Start Me Up: Browns @ Bengals

Let's hope Brandon Weeden will have a better
rating than 5.1 today.

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday—the second Browns Sunday in the 2012 season.

Straight up, I'm having a very hard time finding positive reasons that the Browns will win this one.

Let me explain. Obviously, the Browns offense still isn't very good. Brandon Weeden is a rookie, and he's going to need some time to adjust to the NFL. I think the game speed overwhelmed him last week—something that isn't entirely unexpected since he only played five quarters in the preseason. Trent Richardson also played too much last week, as even head coach Pat Shurmur admitted he played probably 10-12 more snaps than he was prepared for. But irrespective of the snaps, you can't convince me Richardson should've had 19 carries after not taking a live snap since the National Championship Game in January.

Okay, yes I do expect Richardson to be better this week after getting his feet wet against the Eagles, but who knows what to expect from Weeden? Even if he stinks again, they have to keep him in there. He's a first round pick. If you think he should be taken out in favor of McCoy, you're lost.

I have more confidence in the other side of the ball, but not much. Joe Haden's immaturity got the best of him and now the Browns won't have him for four pretty key games. The other starting cornerback, Sheldon Brown, is reportedly going to play, but won't be at 100 percent after sustaining a shoulder injury last week. With an elite caliber receiver in AJ Green on the Bengals offense, how will Dimitri Patterson, Buster Skrine, and 2012 7th round pick Trevin Wade do against the pass?

Also, lost in the shuffle last week was that the Browns allowed 110 yards on 20 carries to LeSean McCoy. That's 5.5 yards a carry. Why Andy Reid had Michael Vick throw the ball 56 times when he had a running game that effective will always be a mystery to me, but the Browns are going to have to do a better job against the run if they want to win today. Despite getting demolished by Baltimore last week, Bengals RB Benjarvus Green-Ellis rushed the ball 18 times for 91 yards—that's 5.1 yards a carry.

I'm not really a betting man, but if I were I'd put money on the Bengals pounding the run today with the Law Firm and trying to play ball control offense.

But despite all of that negativity surrounding the Browns this week, let's think about what we know about the Bengals. They always have these flash-in-the-pan years, and then go back down to earth. It's happened plenty of times before—they won the AFC North in 2005, then went 8-8 in 2006. Then they won the division again in 2009, and went 4-12 in 2010. They really weren't even competitive against Baltimore on Monday night, and with the short week who knows how they'll look today?

So what's going to happen in this game? Honestly, I have no clue. I think it'll once again be a low scoring affair, with Dick Jauron once again doing a bang up job with the "Bend but don't break" defense. I think both teams will try to establish a solid running game early and often. And I think the Browns will probably struggle trying to cover AJ Green.

But without further ado...

The Prediction: Bengals 20 - Browns 17

It'll be close, the Browns will once again be winning in the fourth quarter because the defense has kept the team in the game, but a tired D will once again lead to a heart breaking loss.

Can you really see this one playing out any other way?

Well, no matter what happens, I'll see you after.
~MAS

It's getting Chilly in Berea—Browns hire Brad Childress as Offensive Coordinator

Oh yeah, that chill you feel is the ex-Vikings head coach making his way towards the Cleveland area—and I'm honestly not sure how I feel about it.

Mary Kay Cabot reports that at this point new Browns offensive coordinator Brad Childress will not be calling the plays next season—which is why he came to town instead of former Green Bay and Texans A&M head coach, Mike Sherman (who, by the way, will probably replace former Browns OC Brian Daboll in Miami). However, Cabot says that nothing is finalized and that "discussions will take place," that could change.

Okay, so Shurmur will still call the plays, but he's going to have someone help him come up with a strategy all week long. Is that going to be a help? Absolutely, positively yes. Shurmur was obviously overwhelmed at all of the jobs he had to do last year, and honestly he was really just left out to dry. I understand that the Browns didn't want to just hire a coordinator just to hire a coordinator last year, but having a rookie head coach be the only coach in the league without an offensive coordinator was seriously irresponsible—if not plain old stupid.

So what credentials does Chilly bring to the table?

Well first off, he worked with Shurmur and Tom Heckert in Philly. Childress was first the quarterbacks coach for the Eagles starting in 1999, then was promoted to offensive coordinator in 2003—at which time Pat Shurmur was promoted to quarterbacks coach. Obviously, this means that Childress was instrumental in the development of Donovan McNabb. Also, in his time with the Eagles, the team went to four consecutive NFC Championship games, and made it to one Super Bowl—the loss to the Patriots.

Of course, you should already know all this. Why? Because it's the same crap on the resumes of both Shurmur and Heckert.

What sets Childress apart from those guys is that he was, I think, a pretty successful head coach with the Minnesota Vikings. He amassed a record of 39-35 in four+ seasons with Minny, as he was fired after going 3-7 in the middle of his fifth season.

Yes, Childress is probably best known for his part in the saga that was Brett Favre—which probably ended up getting him fired—but I think it's important to note that he was the head coach of Favre's arguably best statistical season when he threw for 4,202 yards with 33 touchdowns, just seven interceptions and a career high completion percentage of 68.4.

Just how much Childress had to do with that development is an arguable point, as Childress didn't call the plays for the Vikings in the 2009 season. In fact, the only season Childress has ever called plays was in 2006—his first year as the Vikings head honcho. That's right, he never called plays in his time with the Eagles either—that's always been Andy Reid's job.

Because of that, I suppose it does make sense for Shurmur to keep his play-calling duties, at least for now.

The Browns now have three former NFL head coaches on staff as assistants—obviously Childress, defensive coordinator Dick Jauron (was head coach of the Bears and Bills) and defensive assistant Ray Rhodes (was head coach of the Eagles and Green Bay).

What does all this mean? According to Daryl Ruiter (who, if you haven't noticed by now, I think is a really fantastic source for information), those three former head coaches have a combined record of 136-159. Is that terrible? Yes. But is the experience Shurmur has around him invaluable? I'd say yes to that too.

So hopefully experienced hire will work out like Dick Jauron's hire last year, and the offense will make fantastic strides.

Do I think that'll happen?

For now, let's just say I'll keep my fingers crossed.

~MAS

Final Word - 2011 Browns Report Card

I wanted to wait until I saw President Mike Holmgren and GM Tom Heckert's press conference to give my assessment of the Browns season, and now that it's over I think I'm ready to have my say.

Obviously, a 4-12 record is not good enough by anyone's standards—and that's something Holmgren said today. The "Big Show" also talked about how he saw progress in many aspects of the team, including the fact that he thinks we started closing the gap between us and the rest of the AFC North teams. In his defense, Holmgren knew that he would be criticized for saying that, but in my humble opinion he should be. The NFL is all about results and "what have you done for me lately." No wins in the division and records of 4-12, 5-11, 5-11 and finally 4-12 in the last four seasons really isn't good enough either.

So that brings me to today's topics, the report card and some awards. I don't think there needs to be much more introduction to a report card than to say I'll be giving different groups of the Browns grades. ...Duh.

Let's just get to it, huh?

Offense
Well, this was a group that had a tough bad awful downright pathetic year. If you haven't heard, this team scored just 218 points the entire season. How bad is that? Well, the 1999 Cleveland Browns—yes, the expansion team!—scored 217, and the 2000 Browns scored 161. I'm glad I don't really remember those teams, but honestly there is no reason whatsoever for this team to be on par with the first two years of the "modern era." That's inexcusable. Not that there is some kind of comparison between the Browns and a team that actually plays offense in the NFL, but the Packers scored 560 points this season. The Saints scored 547. Even the 3-13 Vikings scored 340!

Like I said, downright pathetic.

Some other things to think about—the Browns scored 20+ points just twice this year. The first time was against Indy when they won 27-19, the second was when they played at the half-empty Paul Brown Stadium and lost 23-20 to the Bengals.

In five games, the Browns didn't even score a touchdown. That helps to explain the 218 points...

It took the Browns 12 games to finally score a touchdown in the first quarter.

It took until game 14(!!!) for the Browns to score a touchdown in the third quarter. Talk about inexcusable—that means Shurmur just couldn't make good halftime adjustments.

Yes, injuries ravaged the running backs and offensive line (please be healthy next year, Eric Steinbach), but there's no reason the Browns only had four rushing touchdowns and averaged just 3.7 yards per carry. Those ranked dead last and next to last, respectively. Boo!

All told, the Browns ranked 30th in points, and 29th in total offensive yards. Can you guess what grade I'm going to give this unit?

Grade: F

Defense
Okay, obviously the defense had a much better year than O, and I think that's in no small part thanks to coordinator Dick Jauron. I wrote in this post about a year ago when the Browns hired Pat Shurmur that it could take three to five years for the defense to fully convert from the 3-4 back to the 4-3. I will gladly eat some crow on that one—even though we don't exactly have what I would consider an All-Star caliber pass-rush, and our run defense is still awful, the defense was definitely the best unit on this team.

Looking at the numbers, you could really make an argument that despite ranking 30th running defense, the Browns actually had a top 10 all around D.

Stop laughing, I'm serious.

The Browns ranked 2nd in passing D—which could be explained by people running all over us, but hey, ranking 2nd is ranking 2nd. I'll take it.

In terms of yards, the Browns were also in the top 10 as they ranked 10th total defense. Also good.

But what I put the most stock in is the fact that the Browns ranked 5th in points allowed on the season. Yes, just fifth! They gave up just 19.2 points per game, which I think is excellent. (As an aside, two of the top four defenses were Baltimore and Pittsburgh...That's bad news bears.)

Did the Browns get all kinds of turnovers? Well not really interceptions as they only had nine, but they did get 11 fumbles.

But you know what, getting the fundamentals down is a lot of the time the hardest part. If we can make this kind of progress in just one year, I'd expect the defense to get that much better with a couple more pieces. And imagine if they actually had a mediocre offense so that they could get off the field sometimes?

Even though I think the defense did very well, that 30th ranking against the run leaves a bad taste in my mouth. So that's the justification for this...

Grade: B

Special Teams
Honestly, I don't know how in the wide, wide world of sports special teams coach Chris Tabor has not been fired already. Two long snappers, three punters (albeit because of injuries), at least two blocked field goals (one against St. Louis wasn't actually considered a block), and a punt returned for a touchdown. All that, and Josh Cribbs went from one of the best return men to one of the worst, as he ranked 25th in return yards this season.

All that after the Browns routinely ranked in the top five of special teams categories int he past couple of years.

If not for Phil Dawson—who hit seven field goals of 50+ yards, and with all the stupid blocks really only missed one field goal this season—and Brad Maynard—who was excellent punting and had just one touchback on the year, which came in the final game against the Steelers—the special teams unit would surely be getting an F. Instead they get...

Grade: C+

Coaching
By 'coaching' I mean head coach, offensive coordinator (which we don't have...), defensive coordinator and special teams coach. I've said it plenty of times, but I think Shurmur was completely overmatched this season by being both the offensive coordinator and the head coach. There's a reason why 31/32 NFL teams had offensive coordinators this season, even if they didn't call the plays... Just sayin'.

Based on the previous comments on the defense, I honestly don't think we could've had a better defensive coordinator this year. Despite the fact that the run defense was no good, Dick Jauron took a defense in shambles and made it respectable.

You already know how I feel about special teams coach, Tabor, so let's just say that along with Shurmur, he's bringing down the grade here.

Grade: C

Front Office
Now this grade is sort of interesting to me, because it's all about Holmgren and Heckert. Did those two do enough in the offseason to put the Browns in a position to win? Well, on defense the argument can definitely be made for a yes. They drafted Phil Taylor and Jabaal Sheard—two players who will be part of the core of the Browns defensive line for hopefully the next decade. They also locked up key players like Chris Gocong, Athyba Rubin and Joe Thomas with longterm deals. Those things are good.

But they definitely failed to give Colt McCoy any kind of help at the wide receiver position, as I'm still not sure why in the world the Browns refused to sign a veteran wide receiver. The whole PR debacle of Concussion-Gate was also something that really left a bad taste in my mouth for Holmgren—especially the ludicrous, "Don't come to me asking for extra playoff tickets," line.

I'll let Jim Mora handle this one.


Grade: B-

Overall
Well, to be honest, a 4-12 record pretty much speaks for itself, doesn't it? Honestly, 0-6 in the division to boot? I know we're not supposed to be holding the sins of former regimes against Holmgren, Heckert and Shurmur, but you know what? We were supposed to see real, tangible progress in the form of Ws this year—that was the whole idea behind firing Mangini in the first place! But the thing is, I sincerely believe that if Mangini had been the coach of the 2011 Browns, there's no way in the world we would've been 4-12. But that's what we are, and that seriously has to change if Holmgren and Heckert want to justify keeping Shurmur as the head coach of this team for 2013. (...that is, if the world doesn't end before then!)

Grade: D-

So there you have it. I thought about doing some awards for this post, but I thought that might make things run a little too long (thanks for sticking it out this far!), so I'll just give you a little bit more from me to read in the next few days.

That's right guys and gals, keep an eye out for the first ever Myley Awards.

See you then!
~MAS

Believe It, Baby, We Won

I have one word for this game today:

Unbelievable.

I can't remember being so excited about a Browns win. And what a win it was.

Can you believe after stinking so much all day, Colt McCoy was able to drive the ball 80 yards in the 2-minute drill to get the Browns a 17-16 lead? And that after being shut down all day Mohammed Massaquoi and Greg Little were able to make beautiful, key catches in order to get the ball down the field? And that Massaquoi made that 14 yard catch in the endzone for the touchdown?

Seriously, that was one of the more impressive wins I think the Browns have had since we got back in '99. All this, plus we've started out a season 2-1 for the first time since 2002—when the Butch Davis Browns lost their first game against the Chiefs, then defeated Cincinnati and Tennessee in their next two games.

It might not even be worth it to take a look at the numbers today, cause who cares, we won?! But Colt McCoy finished the day 19/39 with 210 yards, 2 touchdowns and 1 interception. That's 48% completions, and a QB rating of 71.5. Not the McCoy we expect in terms of accuracy, but we won the game because he was accurate when we needed it the most. I'll take it.

Ben Watson was the leading receiver with 5 catches for 64 yards, but Mohammed Massaquoi and Greg Little came up huge in that 2-minute drill, with Little catching 3 passes for 24 yards, and Massaquoi catching 2 for 26, including the game-winning touchdown. If we can get execution like that earlier in the game from those receivers, we'll be in really good business.

The running game was actually pretty decent, despite the loss of Peyton Hillis today. Montario Hardesty did a very nice job filling in, even though he didn't get to 100 yards. He did have 67 yards on 14 carries, good for a 4.8 average. I'll always take that. And now that we've seen Hardesty can produce, I think we'll start to see more of Hillis & Hardesty in the same backfield. If not next week, then for sure after the bye week.

I don't know how he's done it, but Dick Jauron has done a fantastic job early with converting the Browns 3-4 defense into a 4-3. I just remember so many growing pains when we initially switched to the 3-4 under Romeo Crenel that it's really astonishing to me how well the defense has played—especially the defensive line. As a unit, the defense had 5 sacks, 6 tackles for loss, and 8 QB hits. Those are exceptional numbers, and I think we've really got to take our hats off to Jauron for that.

Since I love defense so much, I've just got to highlight the dominance of our defensive line. I'm telling you, Athyba Rubin and Phil Taylor are just a joy to watch stuff the middle. They combined today for 16 total tackles, 2.5 sacks, 2 tackles for loss and 2 QB hits. In this 4-3 defense, you want those two guys along with the middle linebacker to have the most tackles, and D'Qwell Jackson led the team with 11 tackles. That's 27 total tackles between those three, the middle core of what could turn out to be fairly dominating defense for the next few years. I'm lovin' it.

Obviously, this is a great end to the weekend and a great start to the week. A comeback win is exactly what this team and city needed to really get behind the Browns again.

And as an aside, I think it's wonderful for football that the Bills and Lions are 3-0, and the Browns are 2-1. How about them apples?!


Enjoy this feeling, and I'll see you next week!
~MAS

Hiring Dick Jauron, A Negative Nancy and Losing Brad Seely

It've got a trifecta of topics burning on my mind today, so let's get right to it with...

Hiring Dick Jauron
As I wrote in this post, I think Dick Jauron is the best man for the Browns defensive coordinator job, and thus I'm pretty happy that the braintrust of Holmgren, Heckert and Shurmur picked him up. The coaching pedigree that he has along with coming from the Andy Reid family of coaches (albeit he was only there for  the 2010 season as the defensive backs coach and senior assistant) I'm sure made him the front runner all along.

Jauron is going to have the probably somewhat unpleasant task of transforming a...well... competent 3-4 defense into a staunch 4-3 defense. The old adage "Defense Wins Championships" has never been more true than this year, when we have all four teams competing in conference championship weekend with defenses in the top 10. Combine that with a division where you play Pittsburgh and Baltimore two times a year - both of them with defenses that routinely rank in the top ten - and I think Jauron is sort of in a tough position as a coach.

I know that implementing the west coast offense has been a big focus of this offseason, as evidenced by the hiring of Pat Shurmur, but if the Browns want to be competitive in the AFC North, they're going to have to be at least above average on D - at that might not even cut it unless we have a top tier offense. We'll have to wait and see how that's going to turn out.

A Negative Nancy
I don't really publicize this all that much, but between the two Browns beat writers for the Plain Dealer / Cleveand.com/sports, I vastly prefer Mary Kay Cabot over Tony Grossi. The main reason is that Grossi is so obviously a jaded Cleveland sports fan, and he lets that carry over into his writing all the time. Last year he was probably the harshest Mangini critic, and that was largely true for this season as well. But what bothered me yesterday as I read stories online was the headline "Browns Lose Dave Wannstedt to Bills." I clicked on the story, and promptly read "[Dick] Jauron has been the Browns top choice all along." So my question is, if the Browns had their guy in mind, and ended up hiring him, how in the wide world of sports does that constitute losing Wannstedt?

That's exactly what I mean by the jaded sports mentality. If you get what you want, then you're inherently not losing. You're winning. Why Grossi had to frame the story in such a negative way, I have no ide other than that's just the type of writer he is. Negative.

Losing Brad Seely
Now this is actually a really big deal. Brad Seely is widely regarded as one of the best - if not the best - special teams coaches in the league, and the Browns have let him go to join Jim Harbaugh's staff in San Francisco. Now, the Browns could have blocked him from leaving (which I think would have been a good idea) but I'm assuming that Holmgren didn't want to make him work in a place where he didn't want to.

You know what? I think when you have someone who is the best at their position, you do whatever you have to to keep them. Coaches like Seely don't just come along every day. If you have contractual control over the guy, I say you exercise that and keep him. It's like putting the franchise tag on a player - sure he might be unhappy, but if he wants a job elsewhere when his contract is up he better keep performing at a high level.

I don't mean to be a negative Nancy myself, but when your special teams have been as good as the Browns have been the last few years, I think it's easy to see why I might have a problem with letting Seely go. I'm not entirely sure that this is true, but I believe the Browns haven't given up a touchdown on a kick or punt return in at least two years - the time that Seely has been with the team. Replacing him is going to be one heck of a task.

*Update* Seely actually had a clause in his contract that allowed him to leave the Browns if Eric Mangini was fired. And that explains a lot...

Well that's all I've got for today, Browns fans. Enjoy the weekend!

~MAS

They Call Him Coach, Pat Shurmur

Well I guess this would count as late, somewhat irrelevant information, but now that I've finally got a calm moment in my first week back at school, I'll pass along what I'm thinking about the Browns recent hire of Pat Shurmur as their 13th full time head coach.

First off, was it a good hire?

I'm going to have to say yes. I know he's not the big name coach we all were hoping for (ahem, Jon Gruden), and that I wrote this pretty critical post about him in my "A Look At" series, but I think he's going to get the job done well. Shurmur comes highly recommended from Eagles head coach (and Mike Holmgren favorite) Andy Reid, he runs the West Coast offense, and he did a very nice job with Sam Bradford down in St. Louis this past year.

Did the Rams offensive stats set the world on fire this year? No. Did they make the playoffs? No, they actually kind of choked on offene the last game of the season to take them out of that equation.  Did they even have a winning record? Well, no again. But I think coordinating the offense that made Bradford have the best rookie quarterback stats since Peyton Manning is something for which Shurmur should be given a lot of credit.

All that aside, the next thing the Browns need to do is hire a great defensive coordinator, because defense is something Shurmur knows little to nothing about. I actually have no problem with that, as the last two Browns head coaches were former defensive coordinators of Bill Bellichick in New England, and neither of them paned out that well. In a sort of after the fact criticism of Crenel and Mangini, I think that if you have a specialty as a head coach, then your team should reflect that specialty, right? Well, the only successful Browns team in the past six years was the '07 version where we were 10-6, and that team was known for Derek Anderson throwing 28 touchdowns, many of which were to Braylon Edwards and Kellen Winslow Jr. Let's hope Shurmur can bring a good offensive identity to the team, since we really haven't had an identity at all since we got back into the league in '99.

But to get back to defensive coordinators, the Browns have interviewed former Bills and Bears head coach, and the current secondary coach of the Philidelphia Eagles, Dick Jauron. According to ESPN and the Plain Dealer, they're also looking at former Dolphins head coach Dave Wannstedt and former Arizona Cardinals defensive coordinator Bill Davis. Now, I'm not really sold on Wannstedt and Davis, the former because he's been out of the NFL since 2005 while serving as coach at Pitt, and the latter because he just got fired from the Arizona Cardinals - if he's not good enough for them, he's not good enough for us.

That brings us to Jauron, who has a pretty good resumé, and is also a candidate to replace the recently fired Sean McDermott in Philadelphia as defensive coordinator. Now that's a team we should be competing with for a coordinator. I'm not sure if he'll come here, but he would also be great to have around the building just as another resource for Shurmur to bounce his head coaching ideas off of - especially when it comes to defense.

Also, we're going to have to change from the 3-4 to the 4-3 defensive scheme. This actually could be a problem that sets the Browns back a couple years because right now we are just not built for that at all with the players that are currently on the roster. We're going to need an overhaul at the defensive line position, and that's a shame because Ahtyba Rubin has been doing a great job stuffing the run for the past couple of seasons at nose tackle. In a perfect world, we'll acquire a couple of great defensive ends who will be able to rush the passer and we'll build around Scott Fujita at the linebacker position. When I think of a great 4-3 defense, I think of the New York Giants because of the way the rush the passer, yet still defend the run quite well year after year. With any luck, we'll be like them in...maybe 2, 3...or 5 years.

That's a lot of information to diget, Browns fans, so make sure you don't go swimming for a little while (not that you would if you're in Cleveland, or anywhere in the world where it's winter this time of year - unless you have an indoor pool, of course). I'll probably be back this weekend to assess what I think are the two best games of the year in the NFL - the conference championship games. The games this week promise to be great, with division rivals Chicago and Green Bay squaring off in the NFC, and two teams with top defenses battling in the AFC, the Steelers and Jets.

Enjoy the games on Sunday - I know I will.

~MAS