I am not so sure why so many supposedly knowledgeable Browns fans are so
upset with the results of the first seven games of the season. Nobody in the
local or national media, Las Vegas, as well as a huge majority of fans predicted
that the Browns would win more than 4-6 games this year. The over/under in most
sports books in Vegas was 4 or 4 and a half, and despite a couple of Browns
players who were upset that they were 2-point underdogs to then-winless Houston,
that over/under number appears to be right on the money, so to speak.
What is surprising about the Browns 2-5 start this year is that they’ve got a
lot of company. Depending on when teams had their bye week, after seven or eight
games, the Browns are one of ten teams with two wins or less. Two of those
teams, Baltimore and Houston, have claimed the Browns as victims, while three of
them, Tennessee, Minnesota and Baltimore (a second time) remain on the schedule.
Only Green Bay, with one win, provided the Browns with a win.
You can look at this a couple of ways. Romeo Crennel chooses to look at it
that the Browns have only been one play away from winning a couple of games,
which would have turned the record around. Or you can look at it as the Browns
can be tossed in a hat with a third of the teams in the NFL, and they all are
just bad enough to be a play or two away from winning games.
In reality, if those ‘one or two plays’ were made, and the Browns reversed
their record, it would be very deceiving. If that happened, would they remind
themselves that they were ‘one or two plays’ away from being 2-5? Or would they
make the mistake of thinking that they were in pretty good shape? I think they
are better off, in the long run, by clearly seeing how much work they have to
do.
Getting back to the other nine teams with one or two. Last year, the Browns
record of 4-12 put them into a tie-breaking situation for the second/third pick
in the draft. They got the third pick and took Braylon Edwards. It is possible,
based on the potential poor records of a huge number of teams, that a team with
only five wins for the season might pick as low as ninth or tenth, which would
not allow them to profit from a poor year.
Now that the season is near the halfway point, it is easy to see that the
schedule worked in the Browns favor. There were, in the first half, and are, the
rest of the way, some winnable games. But with Cincinnati and Pittsburgh so far
ahead of the pack, the Browns should know how far away they are, no matter what
happens in the next couple of weeks.
It is inevitable that there will be a quarterback change, and, as of this
writing, it probably will take place in the home game against Miami in two
weeks. It would not be a good idea to let Charlie Frye debut in Pittsburgh on a
Sunday night.
There seems to be a prevailing attitude (Crennel included) that the team has
been one play away from winning a couple more games. Many fans feel (Crennel
apparently not included) that Frye could have made that difference. That,
however, is presuming that Frye would have gotten the Browns into the same
position that Dilfer put them in---to be one play away. In other words, Dilfer
(and the defense) must have done enough right in the first three and a half
quarters to keep the games close. While Frye adds another dimension, there is no
guarantee that the games would come down to that ‘one play’.
It is easy to point out that Dilfer underthrew Antonio Bryant on the last
offensive play of the Houston game (although the DB should get credit for a
great play), but fourth-and-seventeen plays need miracles to succeed. The play
that should have been made was on second-and-ten, when Dennis Northcutt should
have caught the ball near the sideline. It would have been close to a first
down, and not worse than third-and-one. Worse case scenario, the Browns would
have been in field goal range, which would have tied things up. Instead, on
third and ten, Dilfer was sacked, leading to the final play.
I hope Charlie Frye succeeds, but fans need to be patient. I keep hearing
people compare the situation to that of Pittsburgh’s Ben Roethlisberger, who has
lost only one regular season game as a starter in a year and a half. That’s not
fair to Frye. First of all, Roethlisberger was a first round pick; Frye was a
third. And you can’t compare the talent in Pittsburgh to that in Cleveland. Big
Ben isn’t called on to make great plays, and he has had a terrific running game
around him. The same cannot be said for Frye.
‘More Sports & Les Levine’ can be seen M-F from 6-7pm with replays at 11pm on
Adelphia Channel 15 in northeastern Ohio. Feel free to comment on this story in Les' forum on Bernie's Insiders. You can also e-mail Les at msandll@aol.com or visit his web site at www.leslevine.com