At his press conference last week following a loss at home to Kansas City, Browns’ coach Eric Mangini said his team needed to play perfectly to win. Most thought he was exaggerating a bit, but maybe he wasn’t.
The Browns played very well against the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday, but a couple of key mistakes turned the good effort into another loss, this one by a 24-17 score. They now sit at 0-3 on the season.
Cleveland didn’t have the lead going into the fourth quarter of this game, but they had it one play into the final quarter. However, the defense couldn’t hold it, and some questionable play calling on the team’s final drive led to the third straight loss to start the season.
Going into the game, it would have been a surprise here if the brown and orange could have any success running the football, but they ran for 173 yards, with Peyton Hillis having a huge game, gaining 144 yards on 22 carries.
On a critical third down and 2 late in the fourth quarter though, the play call was a long sideline pass to Josh Cribbs which QB Seneca Wallace sailed out of bounds. Getting the ball to Cribbs was a good thought, but running a play out of the wildcat formation or a short pass would have been a better option. Especially since Mangini should have given serious thought to going for it on fourth down had the play failed.
His choice didn’t work, he chose to punt the ball away, and the Browns never got it back.
The other crucial mistake for the offense occurred after Baltimore took the lead 21-17 on Anquan Boldin’s third TD catch of the game from QB Joe Flacco. Cleveland’s first play was a missed timed pitch to Hillis which Wallace fell on inside the Browns’ five yard line. Stuck with poor field position, the Browns punted and the Ravens turned this error into a field goal to stretch their lead to 10 points.
The defense was not to be out done in the last quarter. Matt Roth lined up the neutral zone on a 3rd and 4 play, giving the Ravens the first down they needed to run out the clock. It killed one of the few opportunities Cleveland had to stop Baltimore in the fourth quarter.
The other shot they had was a 3rd and 5 from the Cleveland 27 with nine minutes to go and the Browns holding a 17-14 lead. Defensive coordinator Rob Ryan dialed up a blitz that failed to reach Flacco, and the result was single coverage on Boldin and a 27-yard touchdown pass, beating CB Eric Wright for the umpteethed time during the game.
After a horrible game against Cincinnati last week, Flacco riddled the the Browns, hitting 23 of 32 passes for 262 yards, more than half of them to Boldin. He had all the time in the world to throw, and he made the secondary pay.
The question here is how was the big wide receiver open all day? He’s their best receiver, and it seemed like the Browns didn’t bother to account for him. Wright simply had a horrific day.
There is no question the Browns have improved from last season. They were getting blown out more often than not at this stage of the season in 2009. This year, they’ve had an opportunity to win each game, but critical errors continue to plague the squad. They did get back to their running roots today, but still made critical mistakes to cost themselves yet another game.
Mangini may just have been telling the truth about his team needing to be perfect to win. If he is, then this team is further from a winning season than we all thought.
JD
Cleveland Sports Perspective 