Cleveland Browns Week 9 Winners and Losers

Having all three professional sports teams playing in November is a rare excess of riches. The Cleveland Indians were a run away from winning the World Series and the Cavaliers used Saturday night to sneak away with a win over Philadelphia to go 6-0 on the season. All of this winning had, at least until this weekend, been a nice diversion from what was taking place in Berea over the same stretch of time. While the last week has turned the entire city of Cleveland into zombies thanks to all of the lost sleep, it had been nice to deal almost exclusively with winners.

What Sunday provided us all was a harsh dose of reality, one where Cleveland’s professional football team has lost more games in the last six weeks than the Indians and Cavaliers combined.

Just how bad is the product being forced upon as as if it were competitive football? Check out these nuggets of deliciousness, all stemming from Sunday’s drubbing at the hands of the Dallas Cowboys:

• Sunday’s loss marks the Cleveland Browns’ ties the worst start to a season since 1975. That year, they finished 3-11.
• Their 12 straight losses dating back to last season also set the record for longest losing streak in the history of the franchise.
• The Browns have now gone 3-27 since a 7-4 start under Mike Pettine and Brian Hoyer in 2014.
• They have lost 19 of their last 20 games, beating the San Francisco 49ers during Week 14 of 2015
• The Browns defense is historically bad, being the first team since the 1964 (Denver) to allow 25 or more points in its first nine games. Stretching this out a bit, Ray Horton’s unit has now given up at least 30 points on six occasions.

Following the contest, linebacker Chris Kirksey stated that the team will not—”for a fact”—go 0-16 on the season. For those who think Kirksey might be on to something and the Browns may be able to steal one in the near future, FiveThirtyEight gives the Browns a 19 percent shot at winning this Thursday in Baltimore—the team who just held the Steelers scoreless for three-and-a-half quarters. They had a 22 percent shot this past Sunday against the Cowboys.

LOSER: Cody Kessler

The kid is tough. He’s accurate. He’s managed to convince this coaching staff that he should be the starting quarterback. But this, at least on Sunday, was where it ends. With only five balls thrown more than 20 yards (all of which were incomplete), Kessler is not a quarterback who can help a team that consistently falls behind get back in to games.

Anyone who watched Green Bay-Indianapolis saw what Aaron Rodgers did when his team was down two scores. Same can be said for Carson Wentz, pulling fourth-and-9 plays out of thin air. And while both examples ultimately lost their respective games, the final score was aided by a quarterback who made quick decisions down the field. With Kessler’s leading receiver being his non-pass-catching running back in Isaiah Crowell, the team simply has no chance save for a miraculous play down field or defensive penalties providing tailwinds. And before you think the Cowboys were applying a boat load of pressure while the others took on some Marty-like prevent defense, peep these half-assed four-man rushes early in the third quarter and save yourself the hot air.

Kessler may be “accurate” and he may not have turned the ball over, and he certainly didn’t miss a field goal attempt—more on this later—but he was easily the lesser of the two rookie quarterbacks despite being the one taken a full round earlier.

LOSER: Hue Jackson

When asked what keeps “rearing it’s ugly head” in the postgame press conference, Jackson had the following to say:

“We just have to… It starts with me. It starts with me. I want to make sure everybody understands that. It starts with me. It starts with me getting our players and everybody involved in this organization to do things right.”

Fair enough, coach. If you’re to blame for your quarterback having a noodle arm, your receivers being unable to get open, your right guard being unable to block, and your defense tackling like those neon, flowing-air guys outside of shitty chain restaurants and shittier car dealerships, then sure—you can be a loser too.

“I feel bad about it all,” Jackson continued. “I do because our fans, they are outstanding and I can’t help but thank them for coming out and supporting a team that is not playing very well right now. I am being very honest. The Dawg Pound and our fans have been outstanding. We have to give them something to keep coming for, and I get that. We have to do that better, and we will.”

WINNER: Ezekiel Elliott

A hell of a homecoming for the fourth-overall pick in the 2016 NFL Draft. Less than 24 hours after his alma mater ran wild on Nebraska, Elliott, through a din of “Zeke” chants, rattled off 92 yards on 18 carries finding the end zone twice. It would have been worse had the Browns been unable to creep back into the game thus letting Dallas turn to the reserve backs.

LOSER: Ray Horton

There’s not having the talent and there’s not executing upon standard principles that make one a defender in the National Football League. On back-to-back plays, there were defensive linemen lined up in the neutral zone—the second of which still resulted in Dallas gaining yards. On the play subsequent to the back-to-back gaffes, Brien Boddy-Calhoun was the only man standing between Elliott and the end zone. The hyphenated defensive back barely grazed a leg.

As said last week, I’m not sure what the answer is here, but there is an insane lack of discipline mixed in with a sub-standard level of talent. You can’t fault someone for not being talented, but you certainly can border on ripping your own hair out when you witness them do things that can easily be corrected merely lining up a yard behind where the football is placed. You know, obeying the rules?

Think Uncle Jimmy can spring for some of these robots?

LOSER: Cameron Erving

On the first series of the game, Erving laced a spectacular set of blocks—the first was his assignment; the second was a crack-back on a pursuing lineman as Kessler was scrambling. It would have led to a touchdown as the Browns quarterback was freed just long enough to deliver the pass to Andrew Hawkins who couldn’t haul it in.

What transpired after the play was Erving in a fight with that same lineman, both men ultimately being ejected. The Browns, meanwhile, didn’t have another center dressed for the game and were forced to move John Greco back to center while rookie Spencer Drango played right guard. Say what you want about who was found guilty of what and why… For a kid who has to prove his worth over the next eight games to let his emotions take priority over his team winning—it’s a horrible look. Once Erving was gone and the Browns were falling behind, they were forced to completely abandon the run game and became immediately predictable, the Cowboys picking up pressure on 13 of 32 dropbacks, effectively twice as many as the Browns woebegone defense was able to amass on the other side of the field.¹

WINNER: My FanDuel Team

Thanks to a nice stack of Elliott, Jason Witten and Cole Beasley, I was given a nice tailwind into the 4 p.m. games. At one point, following a Rodgers-to-Jordy Nelson touchdown, my team was ranked No. 1 in the 100-team tournament I entered. Heading into Monday night, I’m ranked No. 6, effectively locking up an in-the-money spot. The best part, of the teams ranked in the top seven, four others also had Ezekiel Elliott. The Browns defense is free money, you guys.

LOSER: Tramon Williams and Joe Haden

I don’t know whose fault this is, exactly, but leaving a guy this wide open when there are two of you over there is inexcusable. Kudos for rendering Dez Bryant as nothing more than a decoy, but you were straight-up embarrassed on this one.

LOSER: Cody Parkey

Not more than 90 seconds after the FOX commentating crew said the Browns could not afford to come up empty on a first-half drive, Parkey came waltzing in on fourth down and promptly plunked the football off the left upright. The Cowboys drove all the way down the field, scored a touchdown, and never looked back.

LOSER: Alvin Bailey

The right guard had a hell of an afternoon, dominated during a third quarter and was ultimately credited with having allowed three sacks, including the first one shared above. Shout out to Cam Erving.

WINNER: Joe Thomas

There was a moment late in Sunday’s drubbing where the FOX crew discussed whether or not Thomas essentially suffers from Stockholm Syndrome wherein he continues to say all of the right things despite being a nine-time Pro Bowler on a team heading nowhere. While they would not go as far as to say the left tackle is outright lying, there is no denying that No. 73 is the consummate professional.

Thomas gets a bit of a bad rap for not being a substantial socialite, oftentimes not knowing the names of some players in the Browns’ locker room, but for someone who has seen so many sub-par bodies come in and out of Berea, who can blame him at this point? The Hall of Fame-bound big man punches in, dominates, then goes home to do it all over again the next week.

“Every loss, it stacks up” he’d say following the game. “Makes it tougher because in the end, you have to remain positive. You have to try to get yourself ready for a game and the best way to do that is to remain positive. It definitely gets harder every time you lose.”

He’ll never say if he resents the Browns for not dealing him, but if he was bitter, he certainly didn’t show it on Sunday—at least when it comes to the field.

And now, the fans:

https://twitter.com/kiddicusmaximus/status/795406951685517312

Winners: No turnovers, Kessler's downfield aggression
Losers: Crowell, Cam Earving, run game, defense

— What to Hecc…? (@AquaGlide12) November 6, 2016

NEED because no one from WFNY watched? :'D

Win: Kessler for playing the entire game. Cam for saving us 59 minutes
Lose: this team, entirely

— SomeJerk (@SomeJerkInCali) November 6, 2016

https://twitter.com/shell24_7/status/795407434093330432

Winners: Anyone who did anything else on Sunday rather than watch the game
Losers: Any other team vying for the #1 pick

— Scoops (@ejmaroun) November 6, 2016

Losers: Too many.
Winners: Dwayne Bowe, JFF Mingo, and Justin Gilbert for getting out while they could.

— Clint (@irundownhill) November 7, 2016

Losers: Too many.
Winners: Dwayne Bowe, JFF Mingo, and Justin Gilbert for getting out while they could.

— Clint (@irundownhill) November 7, 2016

Winner:all the non-NFL caliber players on our defense that get to tell their grandkids they played professional football

— michael bode (@mgbode_WFNY) November 7, 2016

1. Via Pro Football Focus. [↩]