Browns Camp Kick-Off

July 31, 2010

Time to check in with the Browns as the first year of "The Big Show" begins...

Offense


Sure Starters: Jake Delhomme, Lawrence Vickers, Mohamed Massaquoi, Ben Watson, Alex Mack, Eric Steinbach, Joe Thomas

Possible Starters/Sure Contributors: Seneca Wallace, Montario Hardesty, Jerome Harrison, Peyton Hillis, Josh Cribbs, Brian Robiskie, Chansi Stuckey, Floyd Womack, Tony Pashos

Somewhere from Possible Contributors to Won't Make Roster: Colt McCoy, James Davis, Chris Jennings, Jake Allen, Bobby Engram, Johnathan Haggerty, Carlton Mitchell, Evan Moore, Robert Royal, Alex Smith, Billy Yates, John St. Clair, Shawn Lauvao, Scott Kooistra, Jason Capizzi, Pat Murray, Joel Reinders

Camp Fodder/Warm Bodies: Brett Ratliff, Thomas Brown, Jed Collins, Syndric Steptoe, Joel Gamble, Casey Bender, Paul Fanaika

Quick Take: This offense is going to run a lot. Both out of necessity, and out of playing to its strength. It is unclear which of those two reasons will be primary. The running game could potentially be very good, while the passing game will likely be very weak. A lot of guys can run on this team. Harrison, Hardesty, and Cribbs will all get multiple carries per game. In addition, Joe Thomas and Friends are likely the strongest unit on the roster. Alex Mack was a top-10 center last year, and could mature into a top-5 NFL center this season. If, and it is not that big of an "if," Mack can become a perennial Pro Bowl-type player, a pair of perennial Pro Bowl offensive linemen who are comfortably in their 20s is a great foundation to build an offense on. The seemingly annual "Is Eric Steinbach Starting?" stories are ridiculous. Steinbach is not an NFL youngster by any means, but he isn't old either. He has a well cemented reputation as a very good NFL starting guard. He is a very good NFL starting guard until we have actual-regular-season-game evidence otherwise.

On the other hand, the most optimistic thing to say about the passing game is that it has no where to go but up. Ben Watson was a very good, and somewhat underrated, addition. Between Smith, Moore, and Royal there should be enough depth to create a solid tight end position. As far as the wide receivers go, well, to keep this post short, let me just throw this out there: Josh Cribbs is a potential starter at receiver. Josh Cribbs is undoubtedly a better runner than receiver at this point in his career. I emphasize that Josh Cribbs is a potential starter at receiver. Think about that.

Thomas Brown fans may be dismayed to see him on my "Camp Fodder" list. However, and I am still waiting on Elias Sports Bureau for exact numbers but, running backs assigned number 59 in training camp have an extremely poor history of making the regular season roster.

Defense


Sure Starters: Shaun Rogers, Sheldon Brown

Possible Starters/Sure Contributors: Kenyon Coleman, Robaire Smith, Ahtyba Rubin, David Bowens, Scott Fujita, Chris Gocong, D'Qwell Jackson, Matt Roth, Jason Trusnik, Joe Haden, Eri Wright, Mike Adams, Abe Elam, T.J. Ward

Somewhere from Possible Contributors to Won't Make Roster: Clifton Geathers, Brian Schaefering, Titus Adams, Kwaku Danso, Derreck Robinson, Eric Barton, Marcus Benard, Titus Brown, Blake Costanzo, Kaluka Maiava, David Veikune, Coye Francis, Gerald Lawson, Brandon McDonald, Raymond Ventrone, Larry Asante, Nick Sorenson

Camp Fodder/Warm Bodies: Keith Grennan, Brian Sanford, Swanson Miller, Chris Chancellor, Matterral Robinson, Chris Roberson, DeAngelo Smith

Quick Take: Notice the number of "Sure Starters" versus "Possible Starters/Sure Contributors"? Mangini values versatility on defense, and this roster reflects that. None of the groups are superb, with the secondary the most likely to develop into a dominating position if (and this is a fairly big "if") at least two of the rookies break out and have very big years with absolutely no drop off from the anticipated production of the other veteran contributors. On the flip side, none of the positions can be pointed at as a major weakness. Shaun Rogers willingness to move to defensive end, a move I think he can be sold on and I also think is in the team's best interest, can help unlock this defense's potential by allowing Rogers to be a monster pass rusher while making room for a solid run stopper in Rubin to move into the lineup. None of the top, of I dunno, eight linebackers are superstars. Nevertheless, all are solid and will contribute. All will make plays from time to time. D'Qwell Jackson and (if he is healthy) Eric Barton will be the only contributors at linebacker who cannot comfortably line up either inside or outside.

The David Veikune pick seems worse and worse every time I have to think about it.

Overall: There is reason for optimism that this franchise is moving in the right direction, but it is unlikely they can contend this year. However, the games should be interesting and the product should be much improved from the first 12 games of last season. There is plenty of reason to be excited about the Browns, but temper any Super Bowl talk unless you are referring to a few years down the road.

Jack Bacevice

Why Not, Cleveland?

Why Not, Cleveland?

I have been following Cleveland sports for my entire life and I always have the same question going through my mind, why not, Cleveland? What I mean by this, is why do the big name players not want to come here, or, why do Cleveland teams not try to get them here? For example, we have the whole summer Cavaliers fiasco and Tracy McGrady, Allen Iverson and Shaq are still on the market and we have not made any serious attempts at acquiring any of these players. Why not? What does Cleveland have to lose now? We can pretty much guarantee that with no big names and no great talent that by the end of the season, the seats will be empty. Sure fans will come in the beginning to show support with Mr. South Beach gone, but without a winning team, that is just temporary. So how long do we have to wait until Cleveland becomes one of those places that really try to win?

Let’s switch this over to the Cleveland Browns. Why did the Browns not go after T.O? Is it because of the off the field issues, or even the on the sideline issues? WHO CARES! He is a good football player at a position that we really need a veteran player with some talent. Instead, now we have to play against him 2 times this year, along with Ocho and Antonio Bryant. That should be entertaining. I say you have to fight fire with fire and Cleveland always seems to fight fire with lollipops and cotton candy.

I guess in the end, maybe someday, we will realize that you need to do what all the other teams do to win a championship, obviously, because everyone else finds ways to win while we sit back and wonder, why not, Cleveland?

Adam Stokes

What The Fans Expect of The Browns In 2010-2011

By: Brian Murtaugh

The Cleveland Browns have suffered some dismal seasons over the last several years and fans all over the world are getting tired of seeing hopeful off-seasons turned into on the field disasters. Success for the Browns can be measured in several different ways in 2010-2011. Here are the top five things that I feel the organization and the fans will be looking for when Cleveland takes the field this year.

#5 Continued Progress In the Running Game:
The Browns finished off last season with four consecutive wins and the running game was a huge part of their success. James Davis went down with an injury early in the season just as the Browns were beginning to scratch the surface of his talents. Unfortunately for Davis, Jerome Harrison took over the role as the featured back for Cleveland and blew the opposition away. Harrison rushed for a total of 570 yards over the last three games of the year which included a 286 yard performance against Kansas City. Now that Monterio Hardesty is also in the mix with the other running backs, Browns fans will expect the running game to be effective every single week.

#4 The Chatter About Eric Mangini Will Cease:
The only way your job is safe as an NFL coach is if you win games consistently. Unfortunately for Eric Mangini, winning was not something the Browns did very often until the final quarter of the season. Talks of Mangini getting fired were all over the sports world after last season ended but new president Mike Holmgren was quick to endorse Mangini whenever he took over operations for the Browns. If the Browns become a team that can win consistently in 2010-2011 then the talks of Mangini being on the hotseat will cease and Cleveland will have time to focus on other pressing matters.

#3 The Defense Will Improve:
The Browns defense of last year definitely had its ups and downs. Coach Ryan sometimes looked lost roaming the sidelines but after all was said and done, the Browns were still ranked 22nd in points allowed per game. Now don’t get me wrong, 22nd is not nearly good enough for a team to be a consistent winner but compared the 32nd (dead last) overall rating in yards allowed per game, it doesn’t seem too bad. The Defense made great strides over the last few games of last season and many people expect them to continue to improve. Off-season acquisitions like Joe Haden, Sheldon Brown, and Scott Fujita can only help when it comes to shutting down opposing offenses.

#2 Jake Delhomme Will Make Smart Decisions:
Lets face it, Jake Delhomme was not brought in to be the savior of the Cleveland Browns franchise. Delhomme was simply brought in to be a mentor to a young Colt McCoy and to manage the football game. Even though Jake is coming off a terrible season, the Browns seem confident in the fact that he can be the same guy that took the Panthers to a Superbowl a few years ago. The Browns expect Delhomme to be a leader in the locker room while making smart decisions with the football on the field. If Jake can manage to do both of those things, he will have a successful tenure in a Browns uniform

#1 The Fans Expect A Better Product On The Field:
Cleveland has been suffering through sports seasons for far too long. The Indians have not panned out to much over the last few seasons and LeBron basically tore the whole city in half with his decision to go to Miami. That leaves the Browns and the endless stream of optimism that follows them heading into week one of every year. The Browns do not have to make the playoffs in 2010-2011 in order for this season to be considered a success. Cleveland has to put a good product out on the field every week and give the city a team they can be proud of. If the Browns can remain competitive and in a playoff hunt into the second half of the season, it will give the organization and the city a much needed boost.

A Tale of Two Mikes

By Bert Daniels

Recently, Mike Ditka was quoted regarding loyalty, “It’s all gone, completely gone. Replaced by selfishness and greed.” (CNNSI)

The tough, old school coach was not careful in the interview and let the chips fall where they may. I could feel the disgust radiating from Ditka and sort of liked the clarity in which he spilled his guts. Loyalty has been a long time issue with me in all of pro sports and certainly pro football. The outright lies college coaches tell their team hours before a deal to coach in the NFL is made is indicative of the dearth of loyalty on the gridiron today. Players have no clue to what loyalty really is. They can spout about loyalty to teammates all night long, but as soon as something better comes along they forget the team thing and prove Ditka’s assessment true, by diving into “selfishness and greed”.

But players come and go. There is always a younger, stronger guy coming, and he will replace you soon enough. Players get cut, traded, shopped and treated like meat aged too long, so I guess players sort of get a bye on this one.

Not so with coaches though. The longer you coach, the better you potentially become. There are only a handful of good, playoff winning coaches in the NFL and only a sprinkle of them are of Superbowl winning calibre. They come to a team as a learner and through experience at the fans expense some become skilled craftsman at managing an NFL team, game and city. The average NFL fan is loyal to the nth degree. We expect some loyalty in return.

Mike Ditka. Loyalty.

Mike Holmgren. Not so much.

Holmgren let his guard down as well in an interview recently when asked about coaching again, "(The) odds become less and less the longer I'm here, if it takes awhile to fix this." (USA Today, June 2)

Cleveland is simply a steppingstone for Mike Holmgren. I didn’t want to believe it. As a loyal Browns fan now for far too many decades to admit, I wanted to think Holmgren was the real deal. That he wanted to practise his profession with my team. That he was all about our storied franchise on the lake and wanted to be a part of her history.

Nah. He just wants to build his resume to coach again, and dang it, if this rebuilding thing takes a while he might not even get a chance to coach again.

Watch your back Eric Mangini.

After giving it a lot of thought, here is the Browns draft in review...

By: Jeremy Poe

The old saying that where there is smoke, there is fire proved to be nothing more than just an old saying in the inaugural Holmgren draft party. After ridiculous rumor after even more ridiculous rumor, it seemed as though the Browns were poised to drop a bombshell into Cleveland's version of the Super Bowl...the NFL Draft. However, what seemed to be a potentially explosive move by the Browns brass in acquiring the number one pick from the Rams turned out to be a mere smoke bomb. And I'm pleased to say that I'm glad it wasn't C4!

The Browns stuck to their guns at #7 and took what they felt was the best player on their board. I cannot fault them for doing so. Until Joe Haden steps onto the Cleveland Browns Stadium grass, we won't really know whether that is true. However, on the surface it seems to me as though they may have reached a bit for the former Gator. Not to mention that cornerback may not have been as pressing of a need after acquiring Sheldon Brown from the Eagles.

For months I had been saying on this very site that I believed that Rolando McClain was exactly the type of player that the Browns defense desperately needed. Sure enough, he goes one pick later to the Rrraiders! Being someone who hates all the draft grades that people give out as if it is an elementary school math test, I will just say that I feel the choice of Joe Haden was decent, but not great.

T.J. Ward? I'm not saying he won't be a good player but does anyone remember hearing his name mentioned at any time during the Rose Bowl? This pick was average at best for now. Hopefully I look like an idiot a couple of years from now when he is voted to the Pro Bowl.

I have to say I love the choice of Montario Hardesty as their other second round pick. Yes Jerome Harrison had a freakish finish to last season but the jury is still out on whether he can do it for an entire season, let alone for multiple seasons down the road. I remember that Hardesty was one of the most highly recruited backs coming out of high school. He battled a lot of injuries his first few years in Knoxville which kept him from becoming a household name. But, he did have a monster season for a pedestrian Tennessee team. He is a big, physical runner with breakaway speed and has decent hands out of the backfield (check his stats!). The NFL has adapted to a two-back system and although he might not be the electric open-field runner that Buffalo drafted, you heard it here when I say that Hardesty will be the best back to come out of this draft in the next 5 years!

The only other significant draft choice the trio of Holmgren, Heckert, and Mangini I have saved for last and certainly not least. The biggest splash of the Browns draft was by far choosing the tough little kid from Texas in Colt McCoy. He is the absolute perfect fit to run a west-coast offense which leads me to believe that Brian Daboll will most likely be shown the door at the end of the season so that Holmgren and his staff can install his system with a new coordinator. McCoy is deadly accurate, has excellent mobility out of the pocket, and has an itchy trigger finger-like release which suits the west-coast offense best. His overall arm strength may need improvement and that causes some concern seeing as how he will have to play in some extremely adverse weather in the middle of winter in Cleveland. Despite this, the choice of McCoy was in my opinion a great pick for now and hopefully in the next 5-10 years.

The other choices were nothing to get excited about, but overall on paper the Cleveland Browns had a decent draft. Let's hope it turns out to be more than that!

Now that the hype is over...

By Bert Daniels

The three grades that really matter are, talent, coaching, execution. Obviously if the game plan that a coaching staff develops is good but the team lacks the talent to execute it, the losses pile up. Good players stinking up the place by poor execution of a good game plan, yields the same end result, losses. As well, decent players executing a flawed game plan will rarely bring a win. Two of the three grading out good and your season is 8-8 at best with an easy schedule. If all three areas graded high it might yield a playoff run. So after the hashing and re-hashing of the draft, the grades that really matter are overall talent, coaching and execution.

Coaching. D-. Don’t forget Browns fans, NOTHING has changed since the Browns were a one win team last fall. (before the “win streak at season’s end) Lord Holmgren is not coaching. We still have the same generals we had when everyone was yelling for heads to roll. Did you forget the putrid offensive game plan? Did you forget teams making the defence look like a high school freshmen trying to tackle Jim Brown in his prime? The only reason it’s not an F is special teams.

Execution. We can only go on last year, so again D-. If it were not for the four game win streak at seasons close, I would have to grade an F. I have no confidence that an aging veteran, a backup and a rookie at QB will execute any better than BQ or DA did. (Well, maybe I should take that back. At least they can’t be any worse.) Receivers? Ho hum. Not impressed. I’m just not falling for the false sense of security a decent draft brings in the area of execution. Today’s outstanding draft picks are tomorrow’s rookies. And like it or not, almost all rookies play like rookies. Once in a great while a rookie plays like a veteran and executes well. But almost always they play like they are lost in a game too fast, too complicated and more painful that college ever was. On top of that, these players are now spoiled rich kids.

Talent. Until proved wrong, C. I think last year the talent was average for the NFL. But poor execution of an ugly, simple, predictable game plan took a team with middle of the road talent to D- level. So in come the wonders of the 2010 draft. Do they lift the talent level? In come the off season acquisitions by trades, free agent signings and such. Does this lift the talent level? Maybe. But until a quality, innovative, exciting game plan appears, the talent is stuck with the old, “It’s hard to soar with eagles when you run with turkeys”, axiom. I still remember watching the Browns in the first ¾ of the season, and only woke out of my dazed boredom when Josh Cribbs lined up in the wildcat formation. That was the only time I ever saw execution of a well constructed, (and admittedly borrowed) innovative coaching call, by a talented player working for a raise.

There is however one amazing curve to the grade scale. It is the winning curve. Players can play better than the talent they possess, and execute simple plays flawlessly when they smell a win. Confidence is a great thing. Maybe a full grade and ½ improvement in all areas would come should a win or two come early in the year.