2018 Season | The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

I don't really like that comparison. Brady did the majority of his Super Bowl winning while his organization was cheating its collective ass off. He's like a Brett Favre/Drew Brees hybrid who'll go on to win more Super Bowls than Tom Brady.

 

Johnny Manziel: *uses his feet almost as much as his arm to create mismatches and throws for a comically low yardage amount*

"That sandlot football crap won't fly. He's a bust."

Josh Allen: *uses his feet almost as much as his arm to create mismatches and throws for a comically low yardage amount*

"This guy is special and going to challenge Baker Mayfield for a long time."



I respect what you're driving at, bum, but we both have a preconceived opinion of Josh Allen that one performance isn't likely to change.

 

I'll give Josh Allen one thing. He made a throw ( I think week 2 ) that looked like it was out of Tecmo Super Bowl. If you're not familiar with the 16-bit game, in it you could run the qb back to the endzone and thrown the ball the length of the field. Especially if you were throwing from sideline to sideline (top to bottom of screen) the ball would follow a parabolic arc that would take it out of the screen for a couple seconds and drop it back down. It was just a ridiculous thrown and it was on point in coverage, somewhere around 70 yds in air.

Besides that it has been bad throws and checkdowns.

 

You:


The head coach they tell you not to worry about:

 

Week 4 @ Oakland

The Good

• Nick Chubb. Three rushes, 105 yards, two touchdowns. Chubb is still not seeing a high volume of carries (I expect that will change), but he is making them count. They mentioned during the broadcast he's the first Browns running back to have two 40+ yard carries in a game since Jim Brown in 1963. He's proving to be quite the homerun hitter.
  
  
• Baker Mayfield. 300 yards passing, two touchdowns, 42 points on the board (on the road), and an near overtime loss in his first NFL start. There's a lot to be happy with here. His overall stat line looks worse due to drops, untimely errors (handoff exchange, etc.) and those certainly contributed to the loss... but as @IrishDawg42 said in another thread... not once did I feel like the game was lost watching Baker in there.
  
  
• Hue Jackson. A rare sight to see in the "Good" section, especially after another loss, but his team is 1-2-1 and is either: (1) impartial referees, or (2) a competent NFL kicker away from leading the NFL at 4-0. He's lost two games by a combined six points and tied another. There's a lot of work still to be done, but this team is fighting hard for the coach and that's more than can be said about a lot of other teams out there (*coughs* Buffalo *coughs*).

The Bad

• Baker Mayfield. Gotta take the good with the bad here with the rookie. The first pick was a deflection, the fumbled snap was more on the center, the second pick was a deep shot at the end of regulation trying to make something happen... yeah, but they all contributed to an overall loss. The fumbled hand-off was the turning point in the game (again, minus the con job by the refs - more to come). Baker will need to improve and I have no doubt that he will. The sooner he does, the more games we will win.
  
  
• The Defense. After seeing a lot of love the first three games, they go ahead and allow nearly 600 yards and 45 points. Sure, there were injuries (more to come) and they were put in a bad spot by the offense on more than one occasion... but they needed a couple big-time plays to help swing momentum back to the Browns and they didn't seem to get it done. They allowed 100+ yards to Marshawn Lynch, who's previous high this season was 65. They had no answer for the tight end. And they let Carr convert a TD and two point with the game on the line.
  
  
• Drops. These will improve, but definitely didn't help the offense get started. Figure that since this was Baker's first week getting reps with the team, there's still some time-on-task to be done to get this ironed out (his rapport with Higgins is noticeably better from their time on second team together). However, this is the second game now where the receivers have put 3-4 drops on film that cost momentum, yards, and points.

The Ugly

• The Referees. Literally took points off the board with the Carr fumbled return for a touchdown and then officially took the win away from the Browns when they reversed the spot. They better have seen something f**king incredible on that replay. They then followed that beauty up by missing a block in the back on Oakland on the ensuing punt. What's worse, this is the third time this season the referees have blatantly affected the outcome of a Browns game.
  
  
• Injuries. Browns were dinged up in this one and may have lost Mitchell for the season. Depth is going to be tested and this is their second overtime of the young season. They've got a divisional rival on the schedule this week in what feels like a game they need to win to wash the bad taste of the Oakland loss out of their mouths. They are going to have to do it a little banged up and missing a few pieces now.
  
  
• Special Teams. I thought our special teams woes were gone with Tabor. Boy, was I mistaken. Outside of our punter, every player on this side of the ball and every execution needs tightened up. The Browns still aren't a team that can overcome a series of miscues or issues and special teams has had a whole slew of them since the beginning of the year.

 

Same hit the nail on the head. I can only add one thing and expand on others.

The Ugly:

• I don't know how I have never noticed it before, but the Oakland field is pure garbage. Having an infield in the middle of the field is a HUGE safety risk, let alone the shotty turf. For a league that is so concerned with player safety, letting teams go onto that field for 8 games is atrocious. On the first INT, the ball was where it needed to be, Landry couldn't get traction coming out of his break making him a split second behind.
• Special Teams. Why the hell is Pepper returning kicks? He may have been able to do good in college when he was just naturally quicker than everyone, but he is not in the NFL and should not be returning kicks.

 

The Ugly:

And the Raiders' game ball is awarded to........

 

That's all I have to say. Too pissed at the refs for determining the outcome of this game. Absolute bullshit.......

 

I really wonder about his vision. He runs into the backs of his blockers with regularity. It's just awful to watch our kick return game...Peppers has been a huge disappointment in that capacity.

 

I agree. We were celebrating the win....Complete bullshit is right. I just don't see how they took that away.

And how the hell did they miss the most obvious "block in the back" ever on Oakland's big punt return late in the game. That was just ridiculous. Huge effect on the outcome...Idk. I swear if that was Cleveland's punt return, every ref on the f-ing field would have thrown his flag. smh

 

@SAS ,

That's probably the most accurate post game review I have ever seen on any team board on this site. Ever.

I can only add one "Good".

If you look down in the standings, there sit the Pittsburgh Steelers. Conversely, when they look up, there we are and THAT really pisses them off.

 

This is a fact. Although I guess it won't matter in two more seasons.

 

I do my best work at 1:00 am. The rest of the time, it's rubbish.

 

Carlos Hyde on third-and-two: *narrowly rushes for a first down*

Oakland Vegas Raiders Refs: *review play, showing Hyde got further than the initial spot, which was ruled a first down*

VRR: "The call is reversed."

NFL: "We stand by our referees."

Literally everyone else besides Vegas fans:

 

Man, we really need to beat Baltimore this week.

 

THE GOOD: 42 points on the board....Mayfield to Landry with the beautiful toe tap in the back on the endzone.....NICK CHUBB!!!

THE BAD: The Browns defense all afternoon. Raider WR's were running wide open all day. Was anybody assigned to cover Amari Cooper? It looked like we forgot about him on every other play....The back to back turnovers deep in our own end, about midway through the 2nd half, after we had taken a seemingly commanding 28-14 lead. That just CAN'T happen....

THE UGLY: Antonio Callaway dropping the two point conversion was sickening...But not as horrific as TJ Currie's attempt at playing defense on Oakland's two point conversion to tie the game in the final seconds. We win the game if he just turns around and bats the ball away. The pass from Carr was terrible, but our CB was playing Jordy Nelson like he was Megatron or something. Geez. Just make a play. That was SO ugly.. It was relatively simple play to make when Carr just tossed that prayer up there like that. I just don't know WTH our CB was doing...(my apologies if it wasn't Curry. I was so pissed when they got that.)

 

Actually, it won't matter in two more days if the A's get bounced out of the MLB playoff wild card game.

 

I was reading somewhere (and it didn't make sense) that the LV facility is not ready for 2 years, but the lease is up with the A's stadium this year meaning they need to find a temporary home for a season and that they either were or should be looking at San Diego.

 

To kind of piggy back off of TD, I saw a lot of finger pointing on D and ST. It seemed like there was A LOT of miscommunication going on and when there was a big play everyone seemed to be blaming someone else or at least they were expecting something else from the other players. Even the P gave a "you guys give me this?" shoulder shrug on the big return.

This being the second game I got to actually watch this season I was trying to pay a little more attention to the schemes and routes, and noticed on several plays that both safeties were 15 or so yds off the ball and not in 3rd and long territory. Absolutely mind numbing to think that we are trying to win by playing 11 on 9.

 

Can't wait to draft Dre'Mont Jones so he can drop into coverage, too.