DawgTalkers.net Forums The Archives 2020 NFL Season Looking Back: Browns 24 Steelers 22 Injuries

In every game we haven’t had Teller (and now Wills) it’s SO apparent that our OL is our true MVP

having Taki is important. Hoping he can play this week, especially without Goodson available

Man, if Harris can't go, and if we don't get Teller or Hubbard back... we're working a 4th string RG??

That's UGLY.

Browns signed WR Alex Hollins WR off the Vikings practice squad Dec. 28th.

Any news on his game?

Yes... it isn't likely to matter to us at all this year.

Harrison coming back is huge with Sendejo out. Harrison and Joseph is probably our best safety duo possible at this point.

Is't Joseph out with Covid ?

He is on the list because of contact tracing. He should be back for the game.

Got it. cant keep track on all this.

Steelers who DNP (it may be a hint at who they’ll sit)

Watt
Tuitt
DeCastro
Heyward
Pouncey
Roethlisberger

Do we have a clear insight into who is probably out for the Browns this weekend .... with all the Covid stuff I am confused.

as of right now: Sendejo and Goodson are definitely out

Great analysis!

Hopefully, they rest enough guys that we can stick to what we've already done this year on offense and still beat them. I think we should. I also don't want us to have to work too hard for it. I think that getting up quick and early is the key to getting out of this game without many injuries.

If we win, there is like a 90% chance that we face them again next week in Pittsburgh. I don't want to go in there without a few new wrinkles that they don't know to expect.

I do fear that they are going to play backups for two reasons: first to rest their primary guys, but second to use up their backups to beat us up for the following week. If they can get just one or two of our guys to miss next week, that's a gigantic difference maker.

Yeah, that’s the price we paid of losing the Jets game: we have to show our hand and risk injury. Guys will have to give max effort (and we’ll be playing everyone possible).

Steelers can use backups to injure/wear us out and see our hand as well.

I was thinking about that yesterday. Since Pittsburgh decided to rest players, Tomlin created a bit of a win-win for the team.

Since they started losing, it's like they were "auditioning" to show they were actually a good team while the whole league was starting to write them off. Now, they go out on a good note regardless of Sunday's outcome.

If they lose - well, it was all backups.

If they win - Cleveland gets smacked in the face and is forced to wear the "little brother" moniker for a while longer.

Also, a Cleveland win (plus the likelihood of a rematch the next week) gives Tomlin a fresh recipe to defend our strengths going forward.

The nice thing is, if we've thought of this, then coach Ski has as well. In years past, there was a good chance regular posters on Dawgtalkers had a higher football acumen than the coach himself. Our coach will be setting them up for a rematch. It's chess, not checkers with this guy.

100%. I don't like Tomlin - but the move he made is very very smart. It'll be interesting to see how "physical" they are and if they play dirty to actually ding up / take out our starters.

What would be a the Stefanski/Browns very smart response is to beat them two weeks running.

Cleveland radio is saying somebody tested positive today, it was someone not on a previous list.

They say, the thing is, that if anyone is a "close contact" for whomever the new positive test is,
That those close contacts do not have the 5 days necessary to test negative to be eligible to play in this Sunday's game.

So, everything's up in the air.

j/c...

My confidence is starting to waiver.

And it’s only Thursday. Still two more days to hit the fan.

Not practicing today is also huge.

If this keeps up it will be our back-ups against theirs. We need this game they don't and it's our fault for not taking care of business when we had the chance against the Jets and Ravens.

This is trending poorly

Mike Tomlin doesn't need to do anything against us. He's a good coach. He knows us as good or better than any other opponent. He also knows if he has all his starters and we have ours he most likely will win the game. Just line up and play. Look at the recent history. I'm sure he and his staff are very confident they can beat us. It's up to us to start changing the culture. His HC record against us 22-4-1. Enough said

It's going to be our backups VS their backups...

Right. Good luck

haha uh oh

If I were Tomlin, I would be worried about his team getting Covid infected playing us. Maybe they will sit out some more starters as a result.

Practice squad vs practice squad.

I’ve read some places where they might not even bring some players to Cleveland ... Cuyahoga county is like ground zero right now

So we are missing 4 on Defense as of now Right, LB's Goodson and Smith, FS Sendejo and CB Ward but the Offense is in pretty good shape so far, lets hope this is it and we will have a chance Sunday...

Yes smith, and ward will miss this weeks game and the playoff game if we make it.

On offense Bryant will miss this weeks game and also playoff game.

I may be wrong, but I think we’ll miss Smith more than we think

That's not necessarily true. The time they have to miss is 10 days. It is possible they can return if we play on the 8th.