effective as the Battle of Mogadishu was in preventing Somali from tumbling into civil war.

For the Browns, it has felt as though they have been able to disguise themselves as storm trooper (i.e. a legit professional football team against whom other teams actually have to practice) all within the confines of the Empire’s (i.e. the NFL) Death Star. For the most part, the Browns have been able to evade complete discovery. In a way, the Browns were similar to any of the Assassin Creed video games. In those games the player is, well, an assassin who sneaks around so as not to get detected. The player has this little arrow that will enlarge and change color to alert her that she either has been or, if she does not hide, will be detected. In times, when the assassin is not noticed, the arrow will stay “white” and small. The Browns for the first five games have mostly stayed in either the non-detected or “slightly detected” stage (loss to the Raiders).

However, the massacre that happened this past Sunday was essentially the equivalent of Solo and Skywalker stepping off the Millennium Falcon, in the Death Star, and being decapitated immediately by Darth Vader. The Browns did not fool anyone. They reverted to their old ways, and I’m talking “old ways,” like the butt whooping the Browns received by the Cowboys in the 2016 regular season twenty-five-point loss. The Browns weren’t just an assassin detected, but it was like being detected in the Palace of Versailles, in Assassin’s Creed Unity, and all of King Louis’ Palace Guards were slashing their cutlasses into the Browns’ gullet simultaneously. Watching the Browns’ on Sunday was like watching Alabama beat The Citadel in football, and, unfortunately, The Browns were The Citadel!

So enough with the sci-fi analogies. It is the only way that I can cope with the loss without resorting to a strong drink, which, if the people at my bar are a sample size of the greater Cleveland Browns’ fan base, most people have chosen a stiff drink as their coping mechanism (I salute you!). How was this a massacre? The score alone, 38-14, is enough to suggest that this was a massacre, but that’s not a reliable measure to simply write off a game as a “massacre.” If questioning this theory, just look at the Ohio State victory against Minnesota last Saturday. Although Ohio State won by sixteen points, anyone who watched that game would never consider it a blowout.

So then why was this such a blowout for the Browns? First, the Browns could not stop the run … at all! The Chargers could run it up the middle, around or side to side.  It didn’t seem to matter where they ran it because they just could. Melvin Gordon was the Chargers’ leading rusher with 132 yards on just 18 carries.  He also recorded three touchdowns. All the Browns rushes combined do not even come within ten yards of surpassing Gordon’s rushing yards. The Browns’ leading rusher, Duke Johnson, had thirty-six yards on two carries; whereas Carlos Hyde had the most touches (14), but only ran for a total of thirty-four yards. The second issue isn’t so much the Browns’ rushing attack, but more so the Browns’ offensive line - or lack of one. Combine the lackluster rushing with Baker Mayfield’s five sacks, for a combined loss of twenty-four yards, and it is a recipe for an offensive disaster. The third issue was Baker Mayfield himself. He resembled, dare I say, Tyrod Taylor instincts. In other words, Baker held the ball far too long when he should have either dumped it off or thrown it away. However, this coincides with the fourth issue – lack of wide receivers. With Rashard Higgins injured, the Chargers doubled team Jarvis Landry and took their chances playing one on one with the Browns anemic receiving corp of Njoku, Calloway, and the rookie – Damion Ratley (who ironically would be the leading receiver for the Browns).  So pretty much the offense as a unit was completely dismal, i.e. they played like the traditional Browns. So the Chargers thought, and to quote the ex-Arizona Cardinals head coach, Dennis Green, “they [Browns] are who we thought they were” and they suck!

On a bright note, the Cleveland kicking game, which has been the Browns’ Achilles heel (pun is absolutely intended) was the best part of the team! Greg Joseph went two for two. Encouraging as that may be, the Browns have to restart, and they have to realize that this game exposed them. The Browns can’t stealthily sneak up on opponents and take them out, like in Assassin’s Creed. Sometimes they are going to have to take their opponents head, a full-frontal attack, with “guns a blazing.”

Onto Tampa Bay!

 

P.S.

If you still don’t think this was “that bad of a loss”, just realize that Geno Smith played better than Baker Mayfield (in terms of QBR). The very fact that the Los Angeles’ Chargers allowed Geno Smith to not only touch an actual football field, but allowed him to touch an actual football, should cause any reasonable person to instantly nauseate.  That’s how bad the Browns played.

The Booger Beat: MNF Redskins v. Saints

By Kris Mead

 

With John Gruden’s departure from Monday Night Football on ESPN, most viewers who enjoy not having their ears bleed while watching football, were hopeful that they could once again unmute their televisions and watch the game with the sound on. However, that wish was short lived as ESPN replaced one washed up NFL coach, who could only muster speaking words with, at most, three syllables, with an equally, if not more unintelligent, brute in Booger McFarland.

Since ESPN has beat reporters to cover each NFL team, I have taken it upon myself to be the beat reporter for our lovable nimrod – Booger McFarland. Welcome to the inaugural installment of The Booger Beat!

Booger is unique not only in his ability to state the obvious, but in how he goes about stating the obvious. For instance, in last Monday’s game, Booger made this analysis, when the Redskins were in the red zone but down 26-6 against the Saints, “Redskins need a touchdown, cannot settle for a field goal in the red zone.” Disregard the fact that Booger could have used his experience playing football to better analyze how the Redskins should attack the New Orleans defense, or what play call the Redskins tend to make in this part of the field.  Instead, Booger used all his NFL insight to state that a team down by twenty points would be better off scoring six points rather than three points.

There was another point in the game in which the Redskins were called for a horse collar tackle penalty. While the penalty was being sorted out, Booger was given the honors of letting the viewers know what was happening. So, Booger stated, “think you may have a horse collar on the tackle.” Booger essentially defined a word by using the word in the definition. By saying that it was a “horse collar,” there was no need for Booger to add that extra insight that the horse collar “is on the tackle.” That’s because the penalty is literally called a “horse collar tackle.”

At other times Booger chose to use the Socratic method on the viewers. At one point the Saints were pushed back on third down due to a penalty. Booger took it upon himself to make his “deep” analysis. First Booger told the audience that, “They [Redskins] got to make a play here.” What Booger did in this case was similar to when a fifth-grade teacher tells her students that they should refrain from using adjectives with three letters and try to use “bigger” words in their writing. Booger basically did the same thing, but in sportscaster talk. Whereas a teacher might encourage her pupils to use the word “enormous” in place of the simplistic word “big” to describe something large, a sportscaster is encouraged to say something like, ”the middle linebacker should blitz up the A gap because you know the offense likes to throw in third and long” rather than, “they need to make a play” when describing a third and long situation for the defense. However, Booger decided to go the more simplistic route. The second item that Booger did was what I’ll call “flip the script.” After Booger said that the Redskins needed to “make a play on defense,” he then asked the audience, “Do they come after him [New Orleans quarterback, Drew Brees] or stay back?” Booger went Socratic method on us football viewers! Booger probably got too tired of giving us idiots all the answers, deciding it was time the viewer worked for his expertise!

Some other “notable quotables” that Booger decided to use:

1. Just a dancing bear, not just a blind dog in a bee house (Booger was describing a Washington defensive lineman causing a fumble on a New Orleans screen play. Still not sure what to make of that analogy).
2. That’s not a good formula to play D against that guy (That “guy” would be New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees. The Redskins committed pass interference which gave New Orleans a fresh set of downs.)
3. Them ‘Bama Boys make a difference (the name Booger gave to the Redskins defensive line because two out of their three linemen came from the University of Alabama…)
4. Redskins need to settle down, lot of football left to play in the second half (another extremely generic football quote. There is exactly 30 minutes of football left to play at the beginning of the second half)

At one point it appeared Booger was being outright contradicted by his own commentator, Joe Tessitore. In the second quarter, the Redskins were down but had the ball. Booger stated, “Redskins can still run the football. They have to be patient.” However, then Tessitore immediately said, “You must press the pedal against the Saints.” Joe, who had zero experience playing football at any high level, outright contradicted the most insightful analysis that Booger gave the entire night!

Joe’s annoyance with Booger would only continue. In the third quarter the Saints caused a sack fumble and recovered the ball. Booger’s analysis was, “I think they [referees] are going to call that a sack fumble, Joe.” Joe immediately stated, without any hesitation to Booger, “No doubt about it.”

A few “Booger Stats”:

1. Total comments in first quarter: 13
2. Total comments in second quarter: 30
3. Total comments in third quarter: 21
4. Total comments in fourth quarter: 10

So, if you do tune into Monday Night Football I still recommend keeping your T.V. on mute.  But if you must have the sound, I recommend only turning it up during the first and fourth quarters. Booger gets all riled up in the second and third quarters and I have yet to find out why this is (possibly they feed him during these quarters), but my investigative reporting (from my couch) has yet to determine the cause. Sorry.

2018 Browns' Chronicles: Week 5

By Kris Mead

 

The Browns not only won a game on a Sunday, the first in over 1,000 days, but, more importantly, they beat a division rival for the first time in three years! Although the Browns won in dramatic fashion, they earned the win against an extremely talented Baltimore team, primarily against its second ranked defense. However, not everyone could be happy and in this week’s issue of the “Browns’ Chronicles” I will examine the human rain cloud, better known as ESPN’s Cleveland Browns’ beat reporter – Pat McManamon.

Who is Pat? Pat is a native Clevelander, so I can’t dog him for being an outsider who only took the Cleveland beat writer job out of desperation, rather than actual interest into Cleveland sports. However, there is some level of argument that ESPN would like to layoff Pat, as they have been gutting their personnel for some time. If you need to see who ESPN let go, just tune into its up and coming rival FS1 and you’ll rediscover the same talking heads who once yammered their mouths on behalf of the almighty ESPN. It could also be there is just a lack of supply for beat writers licking their chops to cover the Browns. In turn, ESPN faces the economic challenge of a lack of labor which drives McManomon’s perceived worth “up” and gives him the “oompas” to keep writing garbage columns.

The article I will be critiquing is Pat’s analysis of the Browns’ week 5 win against the Baltimore Ravens entitled, Baker Mayfield, Browns look for hope from an ugly win. So right off the bat, Pat portrays himself as the guy in school who is friends with the losers, but wants to fit in so desperately with the winners that he’ll throw his own nerdy friends under the bus in order to achieve that gratification.  Just look at the passive aggressive title, “Browns look for hope from an ugly win.” Now, it is quite common for the words, “Browns,” “ugly,” and “hope” to be in the same sentence, but “Browns” and “Win” in the same sentence is about as common as President Trump not making an utterly dumb remark within a 24-hour news cycle. So then why must Pat combine the negative words with the positive words? Sure, Pat wants to come across as an unbiased journalist, but it seems more evident that Pat wants to subliminally distance himself from the “loser franchise” he covers, for fear his readers might view him a loser by association.  With that, let’s continue examining this shallow, uncharacteristically negative, ESPN Cleveland beat writer, shall we?

Pat then begins his article by recalling how the Browns, just last week, lost a game after scoring 42 points, but then, this week, only scored 12 points and yet won. This passive aggressive jab at the Browns inadvertently reveals Pat’s lack of understanding for the unexpectedness that is the NFL.  For instance, the Buffalo Bills lost to the Ravens by 44 points but then went on to beat the Minnesota Viking by 24 -  in Minnesota. Both opening sentences first state something negative about Cleveland and then are quickly twisted around to make it “sort of” positive. It’s as though Pat can’t believe the Browns could win, because the week prior they lost even after playing well.  The same can be said for the Bills and their Viking win, since the Bills lost so badly prior to the Ravens. However, and what Pat fails to understand, is that more often than not the NFL is unpredictable.  Previous week games are inconsequential to the week coming up. If this wasn’t the case the NFL would become an extremely monotonous, predictable form of entertainment. Actually, if the NFL increased in predictability, its entertainment value would, hopefully, decrease (what fan would want to wasting four hours of their Sunday watching something where the outcome is fairly certain?). Now, to be clear, there is some level of statistics which allow coaches to either change their upcoming week strategy or exploit their opponents’ weaknesses. In that way outcomes become a little more predictable.  Nonetheless, due to high levels of competition between each NFL team and the fact that even the smallest variable could cause a team to lose, the NFL is a highly unpredictable week to week.   

The next statement Pat makes, which is uninspiring, comes in the end of his third paragraph in which he says, “[a] team trying to change its culture . . . maybe can use a 12-9 overtime victory to propel it forward.” First, the very fact that Pat is certain a victory will assist a team trying to change its culture is utterly absurd. Pat, how would you suggest a team, that in the past two years has gone 1-31, best go about trying to change its culture? It wouldn’t require a half-baked and whitewashed FBI investigation to figure this one out, as the answer is simple: winning football games is how a historically bad team starts to change its culture. So, it isn’t that the Browns “maybe” could use a victory, but rather that need to have a victory, in any form, drives culture change. Secondly, the win in itself has propelled the Browns forward automatically for the simple fact that under Hue Jackson they have never won more than one game in a season - now they have doubled that. Another way to look at it is if the Browns would have lost, they would not have moved forward at all. So in turn, because they won, they automatically have propelled forward and now need to continue propelling forward by winning games. However, to suggest that if the Browns weren’t to win any more games this year then they would not have propelled forward from this win would be false.  Sunday’s win in itself is evidence of the team moving forward.

Next Pat does something that all non-Browns fans do – they reminisce on how bad the Browns have been. Pat goes on to provide anyone who has been living under a rock various examples of how bad the Browns have been. Thanks, Pat. I am quite confident that anyone choosing to read about the Browns is either a Browns fan or is having suicidal thoughts, and if it’s the latter, don’t waste your time giving them a history lesson.

Pat moves on to describe that “…when they [Browns] somehow pulled out the win, the outlook changed. For this team 2-2-1 is a quantum leap from 1-3-1.”  This phrase makes it seem that the Browns had some sort of 300 moments similar to when the 300 Spartan warriors “somehow” held back the thousand or so Persians from advancing on them. Now, I will give Pat some leeway here as he does go on to discuss how Baker, Denzel Ward, and Myles Garret’s play helped the Browns win.  But to say that this was a “quantum leap” is startling, to say the least. The reason for this is that the Browns are a team that is capable of winning 6 games, if not more. They became markedly better between this year and last year. For instance with the signing of Randall, Terrence Mitchell (although now hurt), and Jarvis Landry, the Browns sured up their pass defense and helped out their depleted receiving corp. Further with the Browns picking Mayfield, Ward, and Calloway in the draft they, again, became more talented than the year prior. It wasn’t a quantum leap that the Browns won.  It is more like a quantum leap that the Browns did not have some sort of unpredictable mishap cost them the game – multiple missed kicks (New Orleans loss) and inexplicable official miscues (Oakland).

So I congratulate the Cleveland Browns and especially to the rookies – Mayfield and Ward. The former for keeping an offense going even when it seemed over, and the latter for making game saving plays in crucial moments. That is what propelled the Browns to the win and what will continue to propel the Browns forward (although the Browns do need to cut the penalties).

Finally, I apologize for Pat McManomon’s constant pandering to the rest of the NFL fandom. Yes, in his article he does mention, briefly, about Cleveland’s growth, but he did so under a cloud of judgment in which he, involuntarily or otherwise, secretly wishes that the Browns would come back down to earth. It may be that Pat has become so accustomed to writing about losers that he isn’t quite sure how to write about winners. If this is the truth, then not only do the Browns need to use this win to “propel” forward and change the culture, but so does Pat.