DawgTalkers.net Forums The Archives 2021 NFL Season Looking Back: Browns 17 Broncos 14 Postgame Thoughts

Thank

Whomever was picking our Rb's/OL and coaches should get a raise.

I’ll read everyone else’s posts later.

1. I had a feeling d’Ernest would have a big game. Told a buddy today he’d get a buck twenty, I was wrong. 146. He was tremendous tonight, as was our OL, which is nothing new.

2.Keenum was very efficient. I feel confident with him in there. I don’t feel confident in OBJ. He’s not earning his money.

3. The Broncos aren’t a good team right now, but a win is precious in the NFL. Climbed over .500 which is better than the alternative.

4. Chase the Kicker was steady again, our ST played solid tonight. We are a pretty good tackling team, overall.

5. Happy with the win. We have time to rest and heal. Hope Ward and Jarvis are okay. We’ve been hit hard by injury but we are a scrappy bunch.

This needs to be addressed.
I won't even presume to know if these numbers are even close to accurate, but I will say this:

Myles Garret is being robbed of the numbers he's earning in every game he's playing.
And it's happening in every single game the Cleveland Browns are currently playing.

I love that you posted this count.


I propose this:

Every single member of Dawg Nation should carefully examine every Cleveland Browns game, and publicly post a running tally of plays in which Myles Garrett is held/illegally restricted on any play from scrimmage when ample visual evidence exists. With nothing more than game footage, CLE fans should be able to flood social media to the extent that the NFL cannot escape what they have been doing to us.

This is why we are a team.

Bake, Landry, and Garrett are built different

The media is after the nfl now



Myles Garrett is trending on Twitter with tons of videos and people mad at the nfl and officials

A few other notes after sleeping on the win:

- The lack of penalties called against Garrett is becoming an issue. He impacts the game and should be rewarded.

- Schwartz needs A LOT of work. You can easily see why he was a late round pick.

- We missed DPJ, just to make 2-3 contested catches

- Part of me is thankful that Mcglaughlin missed a kick finally … you don’t want that perfect ratio to last too long IMO

- That first drive was simply all coaching. It was probably the biggest difference in the game to play with a lead and jump out like that … props to them for preparing and taking the ball (I hate when they do it too haha)

- Wilson certainly played better. Good for him.

- Hance at RT and Wills at LT is a hell of a lot better than having Hudson out there.

- Ward is an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He’ll be gone in a few months IMO.

- Hooper/Njoku played a solid game IMO. With Keenum you aren’t gonna make splash plays, but they made a difference (even though Hooper is SO SLOW)

I thought the Browns were solid across the board, and that was enough to get us thru this game.

I think Keenum was solid but not spectacular which was all we needed last night.

Johnson is a solid RB who would in a rotation add another element to the Brown's running attack. We are going to need to get him some touches he earned them with his performance last night. He may have saved our season.

The offensive line was outstanding and they really helped Johnson gain confidence early in the game, I thought that was a key for him from there he truly took over.

The defense was solid and the backend held up very well.

I think it's time to start thinking about moving on from Joe Woods he is holding this group back at this point.

With three really solid cornerbacks who can lock down WR's, there is no excuse for the lack of creative blitzing. Joe hates blitzing and I hate Joe because he hates blitzing. Did we blitz once last night I counted one blitz. You couldn't not notice that our corners were locked in on Denver's WR's. Joe would rather have guys standing around with their thumb up their behind then send one of them on a blitz. Not acceptable this defense is capable of dominating with just one more pass rusher who comes from anywhere and everywhere. Hell he didn't even threaten a blitz. I fail to understand what he is hoping to accomplish but I have seen enough. I HATE firings but Joe has to go IMO. I confess I like aggressive defenses and Joe is as anti aggressive as any DC I have ever seen.

I would also like to see more hats on plays. The reason we aren't doing as well against the run I believe is a lack of effort.

It was nice to see the Browns use a TO when there was confusion on defense. I am not sure why there would be any confusion on defense after all we run the same straight up defense play after play. Joe is against creative defenses. Just line up and play sound defense which is great but it's not always going to work. I thought Johnson #3 had his best game as a Brown, that was nice to see he shot the gap on an early run and landed the RB on his backside and later he had the interception in the end zone, big plays that we needed.

The Browns did a okay job on third downs and that was nice to see. Again I think if Woods would dial up some blitz's this defense would go to another level.

Have I complained enough about Woods yet. I think we are all frustrated with his lack of aggressiveness. The one and only thing he has going for him is when he does dial it up (never) it works cause whomever we play expect we won't blitz and that allows the offenses we play against to focus on blocking up our front four.

The ref's were awful again and as has been pointed out the holding that goes on with Garret and Clowney, is NEVER called. The holding penalty of Tretter was another example of bad ref calls. All of a sudden the Browns who have been really well coached in my mind to get aligned correctly and execute can't not get holding and motion penalties are unable to execute. Of course some of the penalties were legit half were not. Sick of watching this crap show the refs are working on us.

I thought and still do think that the Browns were going to get a lot of attention from the teams we play. We are still easily the most talented team in the NFL and as such they have a target on their backs and I don't think they were truly prepared for what teams were going to throw at them I think they better understand what they are up against now and they are beginning to push thru, or at least I hope so?

You even see the lineman look at the ref right at the end, HE knew he was holding.

D'Ernest was awesome, he does nothing but produce when called upon.

Great to have most of the Oline back

OBJ still worries me, hopefully those couple catches gets him going again. He seemed pumped once he got them.

Garrett, he's going to expose the the NFL ref corruption single handedly.

Keenum, played a good great, looked in command at the beginning, then cooled down a little. But the run game was killing them.

Much happier at 4-3, than 3-4.

My thoughts:

- A win is a win. We needed one badly, and delivered. Against an AFC team is a bonus. And thanks to the 80s, I really hate Denver.
- It seems Stefanski didn't try to get cute too often this game. We still went for it on a 4th instead of the short FG. Not only was it not a sack, but we converted.
- Case sure does throw some flutter balls.
- OBJ was a complete non-factor in the first half. Contributed some in the 2nd.
- Hope Landry is OK.
- Props to the OL.
- It is often comical to watch Bryant try to block, but I hope he never has to try to block Von Miller again. He was practically an accessory to murder.
- Johnson was incredible. Stepped right into Chubb/Hunt role.
- Stump Mitchell had a great quote. Asked about not having Chubb or Hunt for the game, he said something along the lines of "well, I guess I will have to coach this week." Imagine being an RB coach and having Chubb, Hunt, and our OL. It must be like playing a game of checkers but you have some chess pieces.
- Saw a lot of procedure calls. The last one added some drama but we overcame it. That is progress - we are able to overcome some of our mistakes. Not that long ago we could not.
- Speaking of that, how demoralizing was that last run? What a kick in the nads to the defense. 3rd and 7, in the red zone, need a first to seal the game. Didn't even try to hide what we were going to do and we converted it anyway. It was beautiful.
- Garrett continues to get mugged, with no flags.
- When two guys are face-masking each other at the same time, how does the ref see one and not the other?
- D played well. Not sure why the Jekyll and Hyde with them. Is it changes in the D game plan? Or is it the quality of the offensive game plan we are going up against?
- Greedy bounced back and played well. Been doing well this year, but last week against AZ was giving a lot of cushion. AZ got an east first down every time they went after him. But nice work against DEN.
- Newsome got abused and turned around. Made a key play in the 2nd half, but had a rough game.
- Nice pick by Johnson.
- Not a lot of sacks, but the pressure was there and had an effect.
- Let's heal up over this extended break.

Gutsy Win! Proud of the team. Now rest up and heal up the next 10 days.

Ahhh, what a great morning.

Now that We’re all calm, let’s get to it:

As I said in game day chat, I was wrong with regards to baker-OBJ. OBJ is either injured or unreliable. I give him credit because two catches he made on one drive let to a TD, but if we can only rely on our #1 receiver for one drive in a game, then he needs to go. Berry needs to trade him to an NFC team for whatever he can get and be done with the experiment.

People need to chill on the criticism of our defense. We have up 14 points and less than 230 total yards. The Broncos had a whopping 2.9 yards per rush. And if the refs gave our D line any sort of attention, there either would’ve been a ton of holding calls on the Broncos, or teddy and drew lock would’ve been laying on the ground looking at the pearly gates.

Our offense might as well been a hospital unit at the cleveland clinic, and yet we still ran the ball down their throats. D’Ernest Johnson, what a guy. What an easy dude to root for. Our O line, still banged up, showed up and showed out.

Keenum did his job, and Stefanski is getting well deserved credit for how he called this game. The Broncos had a few very long drives, but that ultimately did them in because we answered with our own very long drives. None more important that the last drive that killed the clock.

This was a total team win when everything was lined up for the Broncos to come out and embarrass us. A win going into a mini bye is gonna give our team a huge confidence booster. And this will allow even more of our starters to potentially come back for the upcoming Steelers game.

Greedy has been playing very well. He’s been a good surprise.

We need Delpit and Harrison to be more consistent tacklers

The refs are against us! The refs and the NFL are against the Browns!

No.

The NFL refs as a group ARE INCOMPETENT. On top of that the game moves so fast that they probably need to double the number of refs to catch half the calls they miss.

here Jarvis is fine... I actually could care less if Ward ever plays again for us. He isn't worth the money

Last night it was apparent how important two pieces are to our team:

Landry and Wills. We need both of them for this offense.

j/c:

Hot damn! We really needed that win and got it, thank God.

P.S. Just about everything else that needed to be said has been said, so I'll leave it at that.

Good coverage by our guys tonight, especially on screens and short routes for the most part. Good job on both sides of the run game. Very happy with a win.

Now, onto my gripe. We would have gotten pressure with our front four if the refs had called a FREAKING HOLD so the OL knew they couldn't get away with doing their impressions of a backpack! Good grief, I thought that Myles should have just worn a ball gag instead of a mouth guard with how he was being treated out there. Andrew Siciliano summed it up best. I really, really hate the refs this year.

j/c:

Blake Hance > Chris Hubbard.

Quoting this because I wanted to hit on a couple of things after reading a number of posts, and you brought both to the forefront:

1. People that are bagging on Woods so harshly - STOP, and think what this D would look like if Myles was actually allowed to do his job. If the opposing offenses actually, at the least, got called for Holding when it happens... how would those offenses look? If they actually stopped Holding so they don't get called, how many Sacks would Myles have per game?? My oldest brother loves to hear himself rant about how he isn't impressed with the Garrett-Clowney experiment (which is insane by itself), but refuses or is unable to look at WHY his simplistic measuring stick of Sacks isn't rolling up like a pinball score. Teams just do NOT run on us, they generally do not get outside on us, and we are hitting their QB constantly when the back end covers. If Myles could go a game where the Refs actually call an honest game, he'd have half a dozen every week.

2. The offense. We were WAY better and more efficient than I expected - AND, Stefanski salted the game away by running it down their throats! We didn't get cute; we didn't try 70 yd bombs on 3rd & 4 when we just need to keep the clock running. WE RAN IT DOWN THEIR THROATS!! Kudos to Ski on that!



Denver is statistically a top defense, but in reality, they are a pretty bad defense. Them losing Von Miller definitely helped us, but even with him we were gashing them. At the end, it was a thing of BEAUTY watching Ski just keep calling the same run to the right over and over and over that they just couldn't stop, and then throwing the haymaker to the left to ice it. Whomever is on their defensive left has to feel like Hell this morning; the way we just kept hitting them in the same spot, it was like a prison shanking.

p.s. I'm eating Crow. Granted, getting Landry and Wills changed my outlook before the game, but still.. I had thrown in the towel on this week, this season, and this team. I expected a demoralizing loss that begins the end of our season, and then it gets ended before Halloween by Pittsburgh. For these men to come out and step up the way they did and take it to Denver like that was BEAUTIFUL and I am more than HAPPY to eat the crow. It tastes wonderful

Agreed bone. Credit to the staff because we outcoached them last night too, that was pretty evident IMO

The D
Look... they let up only 14 points vs an NFL team. They had a good game... period. Doesn't mean we can't nitpick, though.

Early in the game, our secondary looked REALLY good when they came downhill to make tackles. Later on, they looked awful trying to cover guys. Nobody is going to convince me we DON'T have the horses in the backfield to cover. Ward has excellent game tape on him. Greedy may be inconsistent but he's also shown he can ball a little. Newsome is a rookie but is having a phenomenal rookie campaign for a corner. We do we look like a bunch of Sendejo's out there trying to run with receivers? And damn... it's 3rd and 10 and you're giving 9 yards of cushion? That was painful to watch. Why are we still playing like we have no talent in our secondary?

Wu is a force and we are missing him when he's not out there.

I think the far and away big takeaway we should have regarding the D is no busted coverages. This is huge.


The O
Big boys got some of their mojo back. Wills looked like a statue out there with his gimpy ankle but got the job done. He looked REAL stiff at the end there (couldn't get down in his stance), but I didn't see any of the post-play gimp hops like in other games this year. I'd call that a big + heading into the long break. We NEED at least 1 of our starting tackles out there. Having deep-depth guys at both ends is just too much to overcome.
I'm not saying cut him or anything, but the probability of us keeping OBJ is dropping by the day. Dude had a couple more drops this past game, and now he's got the shoulder again. Why are we still trying to feed him the ball when DPJ is there hungry AND making plays. Whether it's for health reasons or to give him a heavy dose of reality, he needs to see his snap count drop significantly.
The dropoff in arm talent between Baker and Keenum was really evident last night. Those first couple long passes, my eyes shot forward and had to track back to find the ball in flight on the TV. His head might've been swimming, but I think he could stand to make some better decisions. There were some big misses (in terms of his eyes), and he got lucky he wasn't picked once or twice. That'll result in some big minus plays against a D that isn't so beaten down like Denver (speaking of which, holy cow have they been smacked upside the head with injuries... they are giving us some competition).
I'm a big fan of the extra dimension Schwartz can bring to the O, but I think the guy's head is swimming right now. He needs to see his targets go down and maybe focus on his return duties as his contribution to the team. I'm not a fan of chucking it downfield and having him try to go up and get it. He needs his game-brain to settle a little bit, IMO, as it's negatively affecting his big attribute (his speed). That reverse where he was tackled in the open field by a LB'er was a really bad look for him.
Obviously it was nothing less than a heroic effort by d'Earnest. Dude answered the call in a big big way, and you can't ask for anything more than that. Obviously the big boys cleared the way, but how many times was he stuffed by the D just to dip or loop or whatever and pick up 4-5 yards? Those final two carries for him really summed up his performance. Got the first down, got it taken away, got it right back again... no problem. Stepped up and handled it.
Having Landry back was huge. That guy is the soul of our O.
I like Felton, but he dances too much for me on returns. I think he can also play a big role for us on O once he settles in a little more.

Our special teams are rock solid.

Just a thought ...no one can complain about the refs and the D. Its one or the other. But of course they will

We can and we WILL!

lol... D played/responded really well. Still things to improve.

Good:

D'Ernest
O-Line - thank god Hudson not out there and Wills back - huge difference - Hance played very well at RT
Special Teams
Keenum -> real, but not spectacular
Ski - play calling
Juice
Orange Pants - should always wear them. It is the key to our success.

Bad:

Schwartz - can't believe this guy ran 4.2x or 4.3x. Football speed is nowhere near that.
Illegal procedure penalties - how many times this season where they do not lineup correctly - fix it.
3rd and 4th Down defense. Never confident they will stop them. Too much cushion and lack of aggressiveness.

Ugly:

Zebras - Ridiculous lack of holding calls on Broncos. Missed double face mask. Ball spotting.

Anybody have a way to find out how many times this season the lineman blocking Myles Garret has been called for holding him this season?

I can't remember a single time. i know that can't be right.
Might be interesting to also see how many times the guy blocking Bosa, or the Watt brothers were flagged.
To be comparable, it should probably be # of flags per rush attempt

I have no idea where to look for that.

j/c...

Wife and I stayed in downtown last night. Downtown was packed last night. Good times.

- Great game. Crowd was loud. Great atmosphere.

- Jarvis Landy is so important to this team and offense. Hope his knee is ok and the ten days off gives him time to heal up.

- I'm in the OBJ brings little value to the team and won't miss him when he's gone camp. However, hat tip to him for playing with a grade 3 sprain in his AC joint and pumping the shoulder full of cortisone to be out there with his teammates even with his couple drops.

- The Browns should immediately cut Billings for allowing the blocked FG and ruining future Hall of Famer, Chase McLaughlin's, perfect season. Hell of a 52 yard boot into the GPODAWUND end zone with swirling winds.

- Case Keenum was efficient and did what he should do for a back-uo making $7M. His run for a first down was huge.

- Great game by D'Ernest Johnson. Happy for that guy. From fishing for mahi-mahi to 146 yards and a TD.

- Great to see Wills back out there. It made a noticeable difference.

- Glad the defense showed up. Good game by John Johnson. Finally a turnover.

- Great job by Stefanski and the coaching staff on a short week with a banged up team.

- Go Browns!

Love this....

It's been called but literally dozens and dozens have been uncalled. It's ridiculous. No idea how you address that without pissing off the refs - but it simply has to change. If that's JJ Watt, TJ Watt or Mack or some other big name or a team in a big market - they get significantly more calls. Period.

I said the same thing to the guy that sits behind me every game. Let him play out the 5th year option next year, but do not extend him this offseason unless it's a wildly team friendly deal.

A win is a Win ! .. Super congrats to D'Ernest and the OL. .. VG. is so important to this team .. Case earned his pay check .. Nice job of play calling and having his Team ready ( Ski ) .. Drives me nuts ; the non holding calls on Miles .. But we just got by a toothless Tiger in the Bronco's .. Still not buying into the Woods " D " ..

Jc...

-JJ3 played his best game, made plays in the box, and made plays as a centerfielder

-Mack Wilson flashed often in the 1st half on both defense and special teams

-Takk dropped into coverage and actually did a superb job tracing their WR Tim Patrick

-Greedy flashed some in coverage

-Denzel seemed to be playing better, but unfortunately got hurt, again.

-Ronnie Harrison lacks instincts, he dropped into his zone looked at the open WR who was in front of him...instead of coming up, he kept backing further into a deeper zone...WR made a big first down, as I had no idea what Harrison was thinking.

-Obviously we all saw Myles being held

-Jarvis although only having like 37 yards, made an impact in his return...tough as nails too, came back even after being injured to provide his blocking skills on that last run by our RB Johnson

-Johnson ran tough, breaking tackles and he has those jitterbug feet too...

-OBJ had a lot of issue(s) last night...but kudos to him for at least gutting it out.

-Oline played much better...Case's big weakness at times is his pocket awareness

-Blake Hance has really stepped up for us at both LT and now RT

-The wind, picked up at times

-The win, picked us up for the time.

Side thought - is there any way we can structure an extension to Ward that is more of a "pay per game" construct?

Last night! The Browns threw a pass to Beckham and he fell down and it hit him in the side. (No problem.)

Now, the Problem, should be. The Browns, had a 3rd and long, and 4+ minutes to think about the play, real time, as there was a commercial break in the broadcast and a long time in returning to the game.

The problem should be, why the Browns, with so much time on offense, to think of anything to do in an important part of the game, on an important down, came up with such a low percentage and dangerous to go bad play, call or decision.

Beckham, ended up, still 4 yards, (about) behind the first down marker,
and He was alone, on the left, with no other Browns around him, and it was pretty much a quick curl, or out, or whatever you call it, he made a move, went straight up then curved around.

Now! I wonder, why, the team, with so much time, to figure anything, 4 minutes is a long time to consider a 3rd down play, didn't have something more collaborative or something. ( I was thinking middle screen.) Oh Well,
The game ended in a W! and that's why they get the big bucks.

j/c...

Even happier for D'Ernest Johnson after reading this. Hope he makes millions in the NFL.

Good win at an important time. Case did what he needed and made no mistakes. He also showed some grit. D'Earnest is a starter on many teams. I am so happy for him, he has paid his dues. Jarvis sparked the offense on the first drive. His enthusiasm is contagious. Wills played very well, and hats off to Hance who was tasked with Miller, who by the way did nothing all night. Great blocking from the TEs too. Team win, lead by Johnson.
Also Hooper made some very nice plays.

Just a side note, OBJ is done. I have given him the benefit of the doubt, but I have seen nothing from him since he came to this team, other than a play here and there. He started the game with a penalty, a drop, then fell in his route, and the ball hit him in the side. Then the play where he got hurt . I just don't think he is the player he once was, and for the money he makes, IMO, it was a waste of a roster space.

Don't want to sound like Throw, but early in the game when Keenum threw him the long pass, if he would have just kept running, it would have hit him in stride, or at least drew a flag for PI. Dude is a project for now.