Week 9: The Browns Will Win If…
November 4, 2011While We’re Waiting… AFC North News, Bucks-Indiana Preview, and NBA Labor Talks
November 5, 2011
Thanks to a tip from commenter RyInCBus, we come across this bit of information from the NFL Network’s Michael Lombardi–
Not since the 2002 Buccaneers has a team won the Super Bowl running the pure West Coast offensive exclusively. Seattle was a Super Bowl participant in 2006, but this long drought begs the question: Is the West Coast offense dead? Some teams, like the Saints, Eagles and Packers, run concepts of the West Coast, but they are not an exclusive West Coast team. The only team remaining that is exclusively West Coast is the Browns, and they might want to expand their package to include a more diversified system. The Browns need more playmakers and a better quarterback, but more importantly they need to add to their offense.
Writing about the Browns offense leads me to a game I play every week at NFL Films. I sit in my office in Mt Laurel, N.J., put the Browns offense on my screen and call a friend who was a coach in the league, but is now in between successes. I tell my friend the personnel group, the formation, where the ball is located on the field and what hash mark and describe the motion — if there is any — and ask him to tell me the exact play that will be run. He is correct about 95 percent of the time. No lie. The Browns are so integrated into the West Coast system that their predictability is becoming legendary around the league.
Well, there you go Browns fans. Whether this ‘game’ Lombardi talks about is real or figurative, factored in with the comments from the Raiders game about someone tipping plays and the impression all season that the opposing team knows even the snap count I would have to say there is a certain measure of truth to this report. The question is what will the Browns do about it?
70 Comments
The worst part of the Hillis fiasco is that as soon as he had a great season and got the Madden cover, you KNEW that the Browns were going to do something stupid and force him to leave.
I even said it to my wife and father, “Don’t worry, the Browns will find a way to run him outta town”… FML.
By the way, Eric G, that link was amazing… it was like therapy.
I’ve traveled all over the country and met folks from all across the country over the last nine years and let me tell ya, the Browns have BEEN a joke man, this is nothin’ new. Rarely do I tell someone that I’m a Browns fan without immediately being laughed at or being told something along the lines of “I’m sorry”.
Tony Rizzo…. “Every Christmas!!!” LOL
@Big Z- I agree, heard the same things from football fans across the country…kinda sad people in Cleveland haven’t caught on to this yet, for the most part…
I live n Vegas Big Z and work at ARIA. Every Sunday I get to watch the game in the Poker Room and every Sunday someone comes up to me and asks why Im watching that “sorry” team or they laugh at me. We are definitely a joke all across the country. But you know what I will always tell anyone who wants to listen that I am a Browns fan till I die and proud of it. One day, one day we will all be rewarded for the misery we have had to endure over the years. When that day comes noone knows but I promise you it will come.
And that rant was amazing!!!!
and they’re giving jim thome a statue. idiot organization and idiot fans who idolize him. he had a CHOICE. he chose Philly.
So lemme see if I have this right: Hillis burns through three agents inside of a year, blows off treatment to get married, jokes around with the third-string QB when he’s supposed to be hurt, then hurts himself inside of 15 minutes after returning to the field … and this is all because of the Browns being a ‘joke’ of an organization.
It clearly has nothing whatsoever to do with a fifth-round pick suddenly getting thrust into the spotlight and letting it clearly get to his head in some way, shape, or form, right and everything to do with an “organization” apparently failing for … what, exactly? Making sure Hillis is mature?
If anything, their decision not to sign him to any kind of a deal is looking better and better with each passing day — even if it now clearly means RB becomes a huge need next year, causing the team to perhaps delay getting another piece to the puzzle (an OLB or DB, I’d guess) for ’12.
In my book, Hillis has become a tool that has helped set this team back another half a season or more. Thanks, jackass – and thanks to you who defend him. If the team continues to be a joke, don’t forget to laugh at yourselves.
Craig, you’re kind of a ‘glass half-full guy,’ aren’t you? It’s a lot of fun reading your positive spin on the weekly horrors of Browns football. Didn’t you used to be the Press Secretary for Saddam Hussein?
Is it almost basketball season?
Don’t look now, but Yahoo! Sports Is running a doozy on Hillis.
Too slow.
what i find amazing is guys saying, oh the guy was throwing footballs before the game with the third string QB… why hasnt he played? As far as i remember his injury is a pulled hamstring, which i dont think is involved in throwing balls.
I’m sorry but this has nothing to do with his attitude. Certainly Hillis has done things in some ways that are not perfect far from it. But I truly believed he’s been encoutering a certain set of unlucky events that got overblown and to which he hasnt reacted well either.
I know people here probably disagree but that’s my gut feeling.
The media will do anything for a story. Right now they’re on the whole bashing Hillis thing, so anything he does will be in the headlines.
“Sources close to the team say that Hillis was seen earlier today eating a Snickers bar, a Snickers bar he no doubt stole from a toddler in a wheelchair”
Yay ESPN.
The media will do anything for a story. Right now they’re on the whole bashing Hillis thing, so anything he does will be in the headlines.
“Sources close to the team say that Hillis was seen earlier today eating a Snickers bar, a Snickers bar he no doubt stole from a toddler in a wheelchair”
Yay ESPN.
I think the Shurmur “Our offense stinks” face is becoming as iconic around here as the Branyan squint face.
Hate to tell you guys trying to defend Hillis, but believe me: this is not a mere national media drive-by assassination of Hillis.
Team personnel from front office to players to other personnel [staff/tv people etc] are totally sick of the guy. His head ballooned after the Madden cover and it’s been a downward spiral since then. He’s an idiot. Apparently, we created another monster.
Maybe it’s time for Cleveland teams to cheer for their TEAMS and not so much their PLAYERS. You don’t see a cult of worship around Big Ben, Polamalu, or Harrison. You see a cult of worship around the STEELERS as a whole.
As far as the offense/predictability goes, it wouldn’t shock me one bit.
Creativity on offense is not necessarily dependent on personell. If Shurmur is indeed running just the traditional WCO and is this predictable is in his third year of calling plays in the NFL, I see no reason why that would change.
It seems to me that the Browns front office is just as out of sync as it has been since 1999. Holmgren is offensive-minded, so you would have thought that his first course of action would be to fix the offense…yet Heckert has spent the first two drafts/free agency periods fixing the defense (which certainly needed fixing), while letting the chips fall where they may on the offensive side of the ball.
Yes, the offense is a joke. I had to laugh watching at how many running plays they called yesterday, especially with a bunch of no-name 4th stringer backs. Why weren’t they running that much when Hillis was healthy? The offensive line is atrocious. Mack and Thomas are probably the only decent dudes on the OL, but the rest of them are horrid. Cribbs had a good game, as did D’Qwell. The defense was porous.
PHIL DAWSON FOR MVP.