It looked like a number of Browns players gave less than a full effort on Sunday in an ugly, ugly, ugly loss to the Bengals. And we are clearly looking at another year where the Browns are FLAT OUT BAD. I really hate to say it, but we are two weeks into the new season and the games are not "must see tv." It's a sad state of affairs.
The Bengals are a much better team than the Browns. Their offensive line is better all around. Their defensive line is better all around. Their veteran defensive backs are very solid. Bryan Simmons is at another level than Andre Davis at middle linebacker. They've got an All-Pro QB. They've got a Pro-Bowl caliber rurunning back. They've got a Pro-Bowl caliber wide out. And they've got several other very dangerous WRs. The Browns have none of those things. So it's no suprise the Browns lost by a wide margin.
What is troubling is how they lost. The Browns' gameplan was shredded almost as soon as the game started. The defense often seemed helpless to stop the Bengals offense. And our offense showed almost no intensity. As bad as the loss to New Orleans felt, this one feels worse because the Browns didn't belong on the same field. Scary.
I give some credit to our defense. They played hard, even while they got used. But at least somewhere in there the defense managed to stifle the Bengals at times. They generated some sacks. They made some big hits. The front seven got outplayed but at least they appeared to play aggressively. The defensive backfield got shredded. Plamer rackes up 350+ yards, and I bet half of that came at Ralph Brown's expense. Much of the rest were passes to wide open receivers sprinting through very soft spots in whatever zone the the Browns were playing.
But I'm also alarmed by the defense. My perception was that the Browns front seven just could not consistently control the line, and if that's the case we all ought to be very worried. We're playing a 3-4 but it looks like our linemen are playing a one gap system. And our linebackers were either misreading a lot of plays or were not able to get free enough to make stops. Wimbley looked good as a pass rusher, but I suspect he made his share of mistakes in other area. Matt Stewart seemed to be the most consistently in the right place. And that's not the guy the Browns are counting on to be the team's best linebacker. Scary.
The offense, on the other hand, is getting killed by a number of things. Mainly, the Bengals dropped back in coverage, let their d-line win the battle in the trenches, and then just cleaned up the trash. The Browns never looked good running the ball, though at least they stuck with the ground game well into the second half. And Frye and/or the receivers couldn't do anything through the air. Everyone will point to Frye and his arm strength; I'm more concerned about a lack of accuracy -- rarely are balls thrown to the right spot and receivers are forced to make a lot of tough catches. And our receivers are unable to do that more times than not. I was also concerned by how often the Bengals successfully anticipated the snap. That has got to change.
One guy who couldn't make any tough catches was Braylon Edwards. yeah, he had a lot of yards. But he left almost as many on the field, and certainly left 4-5 first downs out there. Edwards did have to make touch catches. But I wasn't alarmed that he didn't come up with the ball as much as his effort -- they guy just did not go for the ball very hard. He waited for the ball to come into his arms, and you can't do that in the NFL. Edwards is supposed to be our rising #1 guy, the WR who will fight for the ball and act like he OWNS the damn thing. He looked very much the opposite of that Sunday as he made multiple lazy attempts at securing imperfectly thrown balls. After his drop in Week 1 that allowed a game-sealing INT, Sunday's performance was a giant red flag for Edwards. We can only pray that his very poor body language is the result of comng back too soon from injury. Scary.
Winslow seemed to not be in the gameplan at all. After showing himself to be the best offensive weapon on the team in week one, Winslow instead was off the field on countless third downs. And in a game where the Bengals played relatively soft coverage, Frye/Carthon inexplicably failed to find Winslow. When he did make a grab he looked pretty good. And when balls were poorly thrown he still went for them.
The rest of the team... no shows. Northcutt caught a few balls and did his thing, but he's not going to do much against the types of schemes the Bengals were running. No other WR made plays of note.
The offensive line didn't give up a sack. They also couldn't open up much on the ground. While it's an improvement from Week 1, they still looked below average.
Overall, the offensive failure appears to rest on the shoulders of Carthon, the o-line, and Frye in that order. Maybe Frye should be more culpable. But everyone knows he's still green and the Browns expect to be able to run the ball and they couldn't.
If the Browns played better, if they had some success on the ground and Frye and the WRs hit on 10% more of the passing plays, the Browns still lose this game. But we'd feel a whole heck of a lot better in the process. Instead, it's frightening to think of what might lay ahead. I'd love to hear what the discussions in Berea sound like today. Because now it is time to regroup and maybe even redefine what this season is about. The best I can say is that, hopefully, the rest of the season will be unpredicatble, because that would indicate there are some successes to go along with the very, very low-lows like this game.