Week 13 - 2014 - Bills

As the snow melted in Buffalo on an unseasonably warm day, so did the Browns playoff hopes.  They aren't out of it, but the road got tougher following a 26-10 beatdown by the Bills.  Brian Hoyer was awful for the third straight game, and may have seen the his last game as a starter for the Browns.  His fall from grace has been steady, and the Browns offense has fallen with him.  In the past 3 games he has completed 50.1% of his passes, he has thrown 1 touchdown, and 5 interceptions.  He has thrown 9 interceptions and 5 touchdowns in his past 8 games.  He was horrible on Sunday, not even his biggest supporters can defend that performance.  Johnny Manziel came in and led an impressive drive, looked like he gave the team a spark, and looks to be the quarterback that will lead this late season playoff push.  But the Browns laid an egg, and it was ugly.

Hoyer and the Browns' biggest problem in the past few games has been the inability to generate points off of turnovers.  The defense gave him the ball twice in Atlanta, which he and the offense turned into two field goals.  That is unacceptable, and that and the fact that Hoyer threw three picks were the only reasons that the Falcons were in the game.  Against Buffalo, the defense again came up with 2 interceptions, which resulted in zero points.  On the second turnover they got the ball on Buffalo's 30 yard line and proceeded to get stuffed on a run, throw a one yard pass to a fullback, and get sacked to push them out of field goal range.  I'm not sure I've even seen a team spit in the face of momentum like the Browns do.  It was pathetic.

The defense held the Bills to 2-15 on third downs.  The Bills were 0-10 at one point with a 14-3 lead.  What more can a defense do? 

The Browns were not beaten by the Bills offense, they were beaten by the Bills defense and they lost the special teams battle.  And they were called for 10 penalties, almost all of them untimely.  Jerome Boger is an awful referee.

Kyle Shanahan did not call his best game in my opinion.  Too many outside runs against a fast Bills defense and a stacked box.  It's hard to call games when your quarterback can't beat an 8 man box though, and Brian Hoyer was not beating anyone on Sunday.  His chemistry was still clearly off with Josh Gordon, who did not have a great game either.  But forcing passes into triple coverage is inexcusable, and Hoyer did that on multiple occasions.  Thus the switch at quarterback, and the first real live action for Johnny Manziel.  Manziel showed a live arm and excellent mobility on the touchdown drive.  I personally don't think they are going to go back to Brian Hoyer.  I think that Johnny Manziel fits Kyle Shanahan's offense perfectly.  I think that if Manziel is the starter the Browns will be in the shotgun or pistol more, I think Shanahan will scheme to utilize Manziel's quickness and speed, and I think there will be both some excitement and some rookie mistakes.  But I don't think they will go back, and I don't think they should.  We've seen the best of Brian Hoyer, and that was 8 weeks ago.  He has regressed.

So the Browns will be making a playoff push with (possibly) a rookie quarterback, two rookie running backs, a third string center, a rookie guard, and their star receiver still working out the kinks following a 10 game suspension.  It should be quite a ride, but these guys are growing up in a winning culture and gaining experience which should be invaluable to them.

Speaking of rookie running backs, that fumble by Terrance West was the play of the game.  That is inexcusable.  It might be time to see what Glenn Winston has.  Running backs cannot fumble the ball.  Period.  That was a game changing turnover.  It was TERRIBLE.  Joe Thomas also had the worst game I can remember him having.  Ever.  It was just a mess on offense.

Defensively the Browns played well, they harassed Orton, they held the Bills to 3.5 yards per carry, and they forced the two turnovers.  I'm not sure what else a defense can do other than score points themselves.  The offense and special teams let the Browns down on Sunday.

And those special teams, boy they just continue to let the Browns down.  I hope Chris Tabor has his bags packed and is out on the first bus.  His unit continues its pathetic ineptitude, Billy Cundiff has now missed a field goal in four straight games.  4.  Straight.  Games.  The media likes to make fun of the fans adulation towards Phil Dawson but geez can't we get ANYONE in here that can make 37 yard field goals?  CUNDIFF IS TERRIBLE.  TABOR YOU ARE THE WORST.  Benjamin was running backwards on punt returns, then tripping over his own feet.  They embarrass themselves on a new level weekly.  Pure hot garbage.

It was a tough loss for the Browns, but it may mark the beginning of a new era.  I know there are some fans who will now root against Johnny Manziel out of pure spite.  Go ahead.  There shouldn't be this divide but there is.  If Manziel wins they'll be the first ones jumping back on the bandwagon.  But one thing is clear, Brian Hoyer wasn't getting it done.  It's Manziel's turn to see if he can right the ship and lead this team into the playoffs.  It may have been a week too late, but it's his turn now.  The Browns future is now, it should be a wild ride for the last 4 games.



Random gifs (and vines if I can get them to work)

Cheerleaders fight on, the stand up sign works here too





Dickie V had some wiggle back in the day

 

 

Mike Evans.  That's all.




Bonus pic of Johnny Football because it was hilarious

Week 7 - 2014 - Jaguars

That giant thud you heard around 4pm?  That was Brian Hoyer coming back down to Earth.  Or maybe it was the horrid Paul McQuistan getting planted on his back again by the Jacksonville defensive line.  Or maybe it was a collective groan after one questionable coaching decision after another.  Or perhaps, it was the sound of expectations being lowered.  As only the Browns can, they disappointed their ravenous fanbase with one of the worst eggs they've ever laid (and that's saying something), losing to the previously winless Jaguars 24-6.  It was pure hot garbage from the start.

This isn't Penn Hills High School, Mike Pettine.  This is the NFL.  Teams can't overcome their head coaches too often.  I understand that Pettine is a first year head coach and that maybe he deserves some leeway.  But good lord the list of bad decisions that he made in this game alone could fill this page.  They have looked incredibly unprepared to play every game on the road so far.  However they were 3-2, on a two game win streak, and had looked like a team that was ready to make some noise.   Pettine talked all week about how they weren't going to overlook Jacksonville, blah blah blah, and then they did.  This was an 0-6 team they played!  They hadn't scored more than 17 points in a game!  They are the worst ranked offense in the league, and the 30th ranked defense.  This is a game that a good team, a well coached team, would have come out and dominated.  But it's possible that the Browns are neither.

Pettine couldn't get out of his own way in this one, from the get go.  The most egregious coaching mistake he made was when he opted to go for it on 4th and 1, up 6-0 in the second quarter.  I'm all for aggressiveness when the time is right.  And the time was way wrong on this one.  They should have kicked the field goal and gone up by two scores, especially when it was clear that points were not going to come easily.  Instead they failed to convert and gave Jacksonville back the ball.  The Jags promptly moved down the field and scored a touchdown, going into the half with the lead.  He also made an absolutely ridiculous decision to try and trick the Jaguars on 4th down by trotting out the punt team, then running them off and bringing the offense back.  They were trying to catch the Jags sleeping, but they weren't.  Instead Greco snapped the ball to Hoyer who had no idea what was going on, and gave the ball away on the 50 yard line with the game still in the balance.  He looked absolutely clueless.  It was Shurmur-esque.

He wasn't the only coach that had a rough game.  My good buddy Chris Tabor, the worst special teams coach in football, was back to his old tricks.  Absolutely embarrassing performance by his unit.  Between Spencer Lanning kicking the ball into the endzone for touchbacks and longsnappers getting penalties, he decided to trot Jordan Poyer out to return punts in the 4th quarter with the game on the line, with the reliable Jim Leonhard on the bench.  Poyer tried to catch the punt on the 2 !!!!! freaking yard line, had the ball bounce off his facemask and into the arms of the Jaguars defender.  Jacksonville scored and essentially put the game away after that blunder.  Not only was the catch muffed, but the Browns jumped offsides anyway, so either way Jacksonville was keeping the ball.  How Tabor is still employed is a mystery to me.  I just don't get it.  Every other game his unit does something detrimental.  He is just the worst.

All week long we heard about Brian Hoyer and his contract.  That's what Brian Hoyer was talking about this week, his contract, and whether he did or didn't want to be here if Johnny Manziel is.  Yeah it might be time to table those contract talks.  Brian Hoyer was AWFUL.  16-41, 215 yards, an interception and a fumble, and somehow it looked worse than those numbers.  He was spraying the ball all over the field.  High and low, wide and far, he did his best Derek Anderson impression.  The receivers will shoulder some of the blame but it's the quarterbacks job to deliver catchable balls, and Hoyer just didn't do it.  They had a chance to go up 10-0 in the first half, but Hoyer never saw Travis Benjamin streaking open on 2nd down and then airmailed a pass to a wide open Jordan Cameron on 3rd, leading to a field goal.  This was Hoyer's worst game as a starter.  And get used to it Brian, that's what you're going to see going forward.  Teams are going to bring 8 and 9 guys into the box and make Brian Hoyer throw accurately and beat them.  We'll see how that goes.  It's amazing what good defensive coaches do to quarterbacks once they get some film on them.  I love Gus Bradley by the way.  For the record I would have thrown Manziel in for a series in the third quarter.  The offense was stagnant under Hoyer and I would have seen if I could have found a spark.  If nothing else maybe it would have woken Hoyer up. 

The offensive line looked pretty bad without Alex Mack.  Paul McQuistan can crawl back into whatever hole he came out of because hopefully we've seen the last of him.  He was abused.  Ideally Nick McDonald (great story here by MKC) can slide in at center and move Greco back to guard.  Isaiah Crowell is clearly the most talented back on the team, but Ben Tate gets more carries for some reason.  Crowell should be the feature back.  Let him loose.  FEED THE CROW.  What does Ben Tate do better than Crowell?  Nothing that I can think of, don't say block because he got Hoyer smashed on the fumble that somehow magically went 15 yards forward but was still ruled a fumble.  Those refs sucked, too.  I'm also going to only refer to Terrance West as "Two Step" now, because all he wants to do is dance.

It's clear that the defensive line has been decimated by injury, but to let the Jaguars, who came in averaging like 67 yards per game run for 185 yards is absolutely disgraceful.  My man Tashaun Gipson looked like he could have scored had he cut upfield instead of running sideways on the interception, but he's a player.  They intercepted Bortles 3 times, but the offense let them down.  The defense wasn't great, but they were hung out to dry big time by the offense and special teams.

This was your typical Browns game.  Play like a Brown says Pettine, and they did.  As a life long Browns fan I knew that there was a real possibility that they would get beat by the 0-6 Jaguars.  Once you've seen so much disappointment you steel yourself for games like this.  Instead of moving to 4-2 for the first time since 2001 they fall to 3-3.  This was a game they should have won, but they didn't.  This was a ready for primetime test and they failed miserably.  It should serve as a reset of expectations.  Were these the real Browns?  Was this the real Brian Hoyer?  Is this team a real contender in the AFC North?  Or are they a .500 team?  Time will tell, but this thud will reverberate loudly through this town this week.


Random gifs

This probs hurt

So did this

Oh those sneaky Rams.

Bonus pic - Darnell Dockett is so mean to Oakland fans.  Browns looking to avoid losing back to back games to 0-6 opponents next week when Oakland comes to town.

Week 3 - 2014 - Ravens

I forget who said it, maybe former Steeler Ryan Clark, but I was watching NFL Network one day and the comment was made about the Browns that you know if you play them close, they'll find a way to lose the game (EDIT It was former Ravens and current Browns coach Wilbert Montgomery).  Well whoever said it had it right.  Play like a Brown, Pettine says.  Boy did they.  He should use Coach like a Brown, too, because boy they did.  They blew another game, 23-21 to the Ravens.  They played like the Browns we've all seen over the past 16 seasons.  What other franchise consistently loses games they should win?  I can think of a couple teams blowing a couple games, but the Browns do it almost weekly.  At least the Jaguars are a consistent dumpster fire, same with the Raiders.  I think those two are the only other franchises I hold in the same esteem that I hold the Browns.  Garbage teams that make stupid mistakes, but they don't just give away wins like the Browns do.  NO ONE DOES!!!!  It seems impossible to blow it week in and week out.  But no, alas, it's possible.  Because this team will do it.  They'll find a way to lose.

I don't even know where to begin.  First of all, what did we as a collective fan base do to deserve having to be emotionally invested in this team, other than being born in a certain area or having parents that were fans?  No one in the past 20 years has just up and decided "Oh I'm going to be a Browns fan that seems fun!"  Because it's a horrifying existence.  I want to change sides, to become a fan of an actual, respectable team.  Maybe the Colts or the Bears.  But I just can't.  And I hate myself for it.

Instead I get treated to games like the one on Sunday.  Let's just check some boxes on how much this loss sucked.  At home.  Check.  To the scum of the Earth, and a division rival.  Check.  Had the lead in the 4th quarter.  Check.  Lost on a last second play.  Check.  Yup I'd say that about covers it.  It sucked, and not just a little.  A bunch.  This group of Browns had a chance to be different than the other Browns, and announce that they aren't going to be a punching bag in the AFC North anymore, that they have a chance to really make some noise this year with a soft schedule, that it's not going to be the same old Browns.  But it is.  IT ALWAYS IS.

Mike Pettine put the loss on himself and the coaches.  Uhh yeah Mike, that's where I'd start.  So Mike Pettine has a defensive coordinator, Jim O'Neil.  And Jim O'Neil calls the defenses sometimes, but Mike Pettine wants to call the defenses sometimes.  And then for the second straight game there are 12 players in the defensive huddle on multiple occasions.  Hmmm, I wonder what would cause confusion with that streamlined setup?  Garbage.

Chris Tabor, our special teams coach, is literally the worst coach in the league at his position.  Somehow, like a little blond parasite, he keeps surviving coaching changes.  He is horrible.  People think he's good.  He's not.  I've been saying it for two years.  His unit loses the Browns games.  On a team without a bunch of big play offensive threats you cannot lose the special teams battle, but we do.  Often.  His unit has consistently underperformed, going back as far as last year.  Remember that one time when we had two punts blocked in one quarter?  That was fun.  On Sunday he tried to up even that performance.  First play of the game, offsides on the kickoff.  Two missed field goals, well I guess one was blocked so that doesn't count, right?  His long snapper is low on everything, his kicker can't hit a kick further than about 40 yards, and the defensive tackle protecting the right side let a guy run right in front of him to block a kick.  We lost by 2, by the way.  Oh and let's not ignore the fact that when we needed our punter to let one fly on the last series he powered one for 40 yards.  Oh and why were we in that position?  Because Travis Benjamin, the most terrified football player I've ever seen, let a punt go sailing over his head instead of fair catching it, giving up 20 yards of field position in the process.  TRAVIS BENJAMIN IS AFRAID TO GET HIT.  GET HIM THE F OFF THE FIELD!!!!!!!  He had no business being out there, especially with a reliable option like Jim Leonhard on the bench.  Chris Tabor.  Billy Cundiff.  Christian Yount.  Travis Benjamin.  Get rid of them all they are putrid.  You could put this loss squarely on this unit, and you wouldn't be wrong.

Defensively, in addition to the stupid penalties, not a great game.  They were pretty much gashed by the Ravens run game.  Ahtyba Rubin is just stealing Jimmy Haslam's money at this point.  He can't stop the run.  Going into this last game he was PFF's worst rated defensive tackle, I can't imagine this performance changed that.  Craig Robertson is still playing for some reason.  I just can't figure it out.  But nonetheless, the defense did rise up and make some critical stops when they needed to.  They stopped Baltimore on a key fourth quarter 4th down, they held them to a field goal from the goalline to maintain the lead, and they got the Browns the ball back with a chance to close out the game.  But when it was really time to make a play, they played like Browns.  Joe Haden, $67.5 million dollar Pro Bowl shut down cornerback, gets burned on a straight go route by a 36 year old wide receiver, and that's your ballgame.  Joe Haden, maybe the best defensive player on this team, has been absolutely destroyed in every game this season.  He and Gilbert, this great cornerback duo, have been simply awful.  If they don't get better this team isn't winning too many more games.  And get set before the plays start, Browns defensive backs.  Bill Kern is right, they never look ready for the snap.

On offense, no team in the league knows how to waste momentum like the Browns.  Lets take a look at some big plays.

43 yard pass completion to Travis Benjamin!  Have to call timeout after the play.

21 yard pass to Miles Austin on a 2nd and 23!  Next play, Brian Hoyer 1 yard scramble, then punt on 4th and 1 from the Baltimore side of the field.  (Punt went into the endzone, of course).  Never punt on 4th and 1 from the other teams side of the field.

Creative pass play to Manziel for 40 yards!  Penalty on Terrance West.

22 yard run by Crowell!  Next play, some sort of reverse counter to Taylor Gabriel that lost 10 yards.

Interception by Tashaun Gipson!!  Next play 8 yard loss on a bungled looking pitch play to Crowell.

70!!! Yard pass to Gabriel (who fell down on a perfect pass)!  Next play, one yard loss on a West run.  Then a sack.  Then a touchdown except Hoyer threw the ball 5 yards past the line of scrimmage.  Then a easy field goal.  Blocked.

And the offense actually played well!  Hoyer had his best game, probably the best game a guy like that can have, and he lost at home and put 21 points up.  When Hoyer had to make a throw, even tossing out the second to last series where he threw two incompletions when they could have run the clock, when he absolutely had to hit Andrew Hawkins between the 1 and the 6, to seal the game, he was behind Hawkins who couldn't pull it in.  Ballgame.  He played well, I'm not discounting that.  No turnovers, long sustained drives, big plays.  But when they needed it he missed Hawk.  And they lost, and that's what matters.

I hate the Ravens on a plane that not even the Steelers can touch.  I hate them with all of my being.  I hate losing to them.  I hate that the Browns lose games consistently that they should win.  I hate that I'm invested in this team after seeing this for so long.  I hate Chris Tabor.  But most of all I hate the feeling in this city after a loss like that.  This team had a chance to do something big, and they let us all down.  Offense, defense, special teams, coaching.  All of them.  They all played like Browns.  Someday, that will mean something different.  Not today.

Random gifs

Browns fans baby

Ouch

Ouch

Bonus pic new favorite fan

Week 1 - 2014 - Steelers

The hours before the season opener (besides the draft our Super Bowl) are usually the best time as a Browns fan.  Nothing awful has happened yet.  There is a glimmer of hope that maybe this year is our year.  Maybe the balls bounce our way this season, maybe we finally have a competent and functional organization, maybe this year's opener will be different then the last 9 (all losses) and 14 of the 15 since we've been back.  Maybe Mike Pettine will be a diamond in the rough and turn into a great head coach, maybe Brian Hoyer will write the hometown hero story, or maybe Johnny Manziel will take over and wreck this league.  There is hope, optimism, anticipation.  And then the games start and it's the same old same old, poor quarterback play, poor tackling, poor coaching.  It's the same play with a different cast of characters.  And yesterday, on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, ultimately the result was the same.  A loss, which makes it ten (10!!!!) straight opening day losses for the Browns, who fell to the Steelers 30-27.  Only this time, the second act played out a little differently and may have kept hope and optimism flowing in this town for at least another week.

The game was really a game of two different halves.  Really different halves.  The first half caused this guy to make this, (warning - foul language alert) and I was right there with him.  It was an unmitigated disaster that made the Pat Shurmur coached Browns look like the 1964 championship team.  It was bad.  It was really really bad.  They couldn't block.  They couldn't tackle.  They couldn't execute simple football plays.  The punter got kicked in the face.  The Steelers racked up nearly 370! yards and staked out to a 27-3 lead.  It was Shock and Awe. 

It was clear to me anyway that Hoyer was not comfortable throwing in the first half, and was afraid to get hit.  Everything was off his back foot.  He did not trust his knee and did not want to get hit in it.  Travis Benjamin also did not want to get hit, jumping out of bounds short of first downs and fair catching punts with ample space in front of him.  Benjamin was awful in my opinion, but I suppose it's worth noting that he too is coming back off of an ACL tear.  The defense was embarrassingly bad.  The tackling was wretched.  Special teams was a disaster.  I don't even want to list the players who were awful in the half because they all played so bad.  All of them.  They were all horrible.  It seemed like Daryl Ruiter's prediction may not have even been safe.

This will be the first time in 3 years that the #Browns will return from Heinz Field and not fire their head coach after
— Daryl Ruiter (@RuiterWrongFAN) September 5, 2014

Something happened though at halftime that has rarely happened in the recent history of the Browns.  The Browns decided they weren't going to get bullied anymore.  The Browns have LEADERSHIP in their locker room this year, and those leaders were not going to let them lay down and take it.  I honestly don't think they've had that in a long time.  They came back out ready to fight.  And they took it to the Steelers in the second half.  The offensive line was dominant for the most part.  The no huddle was effective (SHOCKING).  Hoyer looked far more comfortable.  The receiving corp that everyone was complaining about got open and caught the ball, and that was without Jordan Cameron.  And back the Browns came.  All the way back, behind the running game and offensive line and smart decisions by Hoyer.  Isaiah Crowell and Terrance West looked awesome.  Andrew Hawkins looked great.  Kyle Shannahan was in a groove calling plays, and never abandoned the run *cough cough Norv Turner*.  It all clicked.  Defensively, the Browns looked like an entirely different team.  They stuffed the run.  They rushed the passer.  They came back and forced a 3 and out after Pittsburgh converted a fake punt.  Jabaal Sheard played great.  Paul Kruger probably played his best game as a Brown.  They came all the way back to tie the game 27-27.  But they couldn't close the game out.  And a loss is a loss.  That's why I feel weird about the game.  The outcome was obviously not what they want but it's hard not to be encouraged by what they did in the second half.

And they probably could have won, but for a couple of calls that can be second guessed in hindsight.  The first was in the fourth quarter with the game tied, on a third and seven from the Pittsburgh 37.  The line had been outstanding and they were just outside of field goal range.  They had a tired Steeler defense on the ropes and all the momentum.  If they were out of Cundiff's range then the smart decision would have been to run the ball and either kick or go for it on 4th down.  They passed incomplete and ultimately punted (!!!) into the endzone.  If the kicker on your team can't kick a 54 yard field goal in perfect conditions then why is he on your team?  Honest question.  Not that he's automatically going to make it but that he doesn't even have the leg to try?  Disappointing.  The second decision was on the Browns final possession, after the sack on first down.  And I know Schwartz is going to take flak for giving it up but it looked like a three step drop and that ball should have been out.  They should have run the ball on second down and played for overtime.  Pettine is a rookie head coach.  He needs to learn how to win.  But there were encouraging signs, even in a loss.  And yes that pains me to think that way.

And I don't want to hear about what a great special teams coach Chris Tabor is.  I think he's terrible.  I've thought it since he got here.  Constant coverage breakdowns, Tank Carder is still on the team and he SUCKS, penalties, he left a gunner wide open so Pittsburgh could convert a fake punt.  He's terrible.  They better get that unit right they are not good enough to win if they lose on special teams.

And Justin Gilbert, it's hard to play cornerback in the NFL.  But boy oh boy you are a work in progress.  Hopefully there will be better days ahead for the rookie.

So the maybe the play that we've all seen so many times will be different.  Right now it looks the same, they are 0-1 in a bottom line business.  But this cast might play it out differently this time.  At least we get to keep our hope for another week. 


Random gifs

So this happened.......




Ouch Dez...



Your Tampa Bay Buccaneers everybody



Bonus Pic cereal guy is my new favorite fan.  Nice work buddy, sneaking in a box of Frosted Flakes.