The Dream's in the Ditch*

Wow. That was tough. Like dropping a huge can of beans on your toe kind of tough. Like two hours after gas station sushi kind of tough. Like a medieval blacksmith kind of tough. Everything in the world had lined up against the Browns this week; a couple of dozen players on the COVID list, no head coach, and some bad-luck injuries. But plucky Nick Mullens gave his all and put this team in a position to win this game, only to have the defense in the last 60 seconds of the game play softer than 800 thread count Egyptian cotton bed sheets. (Side note: I’ve been to Egypt and I don’t recall anything special about the sheets. However, crystallized in my memory are the after effects of drinking the water in Egypt.) Anyway, you can take your pick at the actual point the game was lost. It might have been running Chubb three straight times and not accumulating 10 yards late in the game, Zay Jones’ easy 15 yard catch putting them in field goal range, or maybe the Browns going three and out five times in the game. At the end of the day, the Browns only managed to put up 14 points, and that’s rarely enough offense to win a game. And certainly that futility is not unique to this game, it’s been the theme of the season for the Cleveland Browns.

While it’s probably true that with our starters and coach we would have won this game, I by no means would have assumed we would beat the Raiders. Derek Carr is a far better quarterback than anybody Cleveland has had since Bernie Kosar (not hyperbole), the Raiders have a great pass rush, and the Browns are offensively anemic. I’m sure the Browns would have been favored by a touchdown, but how could anybody in their right mind have confidence in the Browns looking at the last 6 weeks? My point is, this loss probably knocked Cleveland out of the playoffs, but really the Browns didn’t beat a good team all season. (Maybe the Bengals could count as a “good win”.) You can point to a lot of moments, decisions, and mistakes that all made that playoff window this season a little more narrow. Coming off a season that produced 11 regular season wins and a playoff win against a rival, this season is an abject failure, and that sentiment could be seen on the players faces after the game. And that failure harkens from a series of missteps along the way in 2021.

There will be plenty of opportunities to assemble a long list of things to fix before September of 2022. (quarterback, receivers, play-calling, a new peanut vendor in section 236, etc.) But for now, the Browns are on a super-short week as they get ready to play the Packers, in Green Bay, on Christmas Day. That would be a tough assignment if you knew which players are available, but the COVID list is still in flux for the Browns, so the coaching staff are planning in the dark, so to speak. Frankly, there aren’t a lot of options to shake things up when you’ve got 4 days to prepare, let alone prepare for the best team in the NFC with all-world quarterback Aaron Rodgers. Once again, the Browns will have to lean on their shorthanded defense, and try to keep it close into the fourth quarter. Stop back later in the week for a more detailed preview of the Christmas day clash as well as my thoughts on all things Wisconsin including bratwursts, The Bodeans, and ice fishing.

Go Browns.

*Thanks the band Deer Tick for providing the current soundtrack for the Cleveland Browns