The Things We Know--Week 10

Josh Cribbs may be a disgruntled member of the Cleveland Browns but give him credit for being the team’s best analyst. Calling the Browns a team that “almost always almost wins,” Cribbs not only captured the essence of the Browns’ latest road loss, this time a 23-20 overtime loss to the Dallas Cowboys, but really the story line of most of the other 8 losses this season and the dozens of losses over the last 10 years.

The Browns almost always almost do something well enough to win but it’s their abiding commitment to failure that ultimately puts them in the position to lose week in and week out. This week it was the crappy play of the crappy defensive backs, a phrase that really contains a sort of double negative so, if my algebra is correct, the simplified version comes down to the play of the defensive backs. Two weeks ago it was crappy play calling or whatever. It really doesn’t matter much anymore. If there’s a game to be played, rest assured that the Browns will do their level best to find a way to come up just short of success.

Yet there may still be something to learn from Sunday’s near win. But how you feel about the Cowboys actual win and the Browns actual loss and whether it taught you anything new about this team depends mostly on how you come out of some of the key questions underlying the game.

For example, was the apparent competitiveness of the game a reflection of Pat Shurmur’s ability to well utilize the bye week or of Jason Garrett’s incompetence as a play calling head coach in Dallas?

Shurmur is 0-2 now following bye weeks so he's not exactly Urban Meyer. He hasn’t necessarily shown much growth as a head coach but yet the team seem well prepared, at least during the first half, following the bye week. There was a crispness to the offense that had been missing in recent weeks. A healthier defensive line was certainly taking the measure of a make shift Cowboys offensive line. The Browns put themselves in a position to score at least 3 times and ended up taking a 13-0 lead into the locker room.

And while the first half was fun and made the Cowboys look more like the Browns than the Browns, the highlight for me was the following exchange that occurred between Greg Gumbel, a usually reliable play by play guy, and Dan Dierdorf, the world’s best color commentator but only if the only person in the competition with him is Matt Millen, when the Browns approached the red zone for the first time:

Gumbel (noting that the Browns are 31^st in the league in scoring touchdowns when in the red zone, and probably at least 31^st in the league in scoring touchdowns from wherever they are on the field): This is where the Browns struggle. I wonder why it is that some teams do better than others when in the red zone?

Dierdorf (salivating at the inane question like my dog salivates just before I finish pouring his food in his dish): Better players. Better play calling.

Precisely. The Browns had a chance to have a commanding rather than pedestrian lead at the half and didn't because they don’t have good players and then they combine that deficiency with poor play calling. Shurmur is more concerned with not getting three points then he is with trying to get seven and Brandon Weeden is worried about throwing still another interception and hurting his chances to be named best rookie quarterback not named Robert Griffin III or Andrew Luck. Wasn’t that exactly the issue against the Ravens when the Browns didn’t throw even one pass into the end zone when they were in the red zone? Thought so.

All that said, let’s face it. The Cowboys knew prior to the pre-game warm ups that the Browns’ defensive secondary was pretty suspect and that’s with a completely healthy Joe Haden. Once Haden showed up in Arlington dressed more for raking leaves than doing battle with Dez Bryant, the Cowboys should have been lighting up the scoreboard. They didn’t. It was almost as if they wanted to prove that they could beat the Browns by deliberating playing to their weaknesses rather than their strengths, such as they are.

If I was Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones during his post-season meeting when he fires Garrett because the Cowboys again missed the playoffs, he should walk him through the first half of Sunday’s game each painful second at a time so that Garrett understands that instead of trying to establish a run game that they don’t have he should have had quarterback Tony Romo throwing on damn near every play. The worst thing you can do is let an inferior team believe it can play you straight up, but that's exactly what Garrett and the Cowboys did by strangely ignoring exactly what they were being given in the passing game.

Buster Skrine didn’t get the title of worst defensive back in the league through mere chance. He’s a fidget of a player with modest speed who probably couldn’t cover Brian Robiskie, let alone Dez Bryant. Yet it took the Cowboys all of the first half to figure out that when the Browns defensive backs weren’t giving 10-15 yard cushions they were interfering. The Cowboys had 10 freaking first downs on penalties, which has to be some kind of record. It would be hard to envision a more inviting passing scenario for any quarterback and yet the Cowboys acted as if the Browns had Frank Minnifield and Hanford Dixon in their primes back on every play.

On those plays were Skrine could establish contact with a receiver, he did, usually well beyond the 5-yard zone off the ball that defensive backs are allowed by rule. A flag inevitably followed. If Skrine wasn’t getting a penalty then it was only because he couldn’t even get close enough to the receiver to commit the foul in the first place.

If was actually quite fascinating when the CBS camera crew would focus on Skrine’s mug after a penalty. He didn’t look sheepish. He didn’t look indignant. He looked like a kid who knew he shouldn’t have been out there, like LeBron James at a Cavs fan party or Rush Limbaugh at a NOW convention. That the Browns had no other effective choice, or at least felt that they didn’t, than Skrine speaks more about how undeniably thin the team’s roster really is then it does about Skrine’s lack of talent.

It wasn’t just Skrine, though. Sheldon Brown did nothing more Sunday then demonstrate that he’s at least a year, probably more, past his expiration date. Because he’s been in the league as long as he has, let’s just assume that at one point in his career he had the speed and skill to cover a legitimate receiver. Not any more.

So when fans and the local writers bemoan how the officials made suspect calls late in the game and again in overtime against the Browns’ defensive backs and that this as much as anything is why the Browns lost, let’s keep that delusion in context. Browns defensive backs were committing so many legitimate penalties leading up to those situations that they had long since given up any hope of getting the benefit of the doubt during crunch time.

I’m not saying that the game wasn’t nearly as competitive as the final score and the fact that it went into overtime might indicate, but I’m not going to argue with anyone who feels differently. I suspect the Cowboys took the Browns too lightly early on. And I think that the Cowboys have their own set of issues to deal with, starting with the offensive line and their running game and moving on up to a lousy coaching staff. And while I’m at it, Cowboys defensive coordinator Rob Ryan called a strangely passive game until late. Put all that, the Browns players, the Cowboys various dysfunctions, in a stock pot, bring to a boil and stir occasionally and you have the full range of reasons that the game ended as it did.

So ultimately what we learned is that teams either play down to their level of competition when facing the Browns or the Browns players play up, again depending on your perspective. The reason it doesn't matter ultimately is that while teams with lesser talent occasionally eke out victories at every level of play, it's not the norm and that is why the Browns may be one of the better worst teams in the league, they're still one of the worst teams in the league.

**

If there was an encouraging sign at all from Sunday’s loss it was the noticeable change in attitude of Shurmur while in aforesaid red zone. The Brown’s first touchdown, which was a 10-yard pass from Weeden to tight end Ben Watson, was a ball thrown in the end zone. Because it was early in the game, it serves as a far better measure of Shurmur’s relative increase in boldness when measured against his fear against the Ravens two weeks ago then the second touchdown pass Weeden threw, a 17-yard pass also to Watson.

It could be that the difference is simply that the Ravens have Ed Reed and the Cowboys don’t. But I think it’s more than that. The pass to Watson was thrown directly into coverage. Indeed, Watson was surrounded by three Cowboys defenders. Two weeks ago both Weeden and Shurmur specifically mentioned not wanting to throw into coverage in the end zone for fear of the interception, which is why Phil Dawson again is the Browns' offensive MVP. In that sense, this was a big step.

Then again, when the team is 2-7 and the head coach is a lame duck and the latest regime isn’t yet sold on the decisions of the last regime, maybe it was more an example of flying by the seat of your pants. When you have nothing to win, you have nothing to lose and if anything describes Shurmur’s fate at this point it’s that.

It's far harder to measure Weeden's progress. Unquestionably he's better now then he was earlier in the season, which is a positive. He doesn't lock on receivers nearly as much, unless he's throwing deep in which case he still locks completely on that receiver, and he can generally find the outlet guy. But Weeden is still awfully late on too many passes, which is a sign that he's still reacting first and then throwing instead of anticipating as he throws.

This too is explainable since Weeden is still pretty raw and he's not throwing to the most accomplished group of receivers. Ultimately, though, when new president Joe Banner and offensive coordinator Brad Childress talk about having to evaluate Weeden at year's end, this is what they'll look for. Does Weeden make the correct reads? Does he have the kind of trigger that is more instinctive than mechanical? Those are hard things to judge and nothing about the Dallas loss added much insight except one thing.

Weeden still has horrible touch. He not only missed a wide open Josh Cooper (though in fairness, Cooper did drop a pass right in his hands earlier) and he threw about the worst pass you're ever likely to see on 4^th down near the Dallas one yard line. Not knowing if the Browns would see the ball again and needing a touchdown on what could have been their last effective play, Weeden absolutely had to give his receiver a chance to catch the ball. He didn't. The throw to Jordan Cameron was well out of bounds.

As it is, Weeden wasn't helped much by the play calling. I can understand trying to force Richardson down the Cowboys' collective throats but what I can't understand is why there was no play action on that 4^th down play. The Cowboys had 42 players in the box and had completely sold out on the rush. It was the exact time to fake the dive to Richardson and have the tight end on the right side release to what surely would have been open field on the right side of the line. Instead the Browns went all in on an iffy fade route to the left side of the end zone. Weeden had virtually no room to work the play and to prove it and his lack of touch, he lofted the ball at least 5 yards out of bounds.

Weeden was helped, too, by his receivers all day. Here's the place where it's time to say something nice about Greg Too Little. He made two very fine catches on poorly thrown balls and then didn't stop to celebrate either one. That's significant progress actually. How that translates to the rest of the season is hard to say although Jeff Schudel at the News-Herald seems to think that Little has completely matured and is now a leader on the team. If that's the key, no one needs Clarissa to explain it all. It explains itself.

**

The Browns next take on a wounded Pittsburgh Steelers team. With Ben Roethlisberger out, this simply isn't the same Steelers team that has owned the Browns like the Buckeyes own the Hoosiers. This also isn't exactly the same Steelers team because defensively it's more suspect then it has been in years. It would be nice to imagine that the Browns go all Ralphie on the Steelers and unleash a few year's worth of frustration on the bullies that torment them and it could happen that way. But past being prologue all too often with this team, they're likely to add another chapter to the almost always almost victories they've compiled against that team and the rest of the league for years.

Lingering Items--Big Mouth Big Ego Edition

Rare is it that a player in any sport says anything of great interest that when he does you want to just cut him some slack, leave the comments to dangle and just enjoy the fact that you don't have to write another “we respect our opponents” or “we're just going to go out there and try to have some fun” quote. But on the other hand, if said player in any sport is going to leave it out there dangling like a carrot at the end of a stick, said player shouldn't be surprised when someone comes along and tries to grab it.

Josh Cribbs, the special teams player ordinaire for the Cleveland Browns, used the run up to the game this week against the Dallas Cowboys to finally unleash what had been building up at least since the aftermath of the Baltimore Ravens game when he sat in the locker room biting his liplike Mitch McConnell being forced to watch a Barack Obama press conference. Cribbs said then he didn't want to say anything that would get him in trouble. Apparently after seeing the game plan against the Cowboys that didn't feature him doing anything more but watch kickoffs said over his head, Cribbs decided that trouble was the least of his concerns.

It was classic Cribbs all the way. One of the more passively aggressive athletes to wind his way through Cleveland in years, Cribbs made sure first we all understood just what a team guy he is before proceeding to explain in rather stark detail just what a typical “me first” guy he really is.

Cribbs' main gripe, of course, is that he just wants the damn ball. He explains that he believes he's the best athlete on the team and that it is wrong, shameful, boneheaded, inexplicable, pick your descriptor, that he is being used on offense slightly less than the Jets are using Tim Tebow on offense. And lest anyone thing Cribbs doesn't carry around his stats like a math geek who can recite Pi to 48 places, Cribbs told the Plain Dealer's Mary Kay Cabot in an English be damned screed, “me going from being able to run the wildcat, to playing receiver last season and catching 41 passes and four touchdowns to nothing—I can't believe it.”

I can. There's no harm in Cribbs walking the Berea campus with confidence and swagger in his own ability. It's what athletes do or else they won't be professional athletes for long. But let's not mistake Cribbs' ego as anything more than furthering Cribbs' particular interests at the expense of the team's. It's also what athletes do.

See, Cribbs is in the final year of a contract and isn't getting the chance to show teams that his skills, such as they are, go beyond special teams. No one is paying special teams players, even with Cribbs' resume, the same as they are paying true offensive playmakers. In other words, for all of Cribbs' bitching, the words between the lines say, essentially “the Browns are taking money out of my wallet each time they design a pass play for Greg Little to drop.”

If Cribbs had merely confined his frustration to how the lack of offensive opportunities this year is costing him money next year, that would have been enough. We could have then used the opportunity to point out that the only reason Cribbs was in a position to catch said 41 passes and 4 touchdowns last season was because general manager Tom Heckert decided that the Browns didn't need to have any actual credible receivers on the roster. Someone had to get in the way of the damn ball and that someone on occasion was Cribbs. We could also have then pointed out again how Cribbs wasn't anything close to a reliable NFL receiver last year or at any point when he lined up wide. His lack of training as a receiver was the context for his inability to run anything resembling a crisp or reliable route. Sometimes he'd square in on a 10-yard pattern at 8 yards or 12 yards or wherever he felt like it. He'd do the same on a 10-yard out. He'd go long when the pattern called for him to curl in. These kinds of mistakes, repeated not just weekly but several times within each game, were understandable because Cribbs was being asked to basically play out of position.

But Cribbs wouldn't leave it at that. His unintentionally hilarious slant on the world and how he fits into it pushed him further into furthering his agenda by further feeding into the animosity fans have against Shurmur. Cribbs told Cabot that he has talked to Shurmur about his role earlier this year and that it had no impact, so no reason to go down that road. “There's no point,” he said. “Obviously they feel like everybody that's in front of me is a better athlete. I disagree. I feel a different way than the coach feels about me. They must feel I can't produce. We have a difference of opinion.” That's putting it mildly.

The truth Cribbs has never faced is that just being an athlete, for whatever that's supposed to me on a team that's supposedly filled with athletes, doesn't necessarily translate to awesomeness in any position you deem yourself capable of playing. Cribbs really never did progress as a receiver. He was raw when he started, got slightly better only through some fleeting familiarity with the position, but leveled out quickly. Think what you will about head coach Pat Shurmur and his decision making ability, but he's been around enough receivers in his life to know one that is credible and one that is not.

Shurmur isn't saying that the mediocre receivers in front of him are better athletes but he is saying they are better receivers and it's hard to argue that point. They are better receivers. They've been doing it longer and are better trained. They run better routes. In short they do the things receivers are supposed to do better than Cribbs. All Cribbs really has done is prove that he occasionally can catch a pass. He's not a deep threat. He's not a consistent go-to guy on third down. Hell, he's not particularly good at using the elusiveness he's developed as a kick returner to much effect as a receiver, mainly because by the time the ball gets to him from the quarterback, it's generally hard to shake loose the guy draped on your back.

Cribbs' comments are a challenge to Shurmur but don't expect much to come of it. There was a time when the Plain Dealer probably would have run this story on the front page of the paper, forget the front page of the sports section. Instead it was buried well inside the sports pages playing 10^th fiddle to a story about John “Not Buddy” Greco and high school playoffs. That's about right. This town is indifferent.

But the impact of his words will linger. Sure Shurmur probably won't do anything because he's a lame duck and he has bigger problems to worry about, such as figuring out which teams may need a quarterbacks coach next season. But new president Joe Banner will probably notice and not in the way Cribbs imagines.

Cribbs in for a wake up call for the rest of his career. He's been fine on special teams this season but not spectacular. He may be back next year for the Browns or he may not but wherever he finds himself next and whoever he's playing for then he'll still end up being the frustrated best athlete in the room. No team short of a team like the Browns of last season that believe having credible receivers on a roster is overrated is going to insert Cribbs into the offense except as an interesting, occasional diversion.

**

As a wrongheaded ego-driven loudmouth, Cribbs is a mere amateur against someone with the All World skills of Rob Ryan, the former Browns defensive coordinator now plying his trade in Dallas. Because everything in a Ryan world is about a Ryan, the almost meaningless match up between the Browns and the Cowboys has turned into a sort of Call of Duty: This Time It's Personal death battle.

Apparently Ryan didn't feel like his massive skills as a defensive coordinator were respected by the Browns when they made their most recent regime change. Ryan claims he slept in the office for 7 straight weeks so that he could work longer and harder to turn around the Browns' fortunes and that this should have been recognized. It was, just not in the way he would have liked. He was fired because he was part of the stinking bath water of the Eric Mangini regime.

I'm not sure, really, what Ryan is bitching about. It's not as if he landed as a crew shift leader at Subway, though I suspect that he wouldn't have minded that gig judging by a waistline that is expanding far faster than the economy. He landed as the freakin' defensive coordinator for America's team or at least what once passed as America's team until owner Jerry Jones took it upon himself to see how many fans he could actually alienate.

What probably chafes at Ryan is not that he landed in Dallas in the same slot that he left in Cleveland but that he didn't even get an interview when Mike Holmgren hired Shurmur. That, really, is what's personal about all of this, proving that coaches aren't any more self-aware than the players under their charge.

The Browns aren't the first team to not see greatness in Ryan as a head coach. They aren't even the latest. Every year there are at least 4 or 5 head coach openings, including this past off season, and none of them resulted in Ryan being elevated to the position he really covets. If Ryan keeps making it all personal, pretty soon he's going to hold a grudge against the entire NFL establishment to the point that his only viable alternative really will be as crew chief at Subway.

There are plenty of reasons Ryan isn't a head coach and isn't likely to ever be. His lack of any semblance of personal discipline or politics makes Chris Perez look like Colin Powell. There's nothing particularly innovative about the schemes Ryan runs. He's related to Rex Ryan.

Let's also keep in mind, too, the initial and most obvious point. When a Ryan speaks it's always about the Ryan. The “this is personal” meme was even too cliché to have been a plot point on Friday Night Lights. It stopped being a motivational tool along about the time players formed a union. But as a tool for furthering the narrative of Rob Ryan it works, clumsily, but it works.

The likelihood of the Cowboys beating the Browns on Sunday is high. The likelihood of the Cowboys defense, just like any other team's defense, getting in the head of a rookie quarterback with an interception problem is equally high. So if the Cowboys do what all sense and logic dictate they should do, Ryan can at least advance the theory that it was his crazy motivational skills that righted the Cowboys ship and not the fact that as bad as the Cowboys are they still have more than enough to beat the Browns, one of the NFL's worst teams. I only hope he gets a game ball for his efforts.

**

Lost in all the “goodbye, Mike, we hardly knew ye” was the gem that Holmgren threw out about the itch he still has to coach one more time. If that doesn't piss off Browns fans then they truly have stopped caring.

At this point I'm pretty convinced that Holmgren's better days are well behind him but putting that aside, if Holmgren still wanted to coach there was an opening on the team that he oversaw as President not too long ago, like 3 weeks ago. When Holmgren dumped Mangini a year too late, he had every opportunity to scratch that coaching itch here and it would have been well received at least until the moment that fans realized that even a Super Bowl credentialed coach isn't going to help this team with this roster win more than 4 or 5 games a season.

It's never been adequately explained why Holmgren chose the route he did but because he did, he finds himself out of Cleveland completely, which may have been his crazy, brilliant motivation all along. Meanwhile the Browns find themselves where they tend to find themselves every two years, on the precipice of another exhaustive search for a head coach.

What all this demonstrates more than anything else is that Randy Lerner made absolutely the right decision to sell the team. It was the only right decision he made during his entire tenure. The only real hope in turning this franchise around is through an engaged owner and not one who would cower in the corner when the lights came on.

**

Cribbs' crybaby outburst leads to this week's question to ponder: Who would you rather have on your team, Josh Cribbs or Tim Tebow?

Buh Bye Week

Maybe the Cleveland Browns serving a 4-year league imposed bye prepared me for it, but honestly I look forward to the team’s bye week each year. Timed right, it not only gives me the opportunity to finish up the outdoor chores I tend to ignore in those agonizingly painful days between the end of golf season and the onset of snow, but it gives me the opportunity to watch football through a much different prism.

Unencumbered by another Browns’ game to break down and analyze for the moment (which, believe me, is not nearly as fun as simply watching it with your buddies while being over served Bud Light), I get to instead focus on what the rest of the NFL is up to.

The good news, indeed the great news, is that the Browns are hardly the most troubled franchise in the NFL at the moment. In fact, it’s not even close. As bad as things have been in Cleveland, at least we haven’t been burdened lately with overwhelming expectations. The last time that happened was in the pre-Twitter days of 2008, nearly a lifetime ago, and we saw the Browns handle it like a cheap lawn chair from Sam’s Club handles your overweight brother-in-law at his kid’s soccer game.

On full display Sunday was the Dallas Cowboys who are essentially reliving the Browns’ 2008 season except for a few small details. The expectations for the Browns were the playoffs, modest but exciting in context. For the Cowboys it’s the Super Bowl or bust. The Browns play in a nice stadium but the Cowboys don’t just play in a stadium, they play in a Parthenon, a monument to excess that, I think, cost somebody somewhere about $6 billion. The Browns had a diffident owner who hid from the media like Howard Hughes in the final throes of dementia. The Cowboys have one of the most visible owners in the history of the NFL. He hides from the media like a Kardashian hides from the media.

But with 7 games under their belt the Cowboys are 1-6 and looking every bit as disinterested, unorganized and out of sorts as any Browns’ team in the last 10 years, including that woeful 2007 bunch. Head coach Wade Phillips has assumed the role of Romeo Crennel, the nice guy who expects grown men to act like professionals and give their best effort because that’s what their paid to do.

It didn’t work out well for Crennel then because he gave the inmates the keys to the compound. And when given the chance the inmates will absolutely take over the compound. They’ll imprison the guards, change the locks on the door and put nothing but desserts on the lunch menu. The Cowboys, like the Browns in 2007, are in full revolt at the moment and all Phillips can do is stand by, grimace occasionally and hope that his favorite Pandora station starts playing through the headset he wears on the sideline instead of the incessant noise from an assistant who knows he’ll too be out of work soon.

Although quarterback Tony Romo is injured and gone for the next several weeks, it’s hardly an excuse for the kind of mail-it-in performance they had against Jacksonville on Sunday or even against the New York Giants a week before when Romo was playing. First of all, Romo may very well be one of the most overrated quarterbacks I’ve seen in the last 10 years. He has skills, but not Peyton Manning skills. Romo’s accomplishments pale in comparison to the attendant hype. He’s an above-average quarterback with the bad luck to be on a team where above-average is never going to be good enough.

The other thing is that the Cowboys defense is pitiful. Given how the Browns’ defense has played all season, even with Sheldon Brown and Eric Wright spending a good portion of the first 7 games watching receivers fly past them like a stranded driver watches semis whiz by on the Shoreway, the Cowboys might very well be at least 4-3 and in the playoff hunt if they had that Browns’ defensive unit. The Cowboys can’t stop the run or the pass, just like the Browns in 2007.

This will not end well for Phillips just like it didn’t end well for Crennel. The difference is that Phillips will not survive the season. Crennel survived mainly because it took owner Randy Lerner that long to realize that yes, he was witnessing a car wreck as it was happening. Let’s just say that Jerry Jones is a little more self-aware.

I also had the chance to watch another overrated team, the New York Jets, put on an absolutely horrendous performance against the Green Bay Packers. I’m still not quite sure what kind of team the Packers have but I am pretty sure that the Jets will once again disappoint the fans of New York. To that I say welcome to the club. Browns fans have been charter members of it for the last 10 years.

The reason the Jets ultimately will disappoint is that they have a head coach who can be as reckless as he can be inspiring, kind of like the Browns’ defensive coordinator. No small coincidence then that the two are twin brothers, is it?

Rex Ryan literally cost the Jets a victory because of hubris couched in mismanagement. It’s the fatal flaw of the Ryan brand. They trust their instincts too often when they should trust their research.

On 4th and 18 early in the game, Ryan let punter Steve Weatherford try a fake punt. I understand the surprise factor, although fake punts are all the rage this season, but Reggie Hodges running 60 + yards last week for the Browns on a fake punt is a once in a lifetime sort of thing. Weatherford had as much chance of getting the first down as Bill Belichick has being inducted into the Browns’ Ring of Honor. (Note: Weatherford was originally ruled to have gotten the first down but on replay the call was reversed. He missed by at least two yards.) It gave the Packers the ball deep in Jets territory, which they converted into a 20-yard field goal. The Jets didn’t know it at the time, though they should have, that it would be all the points the Packers would need.

But that little sneak attack that blew up in their face was a minor blip compared to the strangeness of the play calling and decision making in the last 6 minutes and 36 seconds of the game that beat them over the head With the Jets deep in their own territory and trailing 6-0, they were able to get one first down before Ryan and offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer went into brain freeze mode.

After a Mark Sanchez swing pass fell incomplete, Ryan and Schottenheimer eschewed any desire to move the ball methodically, instead putting Sanchez in a situation where he couldn’t succeed. Two deep passes were incomplete (it wasn’t even close) and the Jets were forced to punt.

With 4:12 remaining and the Packers with the ball, Ryan decided to use all 3 of his remaining time outs. It worked, except when it didn’t. All it did was really accelerate the inevitable outcome.

The Packers were forced to punt and the Jets took over with 3:50 remaining, instead of the two or so minutes they might have had had they preserved at least 1 time out. An off tackle run by LaDanian Tomlinson, which kept the clock moving, was followed by another deep pass that fell incomplete. Sanchez was then sacked on third down as he held the ball too long while looking for an open receiver on another inexplicable deep route. The clock kept moving. Forced to go for it on fourth down and in their own territory, Sanchez again looked deep again and in the direction of Braylon Edwards. That pass, predictably, fell incomplete. Not once did Ryan, Schottenheimer or Sanchez seem to even consider the possibility that getting a few first downs and putting the Packers on their heels might be a good idea. The Packers then moved in for another field goal effectively ending the game.

It was the kind of play calling that Browns’ fans may be used to but the real comfort is that this kind of stuff doesn’t just happen in Cleveland except, of course, when Rob Ryan is calling blitzes and leaving Eric Wright to fend for himself.

Bye week football is not to be ignored but to be relished for what it is. A confirmation that things aren’t as bad as it seems in Cleveland even while it serves to show how far this team still has to go.

Getting Schooled

Tell your expectations to just shut up.

The Cleveland Browns, entering a season in which much, maybe too much, is expected, demonstrated that the preseason was indeed a dress rehearsal for the regular season, going down hard to the Dallas Cowboys Sunday 28-10.

The 18-point margin is deceiving. It was as complete a defeat as one could imagine. The Cowboys were able to pass and run nearly at will and did more than enough on defense in applying a hard lesson to a team that was simply outclassed. About the only Cowboy’s decision worth questioning was why, after winning the coin toss, they decided to defer their decision to the second half. With as potent of an offense as there may be in the NFL, it seemed odd that Dallas would forego the opportunity for a quick score and the tone that would set for a chance at a quick defensive stop. It mattered little. While not stopping the Browns’ offense immediately on their first possession, they stopped it quickly enough.

The Cowboys, behind quarterback Tony Romo, put together the kind of textbook 10-play 80-yard drive that had the look and feel of what could very well turn into a recurring theme for the Cleveland defense. At least it was on this day. The Cowboys initially chose not to run at the strength of the defense, instead sending running back Marion Barber to the edges. Meanwhile, Romo was a perfect 5-5 on the drive, essentially playing pitch and catch as the defense, even with several blitzes, couldn’t come close to making him sweat.

It was the start the Cowboys wanted and the Browns feared and it begged for an appropriate response. Getting that and more, quarterback Derek Anderson led the Browns on marathon 16 play, 78-yard drive to tie the game at 7-7, capped off by a two-yard toss to tight end Kellen Winslow. It was the team’s high water mark for the day. The drive was aided greatly by two Dallas penalties, the most critical of which was a third down interference call on cornerback Adam Jones, who essentially tackled receiver Braylon Edwards as Anderson’s pass was headed his way. More importantly, the drive consumed nearly nine minutes, which had the intended effect of keeping the defense off the field.

If defensive coordinator Mel Tucker used the extra time to make whatever defensive adjustments were necessary after the first Dallas drive it didn’t show. Romo, Barber and the rest of the company went right back to work, barreling through the defense with one big play after another and in short order, following a Romo to Terrell Ownes 36-yard touchdown pass, Dallas had recaptured the lead for good. On the play, Owens had two steps on cornerback Brandon McDonald. You probably won’t see a bigger mismatch in the NFL this year.

With the pace being set by the Cowboys offense, it was a rather large request to ask the Browns offense to continue to respond in kind. Indeed, after that first Cleveland drive, it was mostly just a series of fits and starts for the offense. It didn’t help that Edwards was dropping more balls than he was catching and otherwise looked mentally distracted for most of the day. Yet, you can’t lay too much blame for the loss at the feet of the offense. With most of its starters back, the offense, with the exception of Edwards, had a certain crispness at times that had eluded them throughout the preseason. But the joint pressure applied by both the Dallas and Cleveland defenses was simply too much for the Browns’ offense to overcome.

Still, with less than three minutes left in the first half, the Cowboys only had a 14-7 lead. Unfortunately, they also had the ball inside the Cleveland red zone. They used the time wisely. A hands-to-the-facemask penalty on McDonald against Owens, took the ball to the Cleveland 15-yard line. A tipped pass on first down, a short Barber run on second set up a third and six that Romo converted with a seven-yard pass to Owens. It looked like Owens had scored but the officials marked it down at the one. Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips didn’t even bother to challenge. Instead he just sent Barber in for the easy score with 26 seconds remaining in the half for an insurmountable 21-7 lead.

As the second half beckoned, the wisdom of Dallas’ decision to defer after winning the opening coin toss became apparent. But an offensive pass interference call on Owens pushed Dallas into a third and 15 on that opening series. The defense then put its first real pressure on Romo as he was forced to throw it away. With Dallas pinned back, the Browns took over after the punt at midfield with the chance it needed. Instead, they quickly went three and out. Dallas took over and put together its third long drive of the game, with rookie running back Felix Jones running straight up the heart of the defense and taking with him whatever was left of it, for an 11-yard run and a 28-7 lead.

Down 21 points and forced to all but abandon the run, the Cowboys defense was able to simultaneously lay back and tee off, denying Anderson any real chance to find the home field rhythm he possessed last season. The closest he came was late in the third quarter and early in the fourth when he led the Browns to their best drive since the first quarter, mixing in a little of his own scrambling with a little running by Lewis and a few key passes, including an 18 yarder to receiver Steve Sanders, that took the ball down to the Dallas 24 yard line.

From there, the drive appeared stalled and on 4th and 3 at the Dallas 17. Head coach Romeo Crennel then seized the moment as only he can by deciding to kick a 34-yard field goal, which kicker Phil Dawson converted. With just 10:31 left in the game, it was a bizarre decision unless Crennel was betting the “under” in some sort of coaches’ pool. As meaningless as that decision ultimately was, it nonetheless sucked whatever life was left in the stands and on the sidelines. The Cowboys then held the ball for the rest of the game. At least the crowd got an early start for the parking lots.

As lopsided as the game was, it could have been worse. Romo, perhaps bored with all the time he had to throw, made his only mistake of the game when cornerback Eric Wright stepped in front of a pass intended for Owens in the end zone. Cowboys’ coach Wade Phillips then decided to mostly sit on the ball at the end of the game with it sitting deep in Cleveland territory.

Overall, a potent Browns offense that was rolling up over 350 yards a game last season was rendered mostly impotent, running up a meager 205 yards. Without an opportunity to fully mix in the run, particularly in the second half, it was hardly a surprise. For the game, Anderson was 11-14 for 114 yards and one touchdown. Lewis, in just 13 carries had 62 yards.

Meanwhile, his counterpart, Romo played like a MVP in the making. It wasn’t difficult. On nearly every pass play, at least two receivers were open downfield and with enough time to both survey the field and wave to girlfriend Jessica Simpson squirreled away somewhere in a suite, Romo had no trouble finding them. On the day, he was 24-32 for 320 yards, one touchdown and one interception. Barber, before going out with an injury, ran for 80 yards and two touchdowns while Jones added another 60 yards rushing and a touchdown. Owens, toying with McDonald all day, had five catches for 87 yards and one touchdown. Tight end Jason Whitten meanwhile had six catches and 96 yards. Overall the Cowboys amassed 487 yards against what might be the NFL’s worst defense.

While the game may not have been a complete embarrassment, it was embarrassing enough. It also was an eye opener that demonstrated the difference between expectations and execution. It’s the latter and not the former that keeps teams playing in January. And on that count, this much is clear: the Browns still have many steps to take.

The defensive problems were well known going into the game. Nonetheless, with a rebuilt defensive line, more was expected, less was delivered. Barber and Jones ran free while Romo lounged in the backfield. It’s a scene fans better get used to.

As everyone inside and out of Berea knew, it isn’t going to be any easier in the Browns’ second week, facing a Pittsburgh team smarting just a bit from all the preseason hype coming Cleveland’s way. Though the Browns’ defense played a mostly better second half, it didn’t play nearly well enough to give the Steelers any reason to be concerned.

Last year, general manager Phil Savage made the most dramatic move of his career after the first week, jettisoning starting quarterback Charlie Frye in favor of Anderson. It was the move that ultimately turned the season around. Don’t look for a repeat performance. The Browns defense simply needs too much help.

Jerry Jones and His Deal with the Devil

It’s one thing to dodge the potholes in the road as they come along, it’s a whole other thing to put them in the road yourself. Yet that’s exactly what the Dallas Cowboys are doing by selling whatever might be left of their souls by trading for disgraced former Tennessee Titan’s cornerback, Adam “Pacman” Jones.

Assuming as we must that Cowboys owner Jerry Jones approved this pending transaction, what this proves is that Jones secretly harbors an inner desire to be the NFL’s new Al Davis. Jones, always a bit of a maverick anyway, is further confirming that status by deliberating infecting his team with a cancer that the Titans are only to happy to cure themselves of.

Sure, we’ll hear the usual manure from the usual suspects, in this case Jones as owner and as Cowboys general manager, that he’s both spoken to Pacman and is convinced he’s sincere about turning his life around. It’s essentially the same line George W. Bush used when he said he looked into the soul of former Russian president Vladimir Putin and that’s not working out too well either.

You don’t have to venture too far into the realm of the internets to appreciate the liability that the Cowboys are attempting to take on by essentially taking over the cleanup of this toxic dump. In terms of rap sheets, Pacman’s alone rivals that of the current roster of the Cincinnati Bengals. And that was before the revelation earlier this week that Pacman was paying hush money in connection with his little, ahem, incident in Las Vegas.

Anyone who listened to even a part of Pacman’s radio interview a few weeks back with Michael Irvin, himself no stranger to trouble, couldn’t possibly have come away thinking that “yea, this is the guy we need to have on our team.” Anyone, except maybe Jerry Jones. Someone get him a transcript. Better yet, to appreciate Pacman is to hear him speak, so get Jones the tape. Pacman didn’t so much as own his former troubles as diminish them by laying blame in a somewhat whimsical fashion to his completely understandable obsession with strip joints. Except he likely couldn’t spell obsession and couldn’t define whimsical.

There are any number of variables that go into putting together a successful season. Talent is a given, but it isn’t the end of the rainbow. In a sport that depends on the ability to put a large number of players on the same page, the last thing a team needs is a bunch of rugged individualists, even ones with immense raw talent. One of the great secrets to the success of the New England Patriots hasn’t been overwhelming talent, but overwhelming teamwork. Whether it’s because the players unite behind the common theme of hating head coach Bill Belichick or some other reason, the Patriots are a team first.

The Cowboys, on the other hand, seem hell-bent on disproving the notion. They brought on serial gun nut Tank Johnson while he was still suspended. They also already employ one of the biggest distractions in recent memory, Terrell Owens. All Owens has done over the years and everywhere he’s been is burn every bridge he’s ever crossed, taking a fair share of collateral damage in the process. The fact that Owens hasn’t fully torched all of Irving, Texas thus far is more luck than maturity.

Then there is the matter of the traveling circus that vastly overrated quarterback Tony Romo has become. So proud, apparently, is he of having Jessica Simpson to squire around town that he seems incredibly oblivious to the distractions he’s foisted on his teammates in the process if the little side trip to Mexico he took with the vocally-challend Ms. Simpson during last season’s playoff bye week is any indication.

Sure, Romo would be a fool not to avail himself of the opportunity that his fleeting celebrity status has given him to take the measure of Simpson on a regular basis. But every question he has to constantly answer from a press that can’t tell the difference between news and fluff—“are they engaged?” “is she really as dumb as she seems?”—is another chance he doesn’t have to concentrate on more pressing matters of the day, like how to solve the Packers secondary.

But the Owens/Romo sideshows are about to seem like the halcyon days of yore once Pacman and his entourage arrive in Dallas, which may still be awhile if NFL commissioner Roger Goodell decides he’s still offended by the fact that Pacman felt the urge to frequent a Manhattan strip joint the night before his come to Jesus meeting with the league last year.

Pacman’s mere presence is going to force virtually every person associated with the Cowboys, save maybe the third string ball boy, to constantly respond to what will surely be an endless series of Pacman-related questions. The Dallas media might tire of asking the same questions and getting the rote answers somewhere around next December, but the questions will dog the Cowboys at every stop they make during the season. And that’s assuming Pacman heads straight home after practice. Pacman being Pacman isn’t Manny being Manny. Pacman being Pacman involves late nights, people getting arrested, lawyers being retained and pleas being bargained. In other words, the chance that Pacman won’t be involved in something somewhere is roughly the same as the chance that a clock won’t tick.

Jerry Jones has always come across as the kind of guy so impressed with himself that there is no problem too large for him to handle. Pacman promises to test the depths of Jones’ seemingly unlimited supply of self-esteem and the utter patience of Cowboys fans that have been sorely tested the last two seasons.

This all is good news, of course, for the rest of the NFL East. While Jerry Jones is making deals with the devil, the rest of the division is just going quietly about their business of actually improving the team dynamic.

And if this Pacman thing doesn’t quite work, there’s also some good news for Jones. Odell Thurman was recently reinstated and is probably available and Rae Carruth has to be up for parole sometime in the next several years.

Follow the Money

On the surface, the two stories wouldn’t seem to have much in common. Chicago Cubs owner Sam Zell said earlier this week that he would definitely consider selling the naming rights to Wrigley Field. At roughly the same time, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was heard saying, again, that he believes NFL owners will vote to opt out of the current labor agreement.

Two different sports, two completely unrelated issues. Hardly. Like everything else in sports these days, the two stories share a common parent: money. In particular, the root is the ever spiraling cost of owning and running a professional sports franchise and what to do about it.

There was a time not all that long ago when old white men bought sports teams for the pure ego and hobby of it. That era was characterized mostly by the alarming lack of business acumen these owners brought to their hobby. Whatever rigor they applied to their “real” businesses, the ones that made them all the dough, was thrown out the window when they dabbled in sports.

But this didn’t necessarily cause them any great concern because the value of their teams continued to climb ever higher, seemingly defying all the laws of economics. Owning a sports team became the ultimate boom enterprise. But the downside, at least from a fan’s perspective, is that the economic health of their sports eventually grew worse. Most owners, more interested in stroking their egos than making good business decisions with their teams, wouldn’t hesitate to sign the next great superstar to an even more outrageous contract then the last great superstar. Ticket prices rose.

But eventually a different breed of owner started making their way into pro sports. Buying at ever increasing prices and taking on the kind of crushing debt that made the old white guys shake their heads, this breed grew up on budgets and business plans and didn’t see any reason not to translate that into their sports properties. Indeed, it was a necessity. This breed has no less of a desire to win than their forbearers; it’s just that given what they paid for their team, they aren’t as comfortable dipping into their personal fortunes any further in order to meet their debt payments, let alone such trivial matters as player acquisition expenses.

Zell and Jones are two such owners. Zell is a somewhat reluctant owner of the Cubs, having acquired them when he purchased the Tribune Co., the Cubs’ previous owner, last April for more than $8 billion. Zell’s interest seemed, at least at the time, much more focused on the media properties under the Tribune banner and not, necessarily the Cubs.

Most expect Zell to sell the Cubs sooner rather than later if only to retire some of the massive debt he took on to buy the Tribune Co. in the first place. But Zell is letting it be known now that he will sell the Cubs when he’s good and ready and, by the way, he plans to maximize his recovery by selling the Cubs and Wrigley Field separately.

There is good reason for Zell to wait and to sell separately. According to Forbes, the value of the Cubs franchise has been increasing at an average annual rate of 14% and increased a whopping 32% just between 2005 and 2006, not atypical figures whatsoever in either baseball or football. Needing money is one thing, but given these returns it compels Zell to wait a little longer to sell. In the meantime, why not create a tidy little revenue stream by selling the naming rights to one of the most famous stadiums in the world? For an owner more interested in money than history, it makes perfect sense.

For the baseball purist out there, Zell’s plans may be sacrilege but don’t blame Zell. Baseball’s ownership fraternity has never been all that keen on sharing revenue among themselves and thus it’s not a surprise that left to their own devices things like this would happen. With baseball having created an economic mess of itself for the last several years with no appreciable end in sight, now is hardly the time to begrudge even Sam Zell from making a little more money on the backs of fans. There are much bigger issues to solve in that sport first.

At first blush, it seems that’s what Jones and at least 23 other of his fellow owners are trying to do by opting out of the labor contract early, solving the big problems. Under its terms, the NFL’s collective bargaining agreement is supposed to expire after the 2012 season. But either the owners or the union can opt out of the final two years by giving notice by November 8th of this year. If that occurs, 2010 becomes the final year of the contract and it would be sans a salary cap.

But lest anyone think that this tactic has anything to do with eradicating the sport of a salary cap, think again. Though the owners once fought the concept, the presence of a salary cap does, from their perspective, achieve the desired result by acting as a sort of lifeline or net to those among them who would otherwise try to scale a mountain they have no business climbing in the first place.

What Jones and his brethren really want is a re-working of the cap. It’s no secret that the owners feel that the current collective bargaining agreement, which was actually an extension of the previous contract, was rammed down their throats by then commissioner Paul Tagliabue after several months of hard bargaining with the union. In fact, it’s not a coincidence that Tagliabue’s retirement announcement came just days after the contract was signed. He knew he had lost the support of many of the owners.

It’s not hard to see why. Putting aside the contract’s complexity just know that in 2010, assuming the contract were to stay in place, the players share of projected total revenues (itself an incredibly complex calculation) rises to 58%. That’s a pretty long arm into the owners’ rather deep pockets. Keep in mind, too, that the definition of total revenues was further expanded so that virtually any income that the owners generate gets included in the calculation.

Ever since Jones bought the Cowboys in 1989, he’s been trying to find ways to increase his own bottom line. When he tried striking his own marketing deals built off the Cowboys brand, he got cut off at the pass. Since then he’s been working from inside with an ever-changing fraternity that used to see him as a no-nothing maverick. Now he has the ears of a majority of owners who see the players getting an ever bigger piece of what they consider to be their pie. And the bigger the piece that goes to the players, the less that goes to the owners, many of whom are juggling huge debt.

None of this makes Jones or any of the other owners bad guys, but it does set football up for the kind of labor disharmony that is at the root of some of baseball’s biggest problems, including the lack of a legitimate, wide-ranging drug testing program. Upshaw has vowed that if the cap comes off, it will never return, a big promise that he probably can’t keep. Football owners aren’t quite the patsies that permeate baseball’s ownership ranks.

Whether Zell ultimately sells the naming rights to Wrigley Field and whether there is a period of labor unrest in football ultimately are just the visible and transient outcomes of a larger unspoken issue. But all you need to remember when trying to connect the seemingly unrelated dots in such matters is what the “Deep Throat” character kept telling Robert Redford’s Bob Woodward character in All the President’s Men: follow the money.