The late basketball coach Jim Valvano said it while his North Carolina State basketball team was in route to winning the 1983 NCAA Basketball title.
The term is “survive and advance”, and although the Cleveland Browns haven’t advanced anywhere yet, they did survive and have another meaningful game this Saturday afternoon against the Raiders.
And in the crazy AFC, the 24-22 win over the Baltimore Ravens, moved Kevin Stefanski’s crew into second place in the division, moving past both the Steelers and Bengals, who both lost this week.
A win is a win, so we aren’t going to complain about it. Look at some of the other early season favorites in the conference. Buffalo has the same record as Cleveland at 7-6, and next week’s opponent was sitting at 5-3 a few weeks ago, but losing four out of five has them at 6-7.
Even though the Raiders are struggling, if the NFL has taught us nothing this season, it is that things can change in the snap of your fingers. So, the Browns need to improve on Sunday’s performance is they want a victory against the visitors from Las Vegas.
The offense continues to struggle, scoring only 17 points (the other points were the result of Myles Garrett, literally), and although most of the blame is heaped upon Stefanski’s play calling and on Mayfield, it might be another area that is failing.
Last season, Cleveland had one of the league’s best running games, ranking 3rd behind just the Ravens and Titans. And while they still rank 4th in 2021, lately the yards in the ground game have been tough to come by.
In the first five games of the season, the Browns averaged 188 yards per game on the ground. Coincidentally, they also scored 28.4 points in those five contests.
The following eight games shows Cleveland gaining just 116 yards per game rushing, and the points per game has also dropped to 14, half of the total in the first five games.
We understand Nick Chubb missed three of those games, but he has also played in five of the games, and in three of the ones he played in, he rushed for less than 61 yards.
Now, we agree Chubb is one of the best running backs in the game, and we don’t think he has suddenly lost a step, so clearly something is wrong with the run blocking right now, and that needs to be addressed in the last four games of the season.
In the first Baltimore game, Chubb carried just 8 times for 16 yards, as the coaching staff gave up on the running game.
But against the Steelers, Chubb carried 16 times for 61 yards, and then on Sunday, he toted the ball 17 times for 59 yards. In those three games, he totaled 41 carries for 136 yards, just a 3.3 average per carry.
Keep in mind, Chubb averages 5.5 yards per carry for his career.
We have said many times that Baker Mayfield is not the most important offensive player on the Browns, and that it was Chubb.
However, right now, the coaching staff cannot get him untracked, and the entire offense is suffering.
The offensive line, praised by many pundits at the beginning of the season, hasn’t performed up to expectations. This could be because of injuries. Jedrick Wills hurt his ankle in the season opener and hasn’t been right since, and Jack Conklin has had problems with his elbow and then his knee.
And maybe opponents adjusted to what the Browns did a year ago.
Whatever the reason, the Cleveland Browns need to run the football to succeed, and the coaching staff has to figure out a way to unlock that part of the game.
Cleveland Sports Perspective 