Browns’ Final Roster Not Shocking

No one should be surprised that all 14 of the draft choices made by the Browns’ new front office made the initial 53 man roster yesterday.

How many of them are still there after Sashi Brown, Hue Jackson, and the personnel staff scour the waiver wire is a good question, but our guess is that most of the 14 will still be wearing orange and brown.

Let’s face it, it’s a new front office staff, and the team they inherited went 3-13 a year ago. The question should be why didn’t they just replace most of the players who were on the team a year ago.

After the 2015 season ended, the roster had too many players over 30 for a team that had the second overall pick in the draft.

Now, there are just seven, and only three (Joe Thomas, John Greco, and Gary Barnidge) are starters, and it would not be a shock if two more, Andrew Hawkins and Tramon Williams, are released after the organization reviews the players cut by other teams yesterday.

There are now only three players, Thomas, Williams, and back up QB Josh McCown who have been in the NFL for ten years or more.

Perhaps the biggest surprise yesterday was the trade of former 1st round selection Justin Gilbert to the Pittsburgh Steelers for a sixth round pick in 2018.

We understand Gilbert was a polarizing figure here in his two plus seasons, but we thought he was buried by the old coaching staff, and when he did play, he wasn’t burned consistently by wide receivers.

His reputation was that he didn’t take well to coaching, and we get that.

On the other hand, it is interesting that both Gilbert and another first rounder, Barkevious Mingo, were both acquired by teams with a history of winning football in Pittsburgh and New England.

If either become contributors with their new squads it will say volumes about the talent evaluation of the Cleveland organization, both past and present.

Our opinion of Mingo, in particular, is that he is an athletic freak. His interception of Peyton Manning against Denver last year may have been the most amazing play made by a Browns’ defender all season. Why any coordinator here couldn’t find a place or scheme in which to use him is a fail by Cleveland.

The current roster has 18 rookies or first year players, and 10 second year guys. That’s 28 of the current 53, which even a non-math expert knows is more than half.

That’s how you build a football team.

You also have to make a commitment to the coaching staff, so they don’t have to worry about accumulating wins while playing young players.

That was the weakness of previous regimes here. They wanted to get younger, but they also wanted the coach to win. That’s why the Randy Starks, Donte Whitners, and Karlos Dansbys of the NFL were brought in.

We trust that Brown and Jimmy Haslam have told Jackson not to be concerned with the Browns record in 2016.

How should we judge the coach this season? Focus on the progression of the team. If the Browns are a better, more competitive football team when they take the field on January 1st against the Steelers than they are next Sunday, then Jackson has done his job.

In the meantime, the next few days should be interesting to see who will dress a week from today, and who won’t be a part of phase one of the building process.

We Have Some Questions For You, Coach Pettine.

Only the Cleveland Browns could have a situation where they knock the opposing quarterback out of a game, and have him replaced by a future Hall of Famer, who throws for 379 yards and three touchdowns.

In many ways, the key play of today’s 30-9 thumping by the Pittsburgh Steelers over the Browns was the one where Desmond Bryant forced the offensive tackle to step on Landry Jones’ foot early in the first quarter, because that brought Ben Roethlisberger into the contest.

Big Ben threw three touchdown passes and drew several pass interference penalties by the Browns’ secondary, as the Cleveland defense allowed 30 or more points for the sixth time in 10 games this season.

But, we are sure we will be again talking about who should start at quarterback two weeks from tomorrow when the Ravens visit First Energy Stadium.

Mike Pettine gave the media the “I have to review the film” spiel after the game, and bristled when someone (we think it was Tom Reed) asked if it looked bad that the defensive backfield was terrible and last year’s first round pick Justin Gilbert was inactive for the game.

The coach didn’t really answer the inquiry.

Here are some other questions we would like Pettine to answer.

…Who on the coaching staff thought it would be a good idea to have special teams standout Johnson Bademosi matched up with Steelers’ all pro wide receiver Antonio Brown?

Brown caught 10 pass for 139 yards and two touchdown and drew two interference calls.

Bademosi wasn’t on Brown all the time, but too often, it was either he or raw rookie (first NFL game) Charles Gaines. That’s a ridiculously bad match up.

…Why wasn’t Gilbert active?

He leads the Browns in kickoff return average, and made some nice special teams plays in punt coverage over the last few weeks. And he didn’t seem to be excessively targeted in the Thursday night loss to the Bengals when he did play cornerback.

He is in the same spot as Johnny Manziel. The organization needs to see if Gilbert can be a decent NFL corner.

…Why can’t this team run the football?

Cleveland had 15 rushing and the leader was Manziel, who gained 17 on three scrambles. The Browns have two Pro Bowl players on the line in Joe Thomas and Alex Mack, and John Greco and Mitchell Schwartz are solid. Joel Bitonio was out today, but last year was on the all-rookie team.

The Browns had a couple of decent runs early going straight ahead with Duke Johnson and Isaiah Crowell. They spent the rest of the game trying to run wide and losing yardage.

Why not stick with what was working, at least a little?

…What is the coaching staff doing about the penalties?

Cleveland had 12 flags thrown against them for a whopping 188 yards.

Late in the third quarter, the Browns had the ball with a first down inside the one. They had consecutive penalties (holding on Cameron Erving, illegal formation) to take them out of a scoring opportunity.

That kind of sloppy play points to the coaching staff.

Manziel played well (33 of 45 for 372 yards with a TD toss and a pick). After fumbling on the first play, he showed that he can play and deserves to start the rest of the season, especially with the Browns sitting at 2-8.

He certainly isn’t looking like the bust everyone says he is. And really, there isn’t much evidence that Gilbert is either because he doesn’t play.

Maybe, just maybe, there is some talent on this football team, but it isn’t used properly.

Hopefully, however is coaching next year, and we are confident someone else will be, can put those players in a position where they can contribute.

After all, that is kind of the definition of coaching, isn’t it?

Does Pettine Still Think There Isn’t a Problem On Defense?

If we were Browns’ owner Jimmy Haslam and team president Alec Sheiner, we would take down the billboard with Mike Pettine saying he guarantees the Browns will be the toughest team on the field.

That statement is a complete joke.

Last week, Pettine said turning the ball over a bunch of times like his team did against the St. Louis Rams is a recipe for defeat. That is, of course, unless you are the Arizona Cardinals and you can turn the ball over four times and still defeat the Browns, 34-20 at First Energy Stadium today.

Despite forcing four turnovers, the Cleveland defense allowed 491 yards in the loss, which dropped their record to 2-6 and at least according to many media reports, there could be changes before the NFL trading deadline on Tuesday.

Without the Cardinals’ mistakes, the Browns defense may have given up 50 points this afternoon.

Cleveland allowed only 119 yards on the ground, but that was because Carson Palmer threw deep early and often and with tremendous success, burning both starting cornerbacks, Joe Haden and Tramon Williams repeatedly.

We have always held the belief that the only thing worse than being a bad team is being a bad, old team. And Cleveland has four starters on defense over 30 years old (Randy Starks, Williams, Karlos Dansby, and Donte Whitner). Only Dansby seems to be making positive impact plays consistently.

The other fallacy about being a tough team is the total inability of this football team to run the ball. The Browns gained just 39 yards rushing in the game. Their leading rusher was QB Josh McCown who had 18 yards on five scrambles.

Isaiah Crowell carried 10 times, half of the team’s attempts and gained only 14 yards, eight on one run. The newest running back, Robert Turbin, carried three times, and fumbled on two of those carries.

But we digress. Fans and media alike seem to focus on who plays quarterback, and whether or not Dwayne Bowe is active, but the fact remains that the defense is a sieve, constantly shredded on the ground, and now, through the air.

Early on, the defense did a solid job against the run, but the Pettine/O’Neil defense could not get any pressure on Palmer in obvious pass situations and Palmer attacked the Cleveland secondary with great results. He completed passes of 60, 39, 38, and 34 yards during the contest.

The sad thing is, none of those ball were thrown to likely Hall of Famer Larry Fitzgerald, who did catch nine passes for 84 yards.

Pettine should stop hanging around the offensive unit and get with O’Neil to get the defense fixed. And if that’s playing youngsters, then so be it.

One other comment on the secondary. It is hard to believe that last year’s first round pick, Justin Gilbert, cannot get on the field defensively. Is he worse than what we saw today? That is doubtful.

How do we know Gilbert can’t play? Because the coaching staff, which has lost 11 of their last 13 games, tells us so?

Play him, and for god’s sake, get Barkevious Mingo on the field too. Mingo may do a lot of things we don’t see on camera that drives the coaches crazy, but he made an open field tackle on Chris Johnson early in the game, that could have been a huge gain if not for the second year linebacker.

With a short week coming up, we are sure Pettine will use that as a reason not to make changes, but that’s a cop-out. What is the definition of insanity?

As for trades, we would deal any veterans we could for draft picks commensurate with their value, and that includes Joe Thomas and Alex Mack. It is not like the offensive line is an elite unit.

Meanwhile, Browns’ fans are treated to another crapfest of a season.

Nothing Really Learned From Browns Last Night

When watching NFL pre-season games, this is the rule of thumb we use–

For the first game, only the first quarter matters. For the second game, the first half matters. In the third game, the “dress rehearsal” if you will, the first three quarters matter. And the last game is just to decide who makes the back-end of the roster.

So, what did we learn from last night’s game against the Redskins? Not much.

First, it is tough to judge anything considering the Browns’ two best players, Joe Thomas and Joe Haden, didn’t even play. Nor did Dwayne Bowe, Terrell Pryor, Duke Johnson, and several others who could be key members of Mike Pettine’s squad when the regular season starts on September 14th.

The morning newspaper was filled with praise for new starting QB Josh McCown, which we thought was jumping the gun a little bit.

McCown played just one series, made the throws he needed to make, benefited from a pass interference penalty, and otherwise dinked and dunked the Browns into the end zone.

This is not to say, we don’t think McCown will be better than Brian Hoyer, because we think he will, but we didn’t see anything special about the performance last night. We want to see more.

As for the backup quarterback, Johnny Manziel, he showed improvement from last year, mostly in that he looked like an NFL quarterback.

Gone was the “Johnny Package”, the read option non-sense that is being phased out by most NFL teams because defenses have caught up to it.

And although Manziel scored a touchdown on a run, it was the type of run he should have made. He dropped back, the defense parted like the Red Sea, and he took the opportunity to get his team in the end zone. But, there was a marked difference in the way he approached the offense this year.

Overall, the offense was pretty vanilla with mostly short, safe throws, and perhaps the reason for that was the absence of Bowe, Pryor, and Johnson, who we think will be a big part of the passing game.

It was a little disturbing to see last year’s first round pick, Justin Gilbert, get torched on the opening series of the game, losing Pierre Garcon wide open on a deep pass, which he dropped.

He also whiffed on his next chance, a sideline route. He did recover to defend two passes in the end zone, but he needs to be better in the next couple of contests if he is going to contribute.

The run defense, which was arguably more of a weakness than the quarterback play a year ago, didn’t shine, so that is a bit concerning as well. They still have a hard time keeping backs from getting outside. To be sure, that will be a point of emphasis this week in practice.

Next week, we will get to see the people who are going to play in the regular season a whole lot more, probably through the first half. At that point, we should see more things to start forming opinions.

It was good to see football again, but that’s about all we saw. Nothing to get excited about, nothing to be depressed about.

That’s probably the ideal circumstance if you are Mike Pettine.